Distributed Sound Lab.
Hans Timmermans and Niels Gorisse, Utrecht School of the Arts.

1. Introduction
2. Context.
3. Concept.
4. Design-criteria.
5. Schedules and promisses.
6. Current state.
7. implementation, research, development.
8. conclusion.

Biography of Hans Timmermans.

Biography of Niels Gorisse via de site www.bonneville.nl

1. Introduction

In november 1998 people from NPS-internet department, CEM-studio, NPS-supplement, WorldTune and Utrecht School of the Arts, talked about a real-time system to compose Soundscapes in a distributed session with several composers working simultaneously. The challenge was to design such a system, think about the possibilites and the artistic impact of such and extended and new tool to compose. This group decided to work on the Disributed Sound Lab:

Composers can connect to the system and coöperate in the composition and 'real-time' distribution of Soundscapes.

Distribution of the compositon is in real-time while the composition-process is happening.
Distribution of the compositon is not limited to the actual place/studio where the composer is working, so it can be a listener at home, or a concerthall or a museum or a loudspeaker in the woods of Finnland.

At first the system will be designed to compose soundscapes, because soundscapes seemed a good start regarding idiom, context, concepts, musical-structural properties etc. We don't want to restrict the system to any 'kind' of music, so the system will be extended to other kinds of music in future.

The system should involve the common elements of a studio-based composition-environment and the essential elements of internet-communication systems.

A Graphical Userinterface is an essental element of the system, like in all well-designed software.

2. Context.

In cooperation with the German institute IMBSE, more specifically Wolfgang Neuhaus of the World Tune-project we started thinking about the design of such a system, with the worldtune-project as an early example to start with. The things mentioned in the intruduction should fit in to this design, if necessary we would redesign the system.

We are undertaking this effort not to have the final result, but to investigate the possibilites of the internet for 'groupware-type' applications for composers, the possibilites of the internet for real-time distribution of musical events and to do research on the artistic relevancy and artistic impact of this new technological and conceptual developments.

Discussion with potential users of the system (e.g. composers, listeners etc.) and cooperation with Interaction Designers is a major element of our research.

3. Concept

The systems is in essence a Userinterface which presents control on the following information:

• Musical score
• Actual sounding and pending musical events
• Actions and subscores of participating composers.
• Actions of the local user.
• Sounds.
• Effects.
• Instruments.
• Palets of available sounds, instruments and effects.
• Textual information and communication with the other users.
• Feedback of the local system.
• Feedback of the DSL-system and the actual session.
• Toolboxes for common and usual actions and processes.
• Libraries for sounds, instruments, presets etc.

During a session musical events are being sent to all participants. These musical events can be anything. Audio data, realtime data, or complete musical structures with all kinds of processing like filtering, amplitude modulation, ring modulation, granular synthesis etc. Components like a realtime Synthesis Engine, taking care of the actual synthesis of audiomaterial and all different types of DSP (Digital Signal Processing), and a librarian taking care of the distribution of the audio, are all parts of the Distributed Sound Lab.

4. Design-criteria

The system

• is easy to use, even without a manual.
• is easy and ready to use even without prior knowledge of the sysem.
• has on line help-functions replacing a printed manual
• does not limit the user to any kind of working practice.
• does not limit the user to any kind of music.
• handles all technical processes in a transparent way.
• is as fast as possible given the actual state of technology.
• uses standard internet connection methods.
  

  5. Schedules and promisses

We hope to release a beta version by June 2001 implementing a system for the composition of soundscapes. After June 2001 we will implement other kinds of music and work on a first release of the system that can be shipped somewhere around June 2002.

6. Current state

We just started the project and are currently in the research phase. We already implemented some elementary parts of Distributed Sound Lab, with which we are doing the first research tests.

A first element of the system is MidiChat, a system which incorporates communication of musical data, communication of text, MIDI and general data formats, timing issues, multi-user interaction, and other primary technical things.

Another first element is a realtime synthesis program, which will be extended in future.

7. Implementation, research and development

The final system will consist of:

• Userinterface
• Synthesis-engine
• Communication
• Timing-device
• Local stuff such as MIDI I/O
• Librarian
• Parser
• Presets
• data-protocol
• Central Unit
• compressed audio-formats

Research will focus on interface design, graphical representation of musical events, and technical representation of musical events. Another part of important research is on users, working practices, etc.

8. Conclusion

We still have a lot of work to do, and we would like to start a discussion about user interfaces, and design criteria on this conference.