Freq 2 is a PC only download

alternatively http://squidsoup.org/freq/index2.html

Downlaod Squidsoups's 3d user interface.

Altzero4 is a partnership between squidsoup and Icarus.

If you could freeze-frame sound; explode it into its constituent parts and then freeze it, it would look something like altzero4. Altzero explores issues to do with control and authorship in interactivity, and what we understand and expect from recorded media, by creating audiovisual compositions that are experienced spatially as well as over time. This is done in a variety of ways, but in particular by trying to evolve audio composition from its traditional form as an experience controlled almost entirely by the composer into one that is determined in part by the will of the listener. The musical experience is transformed into a 3-dimensional spatial journey where the listener chooses the route they take. By transferring the time component of sound into space, a linear path through a piece of music is transformed into an infinite array of possibilities. If one such navigable audio structure is perceived as a representation of a moment of music time in space, then a sequence of these structures represents individual key-frames of an audio animation, highlighting the development of the linear piece over time. Each spike represents a single sound fragment (much as in altzero3, where sounds have a physical appearance as columns of bubbles). The whole 3D structure is a soundscape in this case an explorable freeze-frame of a moment of sound. By moving through the structure, listeners hear a dynamic mix of all the sounds within earshot over time this becomes their experience of that moment of sound.

Altzero4 consists of several such structures, time slices of a fictional soundtrack. Taken as a whole and explored in sequence, they reveal another dimension to a recording, as the piece can be explored over both time and space. Each time slice will run on its own computer, and most of these will have low-volume multimedia speakers and headphones. The computers can be placed in a row, a circle or in various positions throughout the venue. If desired, some of the computers can use projection and non-tangible interaction (motion detection using video translated into movement within the virtual space, as we have done previously with altzero2) this could serve as a climax to the sequence. The exact setup is very flexible and needs to be defined in response to the space(s) available. It is important to have multiple computers running simultaneously in a defined order, so that visitors get the feeling of travelling through the musical piece as they move through the venue.

Formed in 1997, Squidsoup is a London-based art and design group whose work is known around the world. Altzero, their main art project for the last 2 years, has been shown at dozens of events including SIGGRAPH N-Space Art Gallery (LA, August 2001), SONAR (Barcelona, June 2001), and Web3D Symposium (Tempe Arizona, February 2002 and ICA, March 2002). Their work has also been shown at Milia (Cannes), Ars Electronica (Linz Austria), Microwave (Hong Kong), Doors of Perception (Amsterdam).

Icarus (Sam Britton and Ollie Bown) have been making electronic music for the past five years, releasing material on various independent record labels and achieving recognition for their distinct sound and complex drum programming styles.

Altzero squidsoup 2002

Could you come up with a definition of "soundtoys" it's probably still too young a concept to make a strict definition -- and i wouldn't want to preclude anyone's work for the sake of a couple of dodgy words, but for me at the moment i guess a sound toy is something that allows you to play with, or explore, sound/music in new ways. so far, this usually means interactive or generative work. What is you project and your work about? random#1 is about generating what i think are quite beautiful and entrancing musical patterns out of systems, structures and a dose of randomness. the structure is defined, but what happens within that is completely random. it's not really an interactive piece, though you can 'perform' yourself. squidsoup's recent sound projects (mainly altzero - see http://www.altzero.com) have tended to have less interactivity involved in them. this is because what i'm looking for are new ways of listening that add to the audio experience; this often involves some doing, but interactivity isn't really the point - listening and experiencing the sound is more important. for example, altzero2 is really a spatial composition; a complex drone that can be explored by moving around the environment. as you move through the space, you discover the subtleties and variations of the piece. navigation is the only form of interaction available. earlier versions allowed for positioning of sounds, distortion, restructuring and so on, but these often seem to distract from the listening experience. How long have you been working in this area? i first started playing around with Director and multimedia in 1996 i think. my first foray into interactive sound was a collaborative cd rom called Dawn in 1997/8, around the time we formed squidsoup. Were you an artist/ musician first who got into using computers/the net or did you respond to the net in an artistic way? i was looking for an artistic outlet and discovered multimedia. i only really got into the net when it became possible to do the kind of stuff i wanted to do without too many compromises. What/who has influenced you in your work? (themes, other artists etc) 60's minimalism - the music mainly (steve reich particularly, also terry riley, lamonte young, philip glass...) more recently the whole loop/sample revolution. and from a design/interactivity point of view, maeda (i know, i know, everyone quotes him), golan levin, char davies' Osmose... antirom used to be heroes. Are there any other artists covering the same field as you? Do you see this work as art? sure, but with a small "a"... With regard to 'soundtoys' especially, why do you think the audio visual metaphor is so key to the net? i'm not sure it is, but many of the people doing this are visual designers rather than musicians and so they understand the visual side of it. random#1 has deliberately got almost no visuals to it (other than a randomly selected colour). however, it's quite hard to make interactivity intelligible and intuitive without the use of visuals. What defines the aesthetics of new interactive music.? loops, samples, glitches, abstract imagery generally at the moment How important is the visual aspect in the 'new' relationship of the audio visual.? Does the net promotes visual awareness that is unique to it? definitely; it has its own language that has developed out of the need to explain navigation and interactivity in an efficient way. but that's about digital interactivity rather than the net -- cd rom, iTV etc have similar but distinct visual languages. How novel do you feel generative music and interactivity is? the ideas aren't new, but computers are enabling novel approaches, interpretations and ways of doing of these ideas. DO you think there is a history to audio visual work? Would you describe yourself as a multimedia artist, a net.artist, programmer, or none of the above? interactive designer mainly, despite the fact that this piece isn't really interactive. multimedia artist... What software do you use most and why? director and basic sound editing software. Director's not brilliant at interactive sound but most people have the plug-in and it's powerful for visuals and interactive design. it's cross platform (mac/PC anyway), reasonably stable, easy to install and runs in a browser. i'd like to get into Max and Nato one day... AND on a more personal level why do you make this work? i'm fascinated with the sense of space and time that repetitive and gradually changing music has for me; and also in the structures themselves; the unpredictability, the way things form out of nothing and then disappear again. the audio cd is great, but surely there's so much more... CAN you recommend three urls to soundtoys? http:// www.media.mit.edu/~golan/ and other stuff he's doing (links from this page) http://www.sodaplay.com - especially with sound enabled. http://www.theremediproject.com/ http://www.singlecell.org seems nice, and it's got most of the usual suspects Anthony Rowe - ant@squidsoup.com