WPN-214

quarrè (2018)

SCRIME-LaBRI (Université de Bordeaux), Conseil Régional Nouvelle-Aquitaine (La Fabrique, cultures connectées)

quarrè is an interactive and immersive sound installation, available in multiple formats (2D/3D) and space configurations. It is based on interactive sequencing research and technologies that have been developed for more than 20 years at the SCRIME-LaBRI computer-science laboratory in Bordeaux, and now by the OSSIA collective. The installation aims to develop multidimensional and dynamic audio/musical writing by letting the users control some of the narrative and interpretative aspects from a remote device (their smartphones or tablets) at certain points in time in the scenario. These controls can either be tactile, or based on more complex sensors and gesture recognition patterns.

MATERIALS

The scenario itself explores the relation between music and its ‘material’, physical’ and ‘gestural’ aspects (e.g. the excitation of a wooden or metallic resonator). In a technological point of view, the audio server uses extensively the technology developed by Madrona Labs with its outstanding physical-modelling plugin Kaivo.

THE TABLET AGE

quarrè-remote is a free and open-source Android application (made in QML) that provides timed and dynamic control of some of the properties of an audio-server using the OSCQuery (OSC, WebSocket) protocol. The server, with its dispatch algorithm, will – depending on the scenario’s state – send interaction notifications to one (or several) of the connected remotes, allowing users to have a time-constrained (or infinite) control over one or several of the scenario or the audio-server’s properties. Users will have in some of the cases to collaborate with one another in order to build an interesting rhythmic, melody or soundscape…

INTERACTIVE WRITING

The scenario was written using the OSSIA score intermedia sequencer and a custom-made plugin to ease up the interaction-writing process. In fact, the whole project started in 2016 as an OSSIA score prototype scenario made to illustrate the software’s development at SCRIME over the years.