iFly Dubai: a nonlinear gesture‑based soundmap

Symposium:


Session Title:
  • Technology (Papers)

Presentation Title:
  • iFly Dubai: a nonlinear gesture‑based soundmap

Presenter(s):


Venue(s):


Abstract:

  • Our project creates a fluid form of sound‑based mapping, moving beyond the key difficulty in sonically re‑presenting space: the inability to engage with the mapped environment in an embodied way. Our presentation explores the phenomenological process of mediating the listener’s experience of both space and time, allowing them to move seamlessly between multiple perspectives. Our project integrates elements of art, science, and technology; combining sound mapping and recording, acoustic ecology and electroacoustic composition into a digital gestural control environment. Our project is a multi‑dimensional gestural control interface exploring interconnected physical and temporal regions of mapped sound. These regions include:

    1. Present‑day sounds of Dubai, collected and interpolated during the conference period
    2. A sonic imagination of the area in the past
    3. A projection of what the sound of the area may become.

    The fluid and flexible nature of the gestural control interface (LEAP Motion) is very conducive to application in the construction of a new form of embodied sound mapping. By applying layers of meaning to multiple vertical strata of gestural space, the listener is able to navigate both time and space in a single movement.As a new form of mapping and technological mediation, our project fits very well into the ISEA2014 primary theme of Location, as well as several of the subthemes, particularly Interlacing Worlds. This project requires a Mac computer with USB 3.0 compatibility. Video projection would be ideal. Sound from the map can either be presented via loudspeakers or headphones.

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