Music
You can change the parameters of music played by the agents,
by Music tab in
Parameter Settings shown in the right figure.
The balance of combination between two timbers is tuned according to
how each agent is attracted by the motion detected from video input.
The primary instrument is used when it is strongly attracted,
and the secondary instrument is used without any motion detected.
The details for each of the parameters are as follows.
Parameters for Time
There are two parameters to decide when the agents should play.
Tweet Chance indicates how to give a chance for each agent
to play sound. There are four alternatives as follows.
- Cyclic Even ...
the agents play sound one by one in a constant time span. Only one agent plays in one step.
- Probabilistic Even ...
gives even probability for each agent in each step to play sound.
- Probabilistic with Velocity ...
gives higher probability to faster agents.
- Probabilistic with Captured Motion ...
gives higher probability to agents with stronger
force to be attracted toward the front plane.
This force is calculated from the motion detected from
video input.
Tempo indicates how frequently it tests
whether each agent should play sound or not.
The unit is the number of tests in quarter of one minute, where the range of
applicable values is from 30 to 180. This means the number of quarter notes in a minute
under the assumption that each test is a 16th note.
When Tweet Chance is Cyclic Even,
you can set up rhythm patterns for primary and secondary instruments by operating
Rhythm Pattern panel that appears when you click
a button labeled Rhythm ... at the left side of
Tempo slider.
Parameters for Pitch Range
The range of the pitches can be specified by
Highest Pitch and Lowest Pitch.
The higher the agent's vertical position is, the higher pitch it plays.
Each of these two pitches is specified by two sliders for
Octave and Key.
A symbol of two or three letters is drawn at the right side of
the sliders to show the specified pitch.
You can set up the difference in octaves between pitches of
primary and seconday
instruments by operating the slider labelled
Pitch of Secondary Inst.
This is useful when you set the secondary timber for
an instrument of difference pitch ranges such as bass and tuba.
Parameters for Scale
It is possible to play all of pitches for each half step,
but it is useful to restrict playable pitches for producing comfortable music.
The box labeled Scale contains check buttons that represent
an instrumental keyboard of one octave.
Each agent play only the notes of which check button is checked.
Preset Scales window appears on the screen when you click
the button labeled Preset Scales ....
It is to manage the list of preset scales.
Please refer to the subsection of Preset Scales for the detail.
Chord Progression window appears
on the screen when you click
the button labeled Chord Progression ....
It is to edit a sequence of chord progression.
Please refer to the subsection of Chord Progression for the detail.
Parameters for Timber
The sorts of primary and scondary
instruments can be selected by clicking the button labeled a name of instrument.
It can be selected from a set of General MIDI instruments and a part of
GS sound resources installed in QuickTime Music.
The popup-menus at the right side of instrument buttons are to
indicate continuation of each tone. The alternatives are:
- Long ... is to continue the sound as long
as possible. This is suitable for timbers decaying soon, such as
piano and orchestra harp.
- Consective ... is to stop playing previous
tone when new tone starts. This is suitable for timbers continuing
or decaying but not distinguished soon, such as horns and electric guitars.
- Short ... is to cut each tone for each cycle.
You can indicate the amount of reverb effect by Reverb slider.
You can select the type of drum kit from nine types installed in QuickTime Music by
a popup menu in Percussion tab.
The button Timbre ... opens the
Allocation of Percussion Timbres window.
Please refer to here for detail.
Parameters for Volume
The sound volume follows the main setting controlled by
Output Volume of
System Preferences.
You can reduce the volume of sound from DT1 by operating
a slider named Master Volume in
the panel of Parameter Settings.
The volume of secondary instrument can be set smaller than that of
primary instrument by operating a slider named
Secondary Volume.
The velocity of each tone comes more quiet as the agent goes to deeper position.
The slider named Minimum Tone Velocity at End Wall
is to determine how quiet the sound played by the agent at the end wall.
You can set the sound volume from the movie file when the video input is
not from a camera but a movie file by the slider named
Movie Volume.
