SOUND
what does it mean to visualize sound?
Consider the properties and qualities
In my first try to visualize sound, I chose to create an expression for the sound made when a glass jar full of corn kernels is shaken with hand.
When analyzing and breaking down this sound, I kept the following in mind:
- what kind of friction makes what kinds of sounds?
- how does direction of shaking affect the creation of sound?
- what adjectives are suitable in describing these sounds?
Once I created my first expression of the audio (right) with prisma sticks, I realized that I was way too focused on visualizing the generation of sound — the different frictions and the direction of sound — rather than focusing on the sound itself.
The two attempts show my effort to only convey the features of the sound itself on paper, when the sound is created at different forces.
sound project
I am working on this project with Elise and Riya, and we were assigned to work with music #4, which is a very jazzy piece with lots of percussion and a trumpet.
As I thought that dynamic was the key property of this piece of music, in my expression of the entire piece, I used varied sizes and thicknesses of medium to portray the active change in volume.
In choosing one instrument to analyze for the project, Elise chose the bass, Riya the percussion, and I chose to work on visualizing the sound of trumpet. The trumpet in this piece has a very steady rhythm with one spontaneous blast at the end of the piece that echoes in a very artificial way, so my main focus was to express that distinction between the two sounds created by the instrument.
In addition, each of my group’s member decided to work on visualizing the piano sound because we identified 4 different instruments and there was only three of us. With the piano, I figured that the key features of it are softness, differing pitch, etc.
Extended Exploration: Criteria & Focus
From the in class discussion, I realized that there was a common tendency to prioritize the expression of time in mostly linear formats as that is the universally known way to read music.
When reviewing other groups’ works who worked with different sounds, linear expressions definitely helped me describe the music generally, but I felt that ways to create emotional expression or focus on more specific properties of the sound could be further explored.
In my new attempt to express the trumpet sound of our group’s jazzy piece, I tried to focus on a different property or a different way to express the quality each trial.
1. Circumcentric (radial direction)
- Time: Layer of each mark
- Intensity: Distance from circumcenter / stroke of mark
- Dry medium
2. Presence and absence of sound
- Solid fills: positive & negative space: focus on presence and absence of sound (silence)
- Low Opacity: resonating sound (echo)
2. Texture of sound
- Texture: dry, rough texture: disappearing echo from center
- Angles: regular sounds → perpendicular angles / non-regular sounds → no angle
4. Medium & Symmetry
- Medium: dry → thinner sounds / wet → richer, lasting sounds
- Symmetry: method/shape of sound is the same, just the dynamic is different
5. Direction & Method of Application
- Direction: opposite directions distinguishing the two different types of made by the trumpet
- Method of Expression: rectangular stamps → short, regular, and raspy sounds — rhythmical / organic strokes → prolonged, spontaneous, resonating sound of the trumpet
Combining Work
Our group met after class to combine each of our section for the first time, this iteration created a very strict diagonal relationship due to the intersecting lines. Although we thought this expressed the contrasting aspect of the jazz and military sound, I thought that there was not much transitions between sounds expressed in here.
After discussing with my group, I came to a thought that the rectangular stamps seem a bit to harsh and rigid, not resembling the shape of a trumpet sound very well.
We thought that shape with changing widths could communicate the nature of wind instrument (amount of air blown in changing), so I created stamps with different shapes, shapes that resemble something like a football.
I decided that a concave lens shape with slits in the middle to show different lengths of rhythm would suit the sound of the marching rhythm of the trumpet. The last trumpet blast is expressed with a spontaneous and organic curve with ink.
However, during one of our final discussions, I realized that the parallel alignment of of the stamps that doesn’t connect to its previous sound makes it kind of out of place and hard to predict its relation to the other parts of the music.
So, I decided to make a final iteration that still utilizes the stamp and the organic stroke, but arranging them to be more in context with the music. Because Riya and Elise’s work intersects around the middle of the landscape page, I thought my stamp and stroke could also stem from the center of the page as well, because that’s where the trumpet comes into play.
When combined, a radial relationship is created in the center of the page, so I created a swoosh stroke with a thick brush to show that the last blast is dominant and escapes the rhythmical pattern created in the middle.
