We present a novel way of manipulating a spatial soundscape, one that encourages collaboration and exploration. Through a tabletop display surrounded by speakers and lights, participants are invited to engage in peaceful play with Beluga whales shown through a live web camera feed from the Vancouver Aquarium in Canada. Eight softly glowing buttons and a simple interface encourage collaboration with others who are also enjoying the swirling Beluga sounds overhead.

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Overview

The playful, graceful motions of Beluga whales swimming in water create a mesmerizing motion space to watch. These highly communicative creatures use a variety of vocalizations, physical expressions and physical contact in their navigation, social interaction and survival. Beluga whales have fatty structures on the top of their heads; it is hypothesized that these structures, called melons, act as acoustical lenses for focusing and directing sounds for echolocation.

We have created an interactive sound and video installation for participants to play with directional sounds initiated by the playful movement of Beluga whales in the water captured with a single live webcam provided by the Vancouver Aquarium.

The piece allows participants to experience a sonic aquarium while feeling linked to the live, organic and mesmerizing movements of the Beluga whales. Our artistic motivations stem from creating an interactive soundscape that provides a representation of the Beluga’s space they inhabit.

The Installation

Echology was produced as an interactive multimedia installation piece for the Open Media Environment (OME) situated in the atrium of the ICICS/CS building at the University of British Columbia. The OME incorporates a center stage area, a movable, suspended, circular theatrical truss that has eight attached speakers and can support various lighting attachments. The circular truss has a rear projection screen stretched inside it.

The installation was exhibited for the first time in a public setting during the 5th International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME05) in Vancouver, Canada.

System Description

The system consists of an interaction table situated in the center of the stage, the eight surround speakers, a PC running Cycling 74's Max/MSP and Jitter, 8 lights and a light controller, a live webcam at the Vancouver Aquarium, and the atrium projection space.

The webcam and 8 buttons on the interaction table provide the main input to Echology. The webcam feed is processed using Jitter and Beluga motions in the feed are mapped to four sound signals which are then spatialized in our soundscape. The large arcade style buttons represent reflection points on the edge of the soundscape (i.e. the eight loudspeakers). The 8 buttons are arranged symmetrically around the perimeter of the interaction table and are used to control the movement of the sounds in the soundscape.

The soundscape is created using eight speakers distributed symmetrically just above head level. Eight lights with blue filters are mounted below each speaker and light up momentarily to indicate when a sound passes by a speaker.

The interaction table also houses a monitor to display our visualization of the Beluga webcam and sound space for the participants. The display gives visual feedback to the participants so they can see where the sounds are and where they will go. This same display is also projected on an overhead rear projection screen mounted in the truss for the spectators.

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