IntermediateTexts

Treat the computer like an over-priced playback device for beat-syncing. Keep building hardware. Keep spinning records. Keep making music.

After considering the use of a 3pdt or tpdt switch common to guitar foot pedals I realized that while it was certainly an option, there are other more commonly (read, my stock of supplies) available switches that would do the trick.  After a bit of thinking and some false starts this evening with a few different circuits and switches, this beefy switch popped up with a double in and double out option.

This allows me to route two signals into the switch from two different sources, and then, by placing one output on one side of the switch and the other output on the other side of the switch I could toggle back and forth between the two input signals…. Below is a little diagram for this section of the circuit.

This switch will go between the arduino and the opto-coupler, diodes will likely be necessary since I’ll be splitting the signal between the opto-couplers and the LEDs used to indicate the 8-step pattern of the arduino gate.

A 3pdt would be the perfect solution to the “two signal lines in/one signal line out” switch issue that’s been nagging at me today. The 3pdt is commonly used in AB switches of guitar pedals as a way of moving between inputs. I’m going to see if there’s another switch option tonight that I’ve already got in-studio, but if not, it looks like ordering and learning how to wire a 3PDT is in order for a weekend activity.

Apparently this didn’t post up last night, so here it is again.  This is the start to the interface/ideas for controls for the Arduino Gate Interface, lovingly known as gater.hater in my head due to the the constant alterations and rebuilds.  With individual control over both the low and hight pulses of the LEDs I may lose the ease of a tap.tempo option for bpm control, but with some practicing I think beat matching shouldn’t be too difficult and this way, I can create more complexities with the individual control over both the High and Low durations.

More tonight.

I’ve put into place both the pulsing programming and some circuitry to modify the LED behaviour outside of the Arduino programming. The LED pulse speed is being controlled through the 10k pot that’s connected to the analog 0 pin on the board. That translates through the programming to the LEDs 1-4 (for testing, 1-8 for final production) that pulse sequentially. I’ve just inserted a 10k potentiometer between the ground and the LEDs. I actually ended up just pulling the pot from the sequence pulse speed control to test that I could control LED brightness levels. I had the ground and +5 still plugged into the board and then connected them over to the ground that LEDs run to.

So, brightness, in one form or another, would appear to now be controlled. I now want to make it so that two potentiometers control the on/off pulses for each LED in the chain. One potentiometer controls on length (digitalwriteHIGH), and one controls off length (digitalwriteLow).

After that comes the inclusion of a “reset” button hit within the programming.

Tomorrow I want to add the programming to control the Off/Low/0 duration that separates it from the On/High/1 duration.

So, not to get ahead of myself, but what about stereo control options? Cross-paths for fades between multiple patterns? Think about this.

When the button is off/0 (the “if” part of the statement) the LED behavior is based on the tap tempo arduino programming. When the button is pressed on the circuit switches to reading the potentiometer (this is the “else” part of the statement). The potentiometer number needs to match that of the tap-tempo programming and vice vers. One must over-write the other smoothly and without there being a jump in numbers.

// These constants won’t change:
const int analogPin = 0; // pin that the sensor is attached to
const int ledPin = 13; // pin that the LED is attached to
const int threshold = 400; // an arbitrary threshold level that’s in the range of the analog input
int sensorValue = 0; // variable to store the value coming from the sensor

void setup() {
// initialize the LED pin as an output:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
// initialize serial communications:
Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
// read the value of the potentiometer:
int analogValue = analogRead(analogPin);

// if the analog value is high enough, turn on the LED:
if (analogValue > threshold) {
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
}
else {
// read the value from the sensor:
sensorValue = analogRead(analogPin);
// turn the ledPin on
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
// stop the program for milliseconds:
delay(sensorValue);
// turn the ledPin off:
digitalWrite(ledPin, LOW);
// stop the program for for milliseconds:
delay(sensorValue);
}

// print the analog value:
Serial.println(analogValue, DEC);

}

// These constants won’t change:
const int analogPin = 0; // pin that the sensor is attached to
const int ledPin = 13; // pin that the LED is attached to
const int threshold = 400; // an arbitrary threshold level that’s in the range of the analog input

void setup() {
// initialize the LED pin as an output:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
// initialize serial communications:
Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
// read the value of the potentiometer:
int analogValue = analogRead(analogPin);

// if the analog value is high enough, turn on the LED:
if (analogValue > threshold) {
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(ledPin,LOW);
delay(200);
digitalWrite(ledPin,HIGH);
delay(200);
}

// print the analog value:
Serial.println(analogValue, DEC);

}

http://umlautllama.com/projects/arduino/s/TapTempo.pde

created 17 Jan 2009
by Tom Igoe

http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/IfStatement

*/

// These constants won’t change:
const int analogPin = 0; // pin that the sensor is attached to
const int ledPin = 13; // pin that the LED is attached to
const int threshold = 400; // an arbitrary threshold level that’s in the range of the analog input

void setup() {
// initialize the LED pin as an output:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
// initialize serial communications:
Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
// read the value of the potentiometer:
int analogValue = analogRead(analogPin);

// if the analog value is high enough, turn on the LED:
if (analogValue > threshold) {
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(ledPin,LOW);
}

// print the analog value:
Serial.println(analogValue, DEC);

}

——————————-

Created by David Cuartielles
Modified 16 Jun 2009
By Tom Igoe

http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/AnalogInput

*/

int sensorPin = 0; // select the input pin for the potentiometer
int ledPin = 13; // select the pin for the LED
int sensorValue = 0; // variable to store the value coming from the sensor

void setup() {
// declare the ledPin as an OUTPUT:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
}

void loop() {
// read the value from the sensor:
sensorValue = analogRead(sensorPin);
// turn the ledPin on
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
// stop the program for milliseconds:
delay(sensorValue);
// turn the ledPin off:
digitalWrite(ledPin, LOW);
// stop the program for for milliseconds:
delay(sensorValue);
}

If/then statement. If button is pushed (1/high) then read potentiometer A. If button is not pushed (0/low) read value of tap tempo. I need a better understanding of how to combine the three example codes I have worked on. With that I can begin to really work on the gating programming circuit I’ve been trying/failing to build with arduino.

I’m back to using an arduino to control the behavior of my gating circuit. It’s cleaner, less wires, fewer issues and can be programmed quickly to alter behavior.

Also, I rather stupidly stripped my wires for the current IC based circuit using snips… and have found that the wires I used are unlikely to hold up to the test of time. I’m looking at seeing how much of this circuit can be etched onto a board. I’d really like to see my process move in that direction. Since it’s cleaner, more durable and more likely to not have wiring/consistency of performance issues.

I also found a site that will allow me to power my USB specific freeduino board through the USB hookup using a 9 volt battery. This is huge since I have little to no interest in having to power this off of my computer when performing…. This way I have a standalone unit with all of the power arduino backing it up.

I’m currently part of a curated screening that is being broadcast on both French and German television. If you’re in either country you can catch it on Tuesdays starting at 6 pm. The press release is listed below.

Performance Anxiety
Curated by Alicia Eler & Jefferson Godard

November 10-December 22, 2009
Broadcasting Tuesdays at 6pm on French channel freebox 129 and German Unitymedia/Kabel BW

JAMES MURRAY - Electrical Performances: Push It, 2007
DVD video, 4 minutes
Courtesy of the artist

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS - November 10, 2009 - Art critic Alicia Eler and video art collector Jefferson Godard present Performance Anxiety, a program of short video works dealing with “performances” of cultural identities. Whether navigating complicated understandings of gender, race, class, sexuality, or existence in on- or off-line spaces, individuals either accept and internalize cultural rules or ideologies and “pass,” or reject them, identifying such performances as a form of cultural oppression. Performance Anxiety runs approximately 50 minutes, and features the work of American artists Rochelle Feinstein, Kate Gilmore, James Murray, Carlos Rigau, Greg Stimac and Stacia Yeapanis.

Unlike most video art shows, Performance Anxiety will not live in a gallery or museum space. Souvenirs from the Earth TV, a Paris-based organization that operates under Nam June Paik’s idea that video art should be available on television, will broadcast the show on French channel freebox 129 and German channel Unitymedia/Kabel BW at 6pm beginning Tuesday, November 10th, and running through December 22nd. The program will also stream once online during the show run; details to come.

In KATE GILMORE’s My Love is an Anchor (2006), the artist anchors her foot in a bucket of cement, and for six minutes she pounds, hammers, and twists back and forth, attempting to break free of this self-imposed situation. Wearing a short black dress, Gilmore seems like she should be at a cocktail party, not struggling on the floor of an empty room. Her work builds on 1970s feminist, endurance-based performance work, and suggests the monotonous, difficult act as a metaphor for change–it takes a huge effort to make even a slight chip in the foundation. Gilmore’s work has been show internationally; recent exhibitions include “100 Years” at PS1/MoMA, Queens, New York; “Reflections on the Electric Mirror: New Feminist Video” at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, New York; “By Any Means” at Locust Projects, Miami, Florida; and at Franco Soffiantino Arte Contemporanea, Turin, Italy.

JAMES MURRAY’s Electrical Performances: Push It (2006) is a fixed video portrait of the artist. Viewers see Murray’s face and shoulders only. The lyrics from Salt and Peppa’s “Push It” appear at the bottom of the screen, but one cannot hear the actual song. Murray sweats heavily, enduring increasing amounts of pain until the song finally ends. The viewer can’t help wondering if he enjoys it, if he’s suffering, or both. Murray says his work is invested in “the ideologies that are prevalent in both queer BDSM and club music regarding the potential for emancipation and freedom through physicality and endurance.” If this holds true, what does his video mean for the politicized homosexual male body post-AIDS crisis that exists in a period of gay culture mainstreaming? Is there such a thing anymore as the queer body politic? Recent exhibitions include Our Great Show at Nice & Fit Gallery, Berlin, and Body Collective at Alogon Gallery, Chicago.

ROCHELLE FEINSTEIN’s Ball and Chain (2007-8) calls to mind lyrics from Janis Joplin’s “Ball and Chain”: “Something grabbed a hold of me, honey, / Felt to me honey like, lord, a ball and chain.” In Feinstein’s take on the phrase, a small disco ball swings around a square black base. The iconic disco ball suggests political connotations of 70s disco and the cocaine wars, and the 80s AIDS epidemic that later devastated carefree, sex-thirsty men who danced all night at clubs. With the renewed love of shiny disco balls in America, Feinstein asks viewers about their own, subjective ball and chain, suggesting the ways that this timeless image has become subjective and, perhaps, de-politicized. Recent exhibitions include “I Made a Terrible Mistake” at LAB Space/Art Production Fund, New York; The Studio Show at David Reed Studio, New York; “Talk Dirty To Me” at Larissa Goldston Gallery, New York; and Desire at Blanton Museum of Art in Austin, Texas (2010).

Chicago-based artist GREG STIMAC’s video Peeling Out (2006) deals with the performance of masculinity in American culture. Stimac travels through rural areas of the Midwest and California, and asks men with trucks to “peel out.” The guys rev up their engines and slam on the pedals, leaving thick black tire tracks on the road and smoke streaming from their exhausts. The truck drivers perform masculinity as they would weight-lifting or heavy drinking games–whoever can do it hardest and longest proves that he’s the “manliest” of them all. Stimac’s work probes these tests of masculinity. Exhibitions include a forthcoming solo show at Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, Illinois (2010); USA Today at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and Preview Berlin, Video Art Program in Berlin, Germany.

In Black Face Beyonce (2006), artist CARLOS RIGAU dresses himself in blackface and a wig, and sings out-of-sync with Beyonce’s song, “Crazy in Love.” The artist intends for this riff on the music video to be viewed on an iPod; the viewer, in turn, feels both shame and pleasure in watching it. Rigau’s work suggests that we have not yet entered a post-racist age. Rigau’s recent exhibitions include Our Great Show at Nice and Fit Gallery, Berlin, Germany; Optic Nerve at MOCA North Miami; and Alogon Gallery, Chicago.

STACIA YEAPANIS’ Life Isn’t Bliss. It’s Just This. It’s Living (2007) explores existentialism in virtual culture. Her Sims character goes through her day, performing mundane tasks like cleaning the bathroom, experiencing emotional outbursts, and doing exercising. The game, as she suggests, parallels life–meaning must be created, and each individual must carve out a place for him or herself. Identities are subjective, malleable, and formed by individuals. If the Sims game mirrors “real life,” one must conclude that the adage is true: life is only what you make of it.

CURATOR BIOS

Alicia Eler is an art critic and new media curator. Her art criticism has been published in Artforum.com, Art Papers and Time Out Chicago magazine, among others. Alicia’s recent curatorial projects include Response: Art and the Art of Criticism, a collaboration between prominent Chicago critics and Chicago artists, and Video as Video: Rewind to Form, a show conceived with artist Peregrine Honig. Alicia is also the Arts & Culture Community Manager of ChicagoNow.com, a network of local blogs sponsored by the Chicago Tribune Media Company. She holds a BA in Art History from Oberlin College. You can find her on Facebook and Twitter.

Jefferson Godard is a video art collector and professor of architecture. He is deeply dedicated to understanding art by emerging talent. Based in Chicago, his true passion lies in video art, and he has curated several video themed exhibitions over the past two years. Chicago shows include Body Collective at Alogon Gallery, a video series at Shane Campbell Gallery and a screening at Living Room Gallery. Most recently, he presented Our Great Show, a curated exhibition of works from his personal collection, at Nice and Fit Gallery in Berlin. The works that he collects and exhibits focus on sexuality, narratives of struggle, and identity with themes of deeply rooted anecdotal story telling. He is a founding member of EMERGE, a collectors forum at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago, and has been profiled on National Public Radio (NPR), and in the Christian Science Monitor, Newcity Newspaper and Chicago Gallery News. Find Jefferson on Facebook.

SFTE logo

Souvenirs from Earth TV is an international Cable TV station, currently broadcasting in France (freebox 129) and Germany (Unitymedia/Kabel BW), presenting a 24h program of film and video art. This channel is a platform where artists of different sensibilities can find a high-end environment to experience new forms of distribution and presentation of film and video art. Souvenirs from Earth’s production section also produces commissioned and free video art.

This is the 8 step sequencer that I’ve been working on. It’s been a little slow going, testing a variety of LEDs, photo-resistors and other components, but last night it started to come together. I’ve had issues with getting both the control and indicator LED to pulse together and without issue…. something that was solved through using a series of diodes in the circuitry between the IC and the final two LEDs.

Tonight will consist of wiring the rest of the indicator LEDs and wiring both the control LED and the audio line.

In the end this project will gate audio on and off in an 8 step sequence. This is accomplished by connecting a control LED to a photo resistor that splits the audio line input. When a light turns on the audio is passed through, when the light is off, the audio stops. With an 8 step pulse chain there is the possibility of beginning to build more and more complex rhythmic patterns. I’ve got a reset button on the surface so that the pattern can automatically be reset to step 1 of the sequence, though we will see if that helps with beat matching. In any case, more photos tonight or tomorrow and hopefully a little bit of video as well.

After on-the-bus contemplation I’ve added a couple of new components, re-done some of the layout and made sure that what I am doing makes sense for both the circuit and future performances with said circuit.  The box was picked up yesterday and is a gorgeous red color… which will go great with the masonite and black acrylic that we cut over the weekend for the arduinome enclosure.

The circuit is entirely bread-boarded and now all it needs is a little bit of final love before being transferred onto a real circuit board and soldered up.  I’m hoping that I can finish work on it tonight, but I’m missing some 1M Pots (I’m sure they’re in storage) so a couple of aspects (the power starvation points) may need to wait until I make one last final trip to the electronics store.

More in-progress photos will get taken tonight.