seth holland

I've been granted access to the Biopac EEG systems, and am wondering how to create a realtime interface between the two programs. any suggestions?

heya, 
 I've been granted access to the Biopac EEG systems, and am wondering how to create a realtime interface between the two programs.  any suggestions?
cheers, 
setholland@hotmail.com


eeg-to-max

I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to 

max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.

I would be very interested in helping you out with the software 

Op 2-feb-07, om 13:18 heeft seth holland het volgende geschreven:

> I've been granted access to the Biopac EEG systems, and am 

> wondering how to create a realtime interface between the two 

Hi
I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to  
max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.

I would be very interested in helping you out with the software  
conversion and implication into max.
Please email me offlist

>
> heya,
>  I've been granted access to the Biopac EEG systems, and am  
> wondering how to create a realtime interface between the two  
> programs.  any suggestions?
> cheers,
> setholland@hotmail.com
>
>
>
>


I just want to make sure that this is true: patchers made in max can be 

converted into VST's, which can be run inside of digital audio workstations 

(cubase, ableton live, etc.) that support VST, right?

If so, can someone give me a link or an explanation about how to do this?

I just want to make sure that this is true: patchers made in max can be 
converted into VST's, which can be run inside of digital audio workstations 
(cubase, ableton live, etc.) that support VST, right?

not sure do; do you mean patchers or patches? i beleive pluggo allows you to convert your patches into vst plugins.

not sure do; do you mean patchers or patches? i beleive pluggo allows you to convert your patches into vst plugins.
hope this helps,
cheers,
seth


thanks for your response. I'll be able to inform you more on mon - i'm going in to the uni to be allowed to use and take notes on the Biopac software. again, i just need to figure out how to interface the biopac software with max.

also, you said to reply to you offlist? does that mean reply to you directly though e-mail?

thanks for your response.  I'll be able to inform you more on mon - i'm going in to the uni to be allowed to use and take notes on the Biopac software.  again, i just need to figure out how to interface the biopac software with max.

also, you said to reply to you offlist?  does that mean reply to you directly though e-mail?

not sure, did you get my last post - should i reply to you via e-mail?

not sure, did you get my last post - should i reply to you via e-mail?
setholland@hotmail.com


Have a look at this link too perhaps it can give you some information...

http://openeeg.sourceforge.net/doc/index.html

> thanks for your response. I'll be able to inform you more on mon - i'm going in to the uni to be allowed to use and take notes on the Biopac software. again, i just need to figure out how to interface the biopac software with max.

> also, you said to reply to you offlist? does that mean reply to you directly though e-mail?

seth holland wrote:
> thanks for your response.  I'll be able to inform you more on mon - i'm going in to the uni to be allowed to use and take notes on the Biopac software.  again, i just need to figure out how to interface the biopac software with max.
>
> also, you said to reply to you offlist?  does that mean reply to you directly though e-mail?
>
> also, where are you based?
>
> cheers, 
> seth


I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation. How did

On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement" wrote:

> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to

> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.

> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software

I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation.  How did
it transport you into next month?

On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement"  wrote:

> Hi
> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to
> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.
>
> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software
> conversion and implication into max.
> Please email me offlist
>
> best
>
> pieter

Cheers
Gary Lee Nelson
Oberlin College
www.timara.oberlin.edu/GaryLeeNelson

swatch beat some funky bending and its march

Op 3-feb-07, om 19:14 heeft Gary Lee Nelson het volgende geschreven:

> I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation. 

> On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement" 

>> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to

>> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.

>> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software

swatch beat some  funky bending and its march
but now its februari again

> I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation.   
> How did
> it transport you into next month?
>
>
> On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement"  
>  wrote:
>
>
>> Hi
>> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to
>> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.
>>
>> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software
>> conversion and implication into max.
>> Please email me offlist
>>
>> best
>>
>> pieter
>>
>
>
> Cheers
> Gary Lee Nelson
> Oberlin College
> www.timara.oberlin.edu/GaryLeeNelson
>
>
>
>


I am actually doing my undergraduate senior research on using a guitar

composition to 'drive' someones mental brainwaves and use those

brainwaves to create music on a computer.

If anybody has successfully synced up an EEG into Max I'd love to hear

how. I bought a unit from www.mindpeak.com and am paying dearly for

> swatch beat some funky bending and its march

> Op 3-feb-07, om 19:14 heeft Gary Lee Nelson het volgende geschreven:

> > I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation.

> > On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement"

> >> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to

> >> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.

> >> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software

> >> conversion and implication into max.

I am actually doing my undergraduate senior research on using a guitar
composition to 'drive' someones mental brainwaves and use those
brainwaves to create music on a computer.

If anybody has successfully synced up an EEG into Max I'd love to hear
how.  I bought a unit from www.mindpeak.com and am paying dearly for
it.  Thanks!

On 2/3/07, pieter coussement  wrote:
> swatch beat some  funky bending and its march
> but now its februari again
>
> Op 3-feb-07, om 19:14 heeft Gary Lee Nelson het volgende geschreven:
>
> > I'd be interested in the time travel aspect of your installation.
> > How did
> > it transport you into next month?
> >
> >
> > On 3/4/07 6:19 AM, "pieter coussement"
> >  wrote:
> >
> >
> >> Hi
> >> I have currently an installation running with a eeg sensor routed to
> >> max. It works but there are a lot of problems with noise and stuff.
> >>
> >> I would be very interested in helping you out with the software
> >> conversion and implication into max.
> >> Please email me offlist
> >>
> >> best
> >>
> >> pieter
> >>
> >
> >
> > Cheers
> > Gary Lee Nelson
> > Oberlin College
> > www.timara.oberlin.edu/GaryLeeNelson
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>


i'm into music therapy in clinical and non-clinical contexts and thinking about the possibilities of using electronic interfaces and soundgeneration for music therapy.

I'm a complete newbie and just starting my research. So i would be very thankfull for hints on existing information/ "fieldreports" about connecting (medical) sensor-input and MaxMSP.

have just met with the psyche dept at u.w.e. and the biopac system has an analog output, so, using the fiddle object, i'm fairly certain i'll be able to use eeg to trigger and be the 'engine' for a patch i'm working on. basically, i want to use the frequency of the brain wave to generate binauaral beats, which the user will then be able to either influence, or react to (slow down the binaural beats and in theory, the brain will exhibit whats know as ffr (frequency following response).

have just met with the psyche dept at u.w.e. and the biopac system has an analog output, so, using the fiddle object, i'm fairly certain i'll be able to use eeg to trigger and be the 'engine' for a patch i'm working on.  basically, i want to use the frequency of the brain wave to generate binauaral beats, which the user will then be able to either influence, or react to (slow down the binaural beats and in theory, the brain will exhibit whats know as ffr (frequency following response).

i'll keep you posted, 
cheers, setholland@hotmail.com


I'm glad to hear someone else has experienced some of my woe's. What

really irks me is that I had talked with someone over there named

Jonathan and he said he would help me out however he could because

once upon a time there was a Max interface that came with the

software. Well after I baught the unit he stopped responding to my

Anywho I had looked into using the BioExplorere interace and got so

far as installing it and getting all my drivers working before

experiencing a complete mental breakdown. I started looking at the

rxtx drivers to unlock my serial port but wasn't getting anywhere

because I don't know java and couldn't understand much of anything

Did you get your waverider working using bioexplorer?

> have just met with the psyche dept at u.w.e. and the biopac system has an analog output, so, using the fiddle object, i'm fairly certain i'll be able to use eeg to trigger and be the 'engine' for a patch i'm working on. basically, i want to use the frequency of the brain wave to generate binauaral beats, which the user will then be able to either influence, or react to (slow down the binaural beats and in theory, the brain will exhibit whats know as ffr (frequency following response).

I'm glad to hear someone else has experienced some of my woe's.  What
really irks me is that I had talked with someone over there named
Jonathan and he said he would help me out however he could because
once upon a time there was a Max interface that came with the
software.  Well after I baught the unit he stopped responding to my
e-mails...

Anywho I had looked into using the BioExplorere interace and got so
far as installing it and getting all my drivers working before
experiencing a complete mental breakdown.  I started looking at the
rxtx drivers to unlock my serial port but wasn't getting anywhere
because I don't know java and couldn't understand much of anything
going on at the wiki.

Did you get your waverider working using bioexplorer?
Thanks!
Jhaysonn

On 2/5/07, seth holland  wrote:
>
> have just met with the psyche dept at u.w.e. and the biopac system has an analog output, so, using the fiddle object, i'm fairly certain i'll be able to use eeg to trigger and be the 'engine' for a patch i'm working on.  basically, i want to use the frequency of the brain wave to generate binauaral beats, which the user will then be able to either influence, or react to (slow down the binaural beats and in theory, the brain will exhibit whats know as ffr (frequency following response).
>
> i'll keep you posted,
> cheers, setholland@hotmail.com
>


Just wanted to update this. I think it got burried :)

Just wanted to update this.  I think it got burried :)


I got an EEG into Max once... It was a pretty old EEG, and it had a "low voltage" output on it on a 1/4" TRS connector. It was basically putting out a DC voltage corresponding to the EEG wave. I hooked it into a line-level audio input (then on a Digi 001) and I was able to get the wave into Max and mess with it.

If you can get a DC voltage out of the EEG, you should be able to repeat it. I would probably check what the range of the voltage is, though, and check what voltage ranges your audio i/o can handle. wouldn't want to blow anything up.

when i first did this, i thought that the line-level input would probably have some kind of highpass filter on it which would filter out the super-low 2-20Hz EEG signals, but they seemed to pass fine. I set up an FFT analysis of the wave (using a super-huge window time to get some resolution on the low frequencies) and then used the FFT data to affect the sound.

i think i still have the patch around somewhere. email me offlist if you want it.

I got an EEG into Max once... It was a pretty old EEG, and it had a "low voltage" output on it on a 1/4" TRS connector.  It was basically putting out a DC voltage corresponding to the EEG wave.  I hooked it into a line-level audio input (then on a Digi 001) and I was able to get the wave into Max and mess with it. 

If you can get a DC voltage out of the EEG, you should be able to repeat it.  I would probably check what the range of the voltage is, though, and check what voltage ranges your audio i/o can handle.  wouldn't want to blow anything up.

when i first did this, i thought that the line-level input would probably have some kind of highpass filter on it which would filter out the super-low 2-20Hz EEG signals, but they seemed to pass fine.  I set up an FFT analysis of the wave (using a super-huge window time to get some resolution on the low frequencies) and then used the FFT data to affect the sound.

i think i still have the patch around somewhere. email me offlist if you want it.


Thank you very much. I am deffinately interestd in what you found to work. I sent you an e-mail just before this post

Thank you very much.  I am deffinately interestd in what you found to work.  I sent you an e-mail just before this post


heya, thank you both for your interest...i'm thinking of a new approach, if i use and old amplifier that doesn't use any filtering, i should be able to modify a speaker in such a way as to count how many times it beats per sec (or maybe even "prepare" the speaker so that it subsonic response can be made audible).

again, i've only got acccess to the Biopac system that has an audio/analog output in the back - the only way to get it to output in realtime. it's not an 'open' program in other regards - having it spit out the EEG activity numerically would be ace, but i've gotta make do with what i've got access to. 

please contact me further at :setholland@hotmail.com.

to jhaysonn and	swieser1, 
  heya, thank you both for your interest...i'm thinking of a new approach, if i use and old amplifier that doesn't use any filtering, i should be able to modify a speaker in such a way as to count how many times it beats per sec (or maybe even "prepare" the speaker so that it subsonic response can be made audible).
   again, i've only got acccess to the Biopac system that has an audio/analog output in the back -  the only way to get it to output in realtime.  it's not an 'open' program in other regards - having it spit out the EEG activity numerically would be ace, but i've gotta make do with what i've got access to.  
  please contact me further at :setholland@hotmail.com.
cheers, 
seth


Are you familiar with Lucier's piece, "Music for Solo Performer?" I would imagine so :P but he used a similar method, and he never mentions using filters, just amplifiers so it might work. Albeit you have to amplify the signal thousands of times when coming from the cranium.

Are you familiar with Lucier's piece, "Music for Solo Performer?" I would imagine so :P  but he used a similar method, and he never mentions using filters, just amplifiers so it might work.  Albeit you have to amplify the signal thousands of times when coming from the cranium.


Unless there's something I'm not aware of, brainwaves are typically in the range of 2-15Hz... the human ear generally can't hear anything below 20Hz, and even at that point, it's more felt than heard until you get up to around 50Hz. so, putting the output of an EEG into an amplifier is not really going to do anything except push the speaker driver in and out slowly.

if you have an audio output on the EEG, and you can get that audio into Max unfiltered, then you're all set. you can do anything you need to do at that point: FFT analysis, modulate an audible frequency on top of the subsonic brainwave, etc.

Unless there's something I'm not aware of, brainwaves are typically in the range of 2-15Hz... the human ear generally can't hear anything below 20Hz, and even at that point, it's more felt than heard until you get up to around 50Hz.  so, putting the output of an EEG into an amplifier is not really going to do anything except push the speaker driver in and out slowly.

if you have an audio output on the EEG, and you can get that audio into Max unfiltered, then you're all set.  you can do anything you need to do at that point:  FFT analysis, modulate an audible frequency on top of the subsonic brainwave, etc.


also, the wave coming out of the EEG is a continuously variable frequency, therefore it would be extremely difficult to accurately "count" the number of beats per second in real-time with any accuracy.

true, 5 to 30 Hz is inaudible, but still will cause the speaker to beat in time - i can then prepare the speaker in such a way that each beat is counted, then averaged out per sec- maybe 2 secs to get a better average.

i was also under the impression that audio being fed into max at such a low frequency - fiddle~ and analyser~ doesn't tend to be read accurately...wouldn't that also be the case even using fft?

i know there are other more open ended EEG systems, but, again, i've gotta make do with what i have access to - i'd love to have a few grand to shell out on an IBVA system, but unfortunately don't.

so, i'll just extend alvin lucier's old school aproach into the max enviornment.

true, 5 to 30 Hz is inaudible, but still will cause the speaker to beat in time - i can then prepare the speaker in such a way that each beat is counted, then averaged out per sec- maybe 2 secs to get a better average. 

i know there are other more open ended EEG systems, but, again,  i've gotta make do with what i have access to - i'd love to have a few grand to shell out on an IBVA system, but unfortunately don't.
so, i'll just extend alvin lucier's old school aproach into the max enviornment.

I agree to seth's thought. I don't know much about max's faults in those lower frequency ranges, but I think his plan is worthy enough at least to be tried. I know I'm fiddling with the idea of some crazy things myself.

I agree to seth's thought.  I don't know much about max's faults in those lower frequency ranges, but I think his plan is worthy enough at least to be tried.  I know I'm fiddling with the idea of some crazy things myself.


I'm pretty shure that you can get a kind of square wave out of the 

audio signal. This can then trigger a transistor, connecting a 

circuit with 5V and connected to an open collector you can read in 

the data on an arduino board or something like that. Thus getting the 

That's how I do it, although I would really could use yur kind of 

sensor since mine are a bit unstable because of interference.

If interested you can have a look at my sensor and patches, but 

because of copyright issues I can't just put it on a website or in a 

On 23 Feb 2007, at 23:37, seth holland wrote:

> true, 5 to 30 Hz is inaudible, but still will cause the speaker to 

> beat in time - i can then prepare the speaker in such a way that 

> each beat is counted, then averaged out per sec- maybe 2 secs to 

> i was also under the impression that audio being fed into max at 

> such a low frequency - fiddle~ and analyser~ doesn't tend to be 

> read accurately...wouldn't that also be the case even using fft?

> i know there are other more open ended EEG systems, but, again, 

> i've gotta make do with what i have access to - i'd love to have a 

> few grand to shell out on an IBVA system, but unfortunately don't.

> so, i'll just extend alvin lucier's old school aproach into the max 

I'm pretty shure that you can get a kind of square wave out of the  
audio signal. This can then trigger a transistor, connecting a  
circuit with 5V and connected to an open collector you can read in  
the data on an arduino board or something like that. Thus getting the  
bpm and the time in between beats.

That's how I do it, although I would really could use yur kind of  
sensor since mine are a bit unstable because of interference.

If interested you can have a look at my sensor and patches, but  
because of copyright issues I can't just put it on a website or in a  
forum except for the maxpatch of course.

>
> true, 5 to 30 Hz is inaudible, but still will cause the speaker to  
> beat in time - i can then prepare the speaker in such a way that  
> each beat is counted, then averaged out per sec- maybe 2 secs to  
> get a better average.
>
> i was also under the impression that audio being fed into max at  
> such a low frequency - fiddle~ and analyser~ doesn't tend to be  
> read accurately...wouldn't that also be the case even using fft?
>
> i know there are other more open ended EEG systems, but, again,   
> i've gotta make do with what i have access to - i'd love to have a  
> few grand to shell out on an IBVA system, but unfortunately don't.
> so, i'll just extend alvin lucier's old school aproach into the max  
> enviornment.
>
> i'll keep ya posted,
> cheers,
> seth
>


> I don't know much about max's faults in those lower frequency ranges,

> but I think his plan is worthy enough at least to be tried.

Max won't fail in the lower frequency range, but most audio interfaces 

do. I'd like to see a list for these kind of odd requirements/features 

according to hardware. Maybe an addition to MaxWiki?

Jhaysonn wrote:
> I don't know much about max's faults in those lower frequency ranges,
> but I think his plan is worthy enough at least to be tried.

Max won't fail in the lower frequency range, but most audio interfaces 
do. I'd like to see a list for these kind of odd requirements/features 
according to hardware. Maybe an addition to MaxWiki?

-- 
Stefan Tiedje------------x-------
--_____-----------|--------------
--(_|_ ----|-----|-----()-------
-- _|_)----|-----()--------------
----------()--------www.ccmix.com


maybe you are interested into checking my last performance involving EEG detection, butoh dance and multiple visuals.

It was presented at the Institute of Sonology, the Royal Conservatory, Den Haag, last 2nd February.

The sound is all live-generated in Supercollider based on the EEG signal,

You can find two video excerpts here, a summary:

http://dindisalvadi.free.fr/Fragmentation.html

http://dindisalvadi.free.fr/Fragmentation1.html

I am available for questions on the hardware if you need..

Hi all,
maybe you are interested into checking my last performance involving EEG detection, butoh dance and multiple visuals.
It was presented at the Institute of Sonology, the Royal Conservatory, Den Haag, last 2nd February.

The sound is all live-generated in Supercollider based on the EEG signal,
and the visuals in Jitter.

You can find two video excerpts here, a summary:
http://dindisalvadi.free.fr/Fragmentation.html
and the whole piece:
http://dindisalvadi.free.fr/Fragmentation1.html

EEG to Max