Nicola De Bello

Cellist Guido Rigatti plays live following the music generated by MAX4LIFE, a Max 7 Device designed and coded by Nicola De Bello. The music generated by MAX4LIFE is always different and always unpredictable, because notes are generated by the evolution of cells-life in a 24x24 grid according to the famous "Conway's Game of Life" algorithm, starting from random initial configurations of cells. MAX4LIFE is a Max 7 device containing also a new external object (coded in C and implementing the actual algorithm) and some pieces of JS. MAX4LIFE will be played as a Max4Live device by Ableton Live, but it exists also as a stand-alone Mac OSX App. A second very simple Max 7 device has been created in order to send the cells matrix to a big screen, so that the audience would be able to see the evolution of life which is actually generating the music they are hearing. This device (used as a stand-alone Mac OSX App) is simply a big 24x24 cells matrix receiving the very same MAX4LIFE data via UDP.

chasing-life-on-max

Chasing LIFE on MAX - Updated

surgesg

pucktronix.golgi.apparatus is a cellular automata-based music sequencer application, with OSC output.

The interface is divided into two parts - the “world” on the left, and the control panel on the right.

You can interact with the “world” in two ways, toggled by the checkbox on the bottom of the control panel - labeled “Toggle Block / Cell Draw Mode”

While the box is unchecked, clicking in the “world” will toggle grid cells - a cell can be either “active” or “dead”.

If the box is checked, clicking and dragging the mouse will draw a colored block over the “world” - up to 8 blocks can be added / edited with the “Block Number” buttons below the checkbox. There are also 8 Block Presets, which can save and switch between Block layouts.

You can adjust the world size using the slider / number-box labeled “World Size” - this will erase any modifications to the world and reinitialize the simulation.

To run the sequencer, click the checkbox in the upper left corner of the control panel. The rate of evolution (in ms) can be adjusted using the number box to the right of this checkbox. The evolution rule (a simple algorithm which determines the change from one generation of the simulation to the next) can be modified with the pull-down menu labeled “Rule”.

The sequencer can also be synced to an external MIDI clock.

As the sequencer runs, eight floating-point numbers between 0.0 and 1.0 are broadcast (using OSC) on the localhost (255.255.255.255) and through port 9999. The eight values correspond to the eight blocks which can be drawn over the grid. Each value corresponds to the proportion of cells under a given block which are “active”. This address / port string is configurable.

Each OSC message address can be modified by editing the text in the corresponding box. (To the far left of the Out 1, Out 2, etc. text) Press “Return” after entering text to confirm. You an also select USB- Octomod-style OSC output formatting.

Finally, in the center of the control panel, are two controls for allowing a variable amount of randomness into the “world”. These controls determine the likelihood of any given cell randomly switching state at a given time.


pucktronix-golgi-apparatus

pucktronix.golgi.apparatus

pucktronix.golgi.apparatus was developed using Max and Javascript.

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