Lately, I’ve been looking for ways to embrace creative and technological restrictions, to dial back all the high-tech choices possible in making motion. When a DV cam died, it seemed the perfect opportunity to examine a still camera as a means of generating footage. I picked up my Sony DSC-W1, a basic but decent 5 […]

I got to run a feature yesterday on Create Digital Music with tips for getting good gigs, written by musician and Chicago electronica scenester Liz “Quantazelle.” That story has in turn generated a lot of discussion on CDM and elsewhere. This raises an interesting question, though: how much of this advice applies to visualists and, […]

Laptop performance gigs: MOMUS displays one (atypical) way to present your live performance persona. We forgot the “Find a way to keep your face warm” tip. Photo by Tamara Weikel, taken in a Chelsea (NY?) gallery. Getting good gigs is a challenge for all genres, and it touches even more issues when computers are involved. […]

A Casio in Iraq Ok, not technically a synth, but check this out. It’s a Casio AT-40 with Arabic labels spotted in Iraq of all places. Via Daniel: “A casio AT-40 with arabic lettering that I spotted in Hewler/Arbil in northern Iraq in december last year. I should have bought it!” Yeah he should have. […]

It’s really a pity The Video Case is a tongue-in-cheek design project from the Museum of Lost Interactions and not a real product. Yes, I know, we’re supposed to laugh at how this not-actually-from-1979 design is so primitive compared to our fancy-schmancy video iPods. But consider the design achievements here: The rigid suitcase protects from […]

Vienna-based design firm GP designpartners sponsored the FRONT musical interface design as part of its annual student thesis project. We’ve certainly heard these promises before for alternative interfaces: “a really new music instrument — without using classical paradigms. an instrument for new sounds, that gives the musician the possibility to express himself — even live […]

Perfect for barbeques, says Hercules. This (sadly, wireless DJ-free) barbeque via Flickr, by Adactico. Yes, just in time for the summer grilling season. Hercules — known in the 80s for their video cards and more recently as makers of a rather flimsy DJ controller — have introduced a toy-like wireless DJ controller. As a serious […]

Great sample libraries usually give you painstakingly-recorded collections of equipment and instruments to which you lack access. It’s a chance to get into someone else’s kitchen. Usually, that isn’t literal. In this case, it is. Welsh’s Synthesizer Cookbook has taken hundreds of samples of cookware from a US$5.95 price to free, providing kitchen sounds for […]