I haven’t seen the World of Warcraft South Park yet, but I did manage to catch the recent stopmotion/claymation episode of My Name is Earl before I left Australia. DV.com has an interview with the production leads for the segment, containing plenty of background, logistical information on how a special episode like this takes place, […]

Greetings from Vietnam! Yes, the rumours are true, I have taken a holiday. However, the initial phase of do as much stuff as possible even if it kills us hardcore travelling has passed, and I’m now in the cool, relaxed, clean and incidentally wifi-infested Hanoi. I’ve caught up on my bloglines subscriptions and wow, lots […]

The Web is becoming a more and more powerful archive for film-making that you might not otherwise see. In addition to sites like the Internet Archive / Prelinger Archives, you can now catch up on more recent film, video, and sound history, ca. the 70s and 80s, and works with a decidedly more experimental tilt: […]

DIY hardware isn’t just for abstract and noise musicians any more: visualists are getting in on the act. While on the subject of glitchy visuals from bent gaming hardware, GetLoFi reports this week on several new DIY projects to delight the eyes. The EX PMX is a homemade analog video synth that … does … […]

Thought every twist on Tchaikovsky had been exhausted in holiday seasons past? Think again: San Francisco-based composer Flip Baber (aka johnnyrandom, pictured) writes to tell us about a compositional challenge that made him turn bike parts into instruments: I was recently approached by award winning advertising agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners to do a composition […]

M-Audio may not spell the word “connective” / “conectiv” right, but they’re getting some very positive feedback from their new DJ line, including Torq (the DJing + vinyl control solution), Conectiv (the audio interface), and X-Session Pro DJ control surface. I’m hearing great comments here from readers, and there’s other word around the Interwebs. Some […]

We’re not going to be satisfied until every touch controller in the house is functioning as an X/Y pad for music. Nintendo DS? Check. Wacom tablet? Tablet PC? Claro que si. So what’s up with your Palm? That stylus isn’t doing anything. miniMusic has the hookup: AxisPad miniMusic [Product Page] Interestingly, the X/Y pad here […]

Circuit bender Gijs Gieskes does work that can be seen as beautiful kinetic sculptures as much as instruments and synthesizers. That’s certainly the case with his Sega MegaDrive2: watch as he reroutes patch cords via magnetic connections in a lovely tangle of wires, or listen to the mechanical sounds of the device in operation. (This […]

Bill Van Loo writes to tell us about a QWERTY keyboard that started its life as stock Apple hardware and wound up a custom-configured, custom-painted controller for Ableton Live: I just finished reworking an old USB QWERTY keyboard to serve as a custom keyboard for controlling Ableton Live, and thought you might like a look. […]