SENSORY SYMPHONY // GUILDHALL SCHOOL OF MUSIC AND DRAMA

Sensory Symphony

The concept for this project was to have audience members drive visual content with their thoughts/emotions. To achieve this, we took electromagnetic brainwave readings from audience members via EEG headsets, which sent the brainwave readings in the form of OSC data which was then fed into Notch, the real-time 3D visual software that was used to create the visual content. The audience members were subjected to a Harpist which performed a repertoire of songs meant to stimulate different moods, and the audience were able to visualise their brainwave activity via the projected video content which was projected onto the set-piece behind the Harpist. In addition to my associate designer role for this project, I also had a chance to explore some of the creative technology aspects of the performance piece. Being a technically challenging project, we had to research different types of brainwave frequencies, and what the varying activity meant, and then figure out how to get the information off the headsets and into the control machine which we were using to generate the real-time visual content. There was also a technical challenge in having multiple headsets streaming OSC data to a single machine and figuring out how to have 12 different sets of frequencies affect the visual content while still having the design remain aesthetically pleasing.

Creative Director - Dan Shorten

Technical Director - Richard Moores Associate Designer - Nicholas Wong Lead Video Engineer - Nina Thoene

Assistant Video Engineer - Dan Barnicott

Assistant Designers - Fergus Kerr, Sam Harris

Sound designer - Charlie Vince-Crowhurst

Staff Supervisor/Support - Josh Garner Lighting Team - Matt Hockley, Peter Lawrence, Jon Armstrong

Stage Manager - Em Davis

Production Manager - Jon Hare

Harpist - Helena Ricci