MetaMusic (a.k.a. Abaltat) handover

For the past two years, a dedicated team of programmers and computer musicologists in the Interaction Design Centre in the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems at the University of Limerick have been working on developing a novel software package. The idea was to create software that automatically can compose music to video clips, such as television advertisements promos and documentaries, that would otherwise cost producers a lot in terms of music royalties.

The project's team-leader Mikael Fernström, the co-originator of the project and well-known computer-music composer, commented that “I’ve been working for so many years on finding new kinds of music by means of computing, but when the Abaltat team approached us as and asked if we could do popular music, we said Why Not!“

The resulting software prototype is now being transferred to an exciting new Irish start-up company, Meiticheol Teoranta, trading as Abaltat. Abaltat is located in Spiddal, Co. Galway. The development was sponsored by Enterprise Ireland’s Innovation Partnership programme. Abaltat is also supported by Údarás na Gaeilge, The Western Development Commission and Enterprise Equity Investment Fund.

At the recent IBC trade show in Amsterdam, Abaltat previewed AbaltatMuse. The software and was nominated for the prestigious IABM Peter Wayne Award. The product was also selected as pick of the show by Broadcast Engineering magazine and has been shortlisted by TVB Europe for their IBC awards to be announced in October

Mr Justin McCarthy, one of Ireland’s most well-known video editors and Technical Director of the company said "Based on our market research and the response at the international IBC trade show, we are confident that we have a worldwide success on our hands. The future of broadcasting includes the ability to deliver programming over all media including the web. The issue of music royalties is becoming more and more of a hinderance. Our software solves this problem giving editors an exciting and creative solution. Editors can now control how the music is written, using an editing interface.

The television world will never sound the same...

Special thanks to Eoin, Ian, Tony and Brian who have worked so hard, for so long, on delivering this vision. We'll do it again, next week ;-)

Good Luck Steve!

After years of service, Stephen has left the IDC for greener pastures!
Here he is pictured at his going away party, already scared by what awaits him...
Good Luck Steve, and thanks for all your work with us!

Interactive Media and Music Technology 2006

It's that happy time of the year. I-media and MusTechs are finalising their projects. We're all hoping that they'll do really well, and make us proud in the DAWN2006 show.

Limerick Milkmarket

So, our next design is Limerick Milkmarket. Why the hell am I writing this, it should be Parag! Anyhow, we've created an on-line cookbook.
We have spread some postcards to get people to send us their recipes. Hopefully we'll get some healthy suggestions.

More on Shannon Portal

A QuickTimeVR panorama of the portal.

The Portal Experience

Here's the most relevant article written on the Portal in the past couple of weeks. It appeared in the Irish Independent.
Now that the Portal's exhibition is nearly over, a brief overview of people's interactions with it can be seen here.
The images "donated" by people to the Portal Gallery can be seen here.

The Portal Up and Running at Shannon Airport

The Portal is finally up and running in the transit lounge of Shannon Airport. A lot of interesting interactions around it and very positive feedback so far!

Well Done Italy!

Portal getting ready for Shannon Airport

So, this is it. On Tuesday, the contraptions we've built will move to Shannon. As the core team is now quite [too] small, we will probably ask all IDC:ers to help out at some stage.

ICAD2006

Last week, Cyberviking and Braz were at ICAD2006 in London. Apart from presenting our paper, this year's competitive activity was to sonify a number of concepts:

• Communism


• Red


• Drama


• Diversity


• A Pint


• A Dragon


• C'mon England

The results of Group I can be heard here.

NomadS Seminar: Supporting Mobile Work: Approaches to designing technology

On Thursday, MAy 25th, the NomadS project hosted an open seminar: "Supporting Mobile Work: Approaches to designing technology". The seminar was aimed at discussing how the design of novel technological tools could improve the lives of "nomadic" workers. The seminar was sponsored by the NomadS through its funding bodies, Science Foundation Ireland and IRCSET. The seminar saw presentations of the work conducted on NomadS, and the participation of an invited speaker: Dr. Monika Buscher, University of Lancaster (UK).

Monika is an ethnomethodologist, ethnographer and designer interested in the study of people's practical action and the design of innovative technologies. She works with landscape architects, health professionals, patients, software designers, industrial designers, and sociologists, currently in a project called PalCom, which is part of the EU’s 6th Framework Programme.

Monika's talk was entitled "Extreme nomads: Mobility and embodied conduct in emergency teamwork".
Emergency situations demand fast, effective creation/preparation/maintenance of many different work places and connecting routes under often extremely chaotic conditions. It requires collaboration between diverse actors. Police, fire services, and medical personnel need to secure the scene, create access routes and ensure they are kept free, categorise, treat and transport victims, handle hazardous materials or deal with contamination, and coordinate work with emergency service personnel in emergency vehicles, dispatch centres, and hospitals. Communication is crucial, but often difficult under immense time pressure, in extremely complex and often dangerous settings. Embodied conduct plays a crucial role for communication and the coordination of mobility and the creation/preparation/maintenance of workplaces and routes. In this paper I discuss ethnographic observations from training exercises for major incidents and some prototypes for technological support for communication and coordination in emergency situations with a focus on the role of embodied conduct.

Thanks to all who participated!

Change

It's been a good day. Interesting seminar from Nomands project.
We all need to start to prepare [realise] that the IDC this autumn will be a different place, as almost half of the postgrads finish or bugger off. My ultimate fear is that I'll be the only techie left. I'll have nobody to talk to [or few].
Perhaps I should get a real job and develop Irish Homeland Security ;-)

Celeritas

This past week we had a hack-fest. Tyndall's latest motes with inertial measurement units were tested together with MAX/MSP for the purpose of creating the Celeritas composition.

Todd, Cian, Cindy, Andy

Steve, Giuseppe, Cindy

Mike 30

Great party! Good fun!

IDC Poll 25 January 2006: Movies and Celebrities

Looks like the IDC people are up there with A-B-C and D list celebrities, and have featured in a number of movies!

Appearances of IDC folks can be found in "Braveheart", "Michael Collins" (which also features Daniel's coat), and "a low-budget movie while Summering in the Hamptons in 1998". The wonderful walking skills of IDC people were also put to use in "walking past in the background" scenes in two German films (unknown titles) in Berlin 2000, and in a "people strolling down the street" scene for "Law & Order" in 2005.

Besides the silver screen and TV appearances, the world of theatre has been invaded by an IDC presence. Dr. Gabriela Avram recounts: " I had a part in a theater play when I was 6. I played about 30 times on a real stage (Timisoara National Theatre), with top class actors, in an excellent play. I was impersonating the daughter of a famous Romanian writer, and I was chosen not because I was cute or smart, but because I had the same name as hers!"

As for celebrity sightings, the juicy list includes: Madonna, Mel Gibson, Nicky from Westlife (met by Darragh at one of their concerts), Ian Dempsey, Alan Rickman, Bertie, Prince Albert (ask Tony), Thandie Newton (ER, "Crash", "Mission: Impossible II"), Jewel Staite (Kaylee from Firefly/Serenity), Faye Dunaway (Gabriela thinks it was her) Bill Gaver, Liam Bannon and Mikael Fernström (met by several IDC members in a number of occasions).

Xmas Party!

Thanks to Gamel for the nice photographs!!!!

"Hedonic Computing" by Dr Barry Brown

Dr. Barry Brown of the Dept. of Computer Science, University of Glasgow has visited the IDC and has given a talk on Monday, November 28th on “Hedonic computing: the computer science of leisure and enjoyment”, followed by open discussion.
Abstract:
This talk explores the opportunities for a ‘hedonic computer science’. Within many parts of computer science there has been a subtle change in approach: from video conferencing to mobility, from flight simulators to video games, from artificial intelligence to A-life. These changes open opportunities for a computer science that is as concerned with enjoyment as much as it is with formalism.  I discuss how we might take leisure seriously as a goal within computer science.  In particular, I discuss three examples of playful technologies - a piece of RCA designed furniture known as the ‘drift table’, an online virtual environment called There, and a collaborative tourism system we have designed. These examples suggest how we might build systems differently to support activities such as wasting time, sociability and enjoyment.

Barry Brown, Equator Research Fellow, Dept. of Computing Science, Uni. of Glasgow

Survival and Demos

Over the past couple of weeks we did it all. The SFI review and then Science Day. Thanks to all brilliant IDC postgrads and staff, it worked. If any of our efforts will bring more resources and more science and technology graduates in the future, it was worth it.
Keep on hacking...

Some Shots from Mikael's surprise party

Thanks to Gabriela, we have these lovely shots taken last week at Mikael's surprise party for his 50th birthday. Happy Birthday again from all in the IDC as it wouldn't be the same without you.

Fivezero experience

So this is it. It’s been a very intense day. The Amazing IDC really got me. I didn’t think it was possible to catch me off-hand like this, but they did. I was aware that there was The Mysterious Flash piece in progress (after walking into the lab and everybody standing around Ian’s desk pretending to whistle). The rest, I wasn’t prepared for.
As I had said before, my expectation was to keep on working and do the fivezero another day, so when the surprise happened, I found myself having very disparate feelings. The Working Man was very angry for getting his schedule wrecked, the Human Man was really wobbly, and in between those two my brain was trying to figure out what the hell to do. I guess I’ll live to see the photos.
I would just like to thank all the lunatics in the IDC asylum, the Masters students on the Insane Media course, and everybody else who made this day a – SURPRISE.
Still, I find it pleasing that I got to the IDC blog first ;-)