Author: Zixi Wen
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Switching Direction
For days I kept thinking about why I was stuck on this Bela drum machine. Maybe the issue was in the IDE or the environment, but I couldn’t solve it. If that’s the case, I should consider other options. But even while working on the film scoring project, I kept thinking about the drum machine.…
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Troubleshooting
In class we worked with sensors and accelerometers. Afterwards, I asked Milo about my drum machine problem. He checked both my hardware and software and said there was no obvious issue, so the problem must be somewhere else. We first suspected the cable, but after changing cables, the buttons still didn’t respond. Milo swapped my…
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First Direction
Today in class we discussed ideas for the audio paper and I was inspired by how sound can reflect political structures. One example from a classmate involved the sound system of North Korea and how authority shapes what people can hear. I shared my initial idea about Mongolian throat-singing because I am fascinated by its…
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Bela Drum Machine Attempt
Today I tried building a drum machine at home. I finished the hardware first, then moved on to software. I wrote a small C++ program for Bela to recognize each button, and used Pure Data to control the sample and-button. The PD patch ran perfectly on its own, but once I connected the hardware (breadboard…
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Recording Foley & Rethinking Direction
Han and I went into the Foley studio today. I helped her record first while also observing what materials were available on the shelves. By helping someone else, I realized how much Foley depends on communication, too loud, wrong mic position, wrong surface…everything affects the recording. We completed most of the Foley work in Pro…
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Film Clip & First Foley Attempt
Jessica asked us to bring a film clip that interests us. I chose Himizu by the Japanese director Sion Sono. The whole film explores the emotional state of young people after the 2011 East Japan earthquake. I think this film is incredible—there’s so much room for emotional scoring, and also a lot of potential for…
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Film Clip & First Foley Attempt
Jessica asked us to bring a film clip that interests us. I chose Himizu by the Japanese director Sion Sono. The whole film explores the emotional state of young people after the 2011 East Japan earthquake. I think this film is incredible—there’s so much room for emotional scoring, and also a lot of potential for…
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Week1: Fluid Listening Practice
This week we had about thirty minutes of recording practice. At the beginning, we sat in different spots and used ourselves as a reference point to sense sounds coming from all directions, then drew what we heard. Later, Kristy and I took turns using the Zoom H4 and a hydrophone. We placed the hydrophone into…
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Patch Architecture Overview
The full patch was structured around three voices: percussion, harmony, and modulation. The drum section included Glee, KickBaba, and Hihat, triggered via a 12×16 Gate Sequencer. The harmonic section used ChordCV, FM-OP, and a basic VCO, all processed through reverb and delay before mixing via MixMaster. The modulation section featured multiple LFOs, chaotic CV sources,…
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Week 28 – Improvised Audio-Visual Composition: Scoring Practice
This week’s session focused on improvising sound to moving image. I worked independently on two short film clips, each around 3–5 minutes. Each was played twice, with time in between for reflection and revision. I used Ableton Live for both pieces. For the second clip, taken from The Conversation (1974), I focused on recreating the…