We get the “where do I go to learn this stuff” question a lot in the inbox. With Max for Live coming later this year, bringing the powers of Max to Ableton Live, I imagine the hunger for knowledge on that tool will be all the greater. (At the same time, I think the growing popularity of DIY tools means that it won’t make alternative tools like SuperCollider, Pd, Csound and the like less popular — I think we’ll see a growing trend toward all of these tools, provided we can show folks how to use them and get better at them ourselves!)

I know one route that has been successful for many people is the coursework at Harvestworks, the storied research and study center in New York. I can heartily endorse this one and say that, while I know and am friends with all the faculty, I have absolutely no investment in this. Dafna Naphtali, Hans Tammen, and Zach Seldess will all be teaching week-long intensives at Harvestworks in Manhattan. They’re not cheap – $1275 for the whole week – but I know some people have even flown to New York from other parts of the world to study up.

And what does all this mean? Well, it means you can turn Street Fighter, the game, into an improvisational ballet as instructor Zachary Seldess has done (above). Among other things, of course.

If it’s all out of your budget, don’t worry; we’ll have some other learning resources for you soon. But for those of you who can take the plunge, here are some details:

(apologies for copy-and-paste, which I always smugly say I don’t do, but I’m in a rush)

HARVESTWORKS DIGITAL MEDIA ARTS CENTER, NEW YORK

—–> MAX/MSP/JITTER FULL WEEK INTENSIVE COURSE

Dafna Naphtali / Zachary Seldess / Hans Tammen
Mondays through Fridays 10am to 6pm
Section A: March 23 through 27
Section B: August 31 through September 4

Cost: $1275 (incl. Harvestworks Membership)

Location: Harvestworks (http://www.harvestworks.org)
596 Broadway #602
New York City, NY 10012 (at Houston St)
Subway: F/V Broadway/Lafayette, 6 Bleecker, W/R Prince

From its central SoHo location in New York City, Harvestworks brings together innovative practitioners from all branches of the digital arts, and provides a vital context and catalyst for creativity in the field. For the last thirty years we have offered artists on-site recording studios, programming services, workshops, classes and one-on-one tutorials in emerging technologies supporting the pioneers of computer music with equipment and instruction. As a tool for artists, Max has been a central part of the Harvestworks program for almost 20 years. We offer regularly scheduled year-round classes and workshops on a wide variety of topics relating to Max/MSP and Jitter; as well as our Certificate Program, a flexible course of one-on-one instruction.

Now, Harvestworks is offering a full-week, 40hr crash course in the basics of Max/MSP and Jitter, run by veteran Max programmer Dafna Naphtali, Harvestworks engineer and teacher Zachary Seldess, and Harvestworks’ Deputy Director Hans Tammen. The course is designed for beginners who want to get a head start with this software package. The course may be especially appealing to artists living outside of New York City who don’t have the opportunity to learn Max in their own hometown and who would enjoy a week in New York City.

The cost of the course is $1200, plus $75 for the annual Harvestworks membership that is required to take the course. The courses are Mondays through Fridays 10am to 6pm. Working in our computer lab after 6pm can also be arranged. Lecture demonstrations will alternate with practice time, and some of our Max-savvy interns can be available to assist during practice time. Workstations with Max/MSP/Jitter will be available, but it is also recommended that you bring your own laptop. The course will provide lots of practice and sample patches. Students enrolled in Max/MSP/Jitter related classes at Harvestworks are eligible for Cycling 74’s educational discount when purchasing the software. The course is limited to 10 students.

We will not provide meals or snacks for the course, but can point to lots of cheap dining places in the neighborhood. We also cannot provide accommodations, but can help with posting requests or bringing you in contact with other artists who might be able to help.

To sign up for the course, or if you have further questions, please call Hans Tammen at 212-431-1130 ext 13, or go to our webstore at
http://www.harvestworks.org/cms/index.php/Classes/Classes-new.html
In his interview on Cycling74’s website, Hans Tammen gives a few insights into Max teaching at Harvestworks: http://www.cycling74.com/story/2008/9/15/113650/347

MAX CRASH COURSE OUTLINE:

Day 1 – The Basics: Objects vs. messages vs. comments; ordering of operations; math in Max; scaling and mapping ranges of numbers; playing sound files.
Day 2 – Basics of modular programming; live audio input; recording sound files; simple data storage.
Day 3 – Controlled chaos; useful GUI objects; more data storage; basics of synthesis.
Day 4: Interfacing with the outside world. Overview of MIDI, the HI object (game controllers), Wii controller, the Harvestworks Sensor Station, using a Wacom tablet. Wireless Miditron. Data storage.
Day 5: Introduction to Jitter: Jitter matrix; basic matrix processing; playing and basic manipulation of QuickTime movies; basics of Open GL.

INSTRUCTOR BIOS:

DAFNA NAPHTALI has been a Max teacher and programmer at Harvestworks since 1995. She earned a degree in Music Technology at NYU. She was Chief Engineer of the NYU Music Technology Studios until 1998, and has taught Max there as an adjunct instructor since 1996. Naphtali is also an academic advisor for both undergraduate and graduate students in NYU’s Music Technology program. She was a programmer for two years for many artists and her own projects at multi-channel sound gallery Engine 27. As a composer, writing custom Max/MSP programs since 1992 has enabled her to perform and compose using her laptop-based noise/audio processing “instrument” to alter the sound of her singing, vocalisms, personalized recordings as well as the sound of any musician playing with her. She has received commissions and awards from New York Foundation for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, Meet the Composer, Experimental TV Center, American Composers Forum, Brecht Forum, and has held residencies at STEIM (Holland), Music OMI and iEAR at Rensselaer Polytechnical Institute. http://www.dafna.info

ZACHARY SELDESS currently works at Harvestworks as a resident Programmer/Teacher, and at Brooklyn College CUNY as adjunct faculty. He also works at The CUNY Graduate Center’s New media Lab creating interactive virtual sound environments in 3D Game Space using the Torque Game Engine and Max/MSP. He is currently pursuing a PhD in composition at The Graduate Center CUNY where his primary teachers are Amnon Wolman and Morton Subotnick. Previously he worked as a performer, composer, private teacher and adjunct professor at Wilbur Wright College and Harold Washington College in Chicago. As a composer, Zachary has collaborated with artists in many mediums including theater, dance, film, and poetry. He spends much of his time these days creating interactive media artwork, particularly within the Max/MSP/Jitter programming environment. Programming projects include work with Jane Rigler on Manhattan New Music Project’s “Music Cre8tor”, a sensor/software music-creating interface for developmentally challenged children.
http://www.zacharyseldess.com/

HANS TAMMEN is currently Deputy Director at Harvestworks, and is responsible for the oversight of all projects related to Max/MSP/Jitter and Physical Computing, as well as managing the education program and the studios. In this position he encounters the projects of approx. 250 clients, students and Artist In Residence per year. After an initial degree in Adult Education in 1988 he taught as an adjunct at Kassel University, and as part of his works as a union technology consultant from 1992 to 2000 he held about 120 one to five-day seminars using modern seminar techniques like metaplan, role-plays, and others. As a composer/guitarist he is best known for his “Endangered Guitar” works, interfacing his guitar with Max/MSP. Signal To Noise called his works “…a killer tour de force of post-everything guitar damage”, All Music Guide recommended him: “…clearly one of the best experimental guitarists to come forward during the 1990s.” http://www.tammen.org.

How 2.0: Pipe Organ Chair from My Home 2.0 DIY on Vimeo.

Pipe Organ Chair Project Page

The other project, by way of the multi-talented Allison Lewis (the creator of SWITCH, a DIY show for young women, and some brilliant fashion + technology work), is a wall harp. Think infrared sensors plus MIDI, using the MidiTron kit by Eric Singer, which is seen regularly around these here parts.

How 2.0: Build a Digital Wall Harp from My Home 2.0 DIY on Vimeo.

I wish that, in addition to the DIY portions, they had spent more than two or three seconds documenting the results. But I think this may be in New York, so maybe I’ll have to go over there and try it out myself.

If you’ve got your own favorite projects involving pipes or infrared sensors, let us know. And maybe this will inspire some of your own work.

Side note to Verizon: please stop torturing us poor New Yorkers with how awesome Verizon FIOS is when we can’t get it. Hurry up with that build-out, already. I can send you my address. You can come over with the fiber optic cable today, even; I’m pretty good with a wire crimper.

Eric Singer, creator of musical robots and maestro of LEMUR, the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots, has unveiled a new wireless sensor-to-MIDI interface. It’s quite a bit pricier than the non-wireless MIDI models at US$495, but the payoff is a complete kit for wireless performance that promises to be resistant to both latency and interference. The receiver can be connected via either USB or MIDI, and the sensor unit has 20 inputs which you can mix and match as up to 10 analog ins and 20 digital ins. Put the sensor/transmitter unit wherever you like, then transmit data wirelessly to the receiver — so the sensors could be strapped to a dancer while a computer or synth receives the data elsewhere.

I hope to have a hands-on demo soon, but in the meantime, here are the specs — just in case that wireless project can’t wait any longer.

• Small transmitter (2 5/8″ x 1 1/2″ x 1 1/2″); encloses internal antenna and 9v battery
• Can be worn on body
• 1000 foot range under ideal conditions; several hundred foot range possible even with obstructions
• Uses 900 MHz frequency band for less interference than the increasingly crowded 2.4 GHz band [Ed. What, you don't like interference each time you microwave a burrito, really?]
• Uses highly reliable RF chip set proven in live performance situations
• Eight selectable channels allow eight units to be used simultaneously or channel switching if interference is encountered
• Continuous re-transmit of sensor values virtually eliminates drop-out or lost data
• Very low latency transmit (maximum 7 ms with all sensors enabled)
• Very low latency USB and MIDI output (actual latency system dependent)
• Normal (7-bit) and high (10-bit) resolution analog modes available
• Easily configured with menu-driven programming patch
• No network configuration required as with Bluetooth or WiFi
• Standard MIDI and USB-MIDI input/output ports
• With USB, appears on computer as a standard MIDI device with no special drivers required
• Once configured, can be used as a standalone MIDI device without a computer
• Several interchangeable styles of connector boards allow flexibility in making sensor connections
• Three-pin style connector board allows direct interfacing of popular sensors available from other manufacturers

If you still like wires, the US$149 original MidiTron remains an option (along with, of course, open hardware like the Arduino and such).

Miditron @ Eroktronix

Vanessa from Etsy shot a great video of last month’s Handmade Music, sponsored by CDM, MAKE, and Etsy Labs. See me chatting about the idea and why working with tools like Reaktor and Max/MSP/Jitter is DIY, too, plus Eric Singer demonstrating the Sonic Banana and Slime-o-Tron slime-to-MIDI interface, Herr Professor showing off his portable GP Linux game machine, some ironing board MIDI, and more.

We also get to find out what those rubber gloves with tin foil were: a shock glove, made from the zap-friendly innards of a digital camera. A musical instrument? Phil Torrone from MAKE explains: “It makes a sound! It goes, OW!” Kind of like a Mupp-a-phone for fans of electricity.

“Tinymeat” sums it up: “It’s a motherfrellin Geekfest! How kick ass is that? Very much I must say.”

Via Etsy Blog, which has details on tonight’s event, as well.

Thanks to Vanessa for producing such a fantastic video! Not seen in the video but very popular is the beat blocks tangible music synthesizer, so here’s a repost of that video:

…plus another from Popular Science, which also had a writeup, both of which I missed (though they also missed CDM — I’ll make sure we connect both ways this time!):

Resources and people mentioned in the video:

I did a project with Reaktor and Max/MSP/Jitter (sound with the former, visuals with the latter)
Eric Singer, creator of the Sonic Banana and Slime-o-Tron (see projects
MidiTron, the real-world-to-MIDI interface he used to build those projects
Lemurplex, which teaches classes on doing this sort of thing in Brooklyn, NY.
LittleGPTracker is the tracker program for the Linux GP game platform (see the GP2x wiki
Ranjit Bhatnagar, artist of sound and other things, did the ironing board. He’ll be at the BENT Festival here in NY this weekend. He used Plogue Bidule for MIDI and sound-processing tasks.

We had a fantastic time last night in Brooklyn at the first “handmade music” event at Etsy Labs, sponsored by DIY seller site Etsy.com, MAKE Magazine, and yours truly and Create Digital Music. Instead of doing long, formal presentations, we decided to set everything up “science fair” style so people got a chance to play and chat. The results exceeded our most optimistic expectations for our “pilot” event. (MAKE will continue to do this on other themes, and I’ll be helping them and will keep working on getting together music and motion folks, as well.)

Thanks to all the CDMers who came out. We had I think nearly 100 people there through the course of the evening, drawing from CDM, MAKE, Etsy, the NYC blogosphere, and beyond — a whole lot of people were new to this kind of stuff. Welcome! For those of you in other parts of the world, well, we’ll just have to do a world tour. In the meantime, here’s a quick round-up of some of the projects.

Crisp Shirts AND Music!

Ranjit Bhatnagar teaches students at Parsons to build alternative instruments and creates his own interactive art and musical gadgets. He showed off his MIDI Ironing Board, which controlled interactive music patches using heat sensors. Iron normally, and via Plogue Bidule for data patching magic, your ironing is translated into music.

More Music with Blocks

Jeff Hoefs showed his Beat Blocks, co-created with Stijn Schiffeleers and Greg Zifcak, a tangible synthesizer based on striped blocks of wood. It was probably the most popular interactive plaything of the evening, as visitors were fascinated by putting together grooves using objects. Here at CDM, of course, we’re quite accustomed to various variations on the “blocks as musical interface theme”, but this one is quite effective.

Via djukami on Flickr, here’s a YouTube video (I think shot at the event — nice speedy uploading, mate!):

Musical Seafood and MIDI DIY Kit

Eric Singer, founder of the League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots (LEMUR), showed off a number of projects including the gooey tangible interface Slime-o-Tron and an in-progress musical fish (shown here), along with his famed Sonic Banana (basically flex sensors in a tube). What’s especially cool about Eric’s involvement is that he was able to offer a solution for building your own projects, his MidiTron interface. That’s the MidiTron, connected to the fish so it can be used with MIDI. The MidiTron should probably be on your short-list for project-building with sensors, along with the MIDIsense and serial-over-USB (or Bluetooth, or Ethernet) Arduino, as seen on this site and our sister site Create Digital Motion.

Eric is also the founder of Lemurplex, a great Brooklyn facility for learning about this stuff. Along with Manhattan’s Harvestworks), New Yorkians have lots of opportunities to take classes without enrolling in a university. We’re of course developing more materials here on CDM which should complement the in-person classes and workshops at various venues internationally.

Open-Source Basslines

Limor Fried showed off her wildly-popular x0xb0x, the fantastic open-source TB-303-inspired synth. She was in an especially good mood because she just got in some parts for the next batch. (The x0xb0x is a victim of its own popularity: expect a backorder.) I had hoped to see more of the MIDIsense, a sensor-to-MIDI board family, but updated boards will be coming soon as Limor plows through her enormous stack of cool electronics projects. Stay tuned. (Why do we need more than one board? Because different projects are sometimes better suited to different boards.)

Extra Goodness

Also seen at the evening: a glove that … um … zaps stuff (never did get to see that in action), a phonograph made out of Lego blocks, a box of virtual fireflies, a GP2X playing glitched-out tracker music. I was representing for software DIY, with a custom synth built in Reaktor, and Jitter patches that converted audio inputs to morphing, blue 3D visualizations and motion into liquid-like video art. (I’ll talk more about those projects and how to build similar patches at a later date, once I’ve polished those project files.) If you were responsible for any of these other projects I didn’t cover — or something else I missed — do get in touch.

Missed this Event?

Drop us a line and let us know if you have a project you’d like to bring to a future date; we’ll definitely have more of these. And if you’re interested in hosting a similar get-together in your neck of the woods, we’d love to hear about that, as well!

Coverage Elsewhere

All my pictures are in a Flickr set:

Musicmakers @ Etsy Labs

If you’ve got Flickr snaps of your own, just send them to the Create Digital Music pool to make sure we see them:

Create Digital Music Flickr pool

Phillip from MAKE has done his own, terrific writeup with links and snaps. It’s on CRAFT, too, so crafty people don’t miss out (we’re all one, big, happy DIY family):

Handmade music night! (photos) [MAKE/Craft]

Handmade Music photo set [Phillip Torrone on flickr]

TK Accidental has a lovely write-up for NYC Metroblogging, with some reflections on the event:

In a world where a subculture or a niche market can constitute a great number of people, exciting things start to happen. No matter who you are and what you like, there’s a group of people out their who like the things you do. It’s both comforting and exciting to meet those people, to be able to express yourself and be met with a nod of understanding. When you can do that, and play with a Frankensteinian Speak & Spell, well, you’re really living the good life.

Amen! And he has a photo of me looking like I’m using my Edirol MIDI keyboard to hack into the defense mainframe, which is a nice bonus. See also his Flickr set, including Phil Torrone with a sonic banana.

wwward.expressions also has good things to say about geeky get-togethers in general: “What really drives me about these gatherings is the energy that all these inventors bring together.”

Eric Skiff captures some of the more grotesque moments of the evening in his Flickr set, including dead conjoined mice (MAKE: Taxidermy?) and gratuitous slime shots. Brilliant work, Eric.

Thursday March 22, we’ll be having the first informal get-together for a regular series of events, and we’d love to have you there. (Note that I went with the music angle to keep things simple, but motion-y projects are equally welcome.)

Musicmakers @ Etsy
Hosted by MAKE and Create Digital Music

Join us for an evening of handmade music technology, from DIY, open source, and custom hardware to handcrafted code and patches. Bring your own projects (in-progress or complete) for an informal show and tell, or just come to check out what other people are doing and learn how to get started in DIY music yourself. Phillip Torrone from MAKE, now housed in the Etsy Labs, and Peter Kirn from Create Digital Music will be on-hand with music projects and kits you can make and connections to online communities for music tech DIYers. We’re building a series of regular meetings for makers in the NYC area, with a first concert planned for later in the spring. Experts and newcomers welcome.

Thursday, 3/22
7:00 pm – whenever
At Etsy Labs in downtown Brooklyn, near the Manhattan bridge (more about Etsy Labs)

Think show-and-tell rather than formal presentations, so if you’ve got something that’s half-finished and barely working, please bring it. (I imagine that’s what I’ll have!) And if you just want to look, we’re happy to have you stop by. Rather than respond in comments, chat about the event, share any projects you might bring, ask for subway tips, and let me know if you can help document, over on the CDM forum:

Calling all NYC-area folks!

If you’re coming, just drop a quick note to rsvp@etsy.com

Updated: Bananas, MidiTrons, Slime! Via MAKE, here’s one celebrity music maker who will be there: …Eric Singer, founder and director of LEMUR: League of Electronic Musical Urban Robots (http://lemurbots.org) will show the MidiTron (http://www.miditron.com), the Sonic Banana and the Slime-o-tron. (Don’t say “I don’t know” on that last one.)

Not in the NYC area? Fret not! Join our virtual Etsy community, stay tuned for more CDM community stuff, and let us know if you’ve got an idea for an event in your corner of the world. (CDM Australian and Japanese tours, for instance, must happen.)

Now, the good news: the software for programming the board is now available for Windows, and it’s much faster and more reliable than its previous python-based iteration:

Windows MIDIsense software [ladyada's ranting, which has lots of other cool stuff]
Sourceforge downloads [Windows and Mac versions, source]

The software is essential even if you intend to use the board with hardware rather than software, because it lets you configure ranges and MIDI assignments for each sensor. I suspect the source code may be useful to you power users out there programming your own custom MIDI projects. Limor says the C++ code is on its way to Mac soon; in the meantime, the existing version works — the C++ version will only work better, when available.

Incidentally, since a reader recently asked, the one thing this board won’t do is send outputs, like driving LEDs or motors. For that, you’ll need something like Eric Singer’s MidiTron board, which is more expensive ($150 instead of $50) but will better suit some projects. If you’re in the NY area, you can learn more about the MidiTron at Lemurplex in Brooklyn.

I do like the MIDIsense, though, as a quick, simple sensor-reading board. See previous CDM coverage and the article I wrote in MAKE 07 for more, and watch for an upcoming project in a future MAKE (more on that soon). And for the patient, see Limor’s flickr screen for a glimpse of what’s in store for MIDIsense: more inputs, and for the first time, outputs. That’s great news, because while I like Eric’s board, it’d be even better to have an open source alternative so you can make modifications.

MIDI Primer in Make 07; Online Guide to MIDI Hardware, Software, and Data

Sensors-to-MIDI with the MIDIsense Board

Unusual controllers for performance (tablets to game controllers)

Cool Max projects (flaming sound organs to musical punching bags)

Essential Max tools (my favorite add-ons and upgrades)

It’s everything you need to start making weird, futuristic music and art. Well, not quite everything, but enough to blow my mind, anyway. I’m planning more online tutorials and possibly another print follow-up soon, so stay tuned!

Unusual Controllers for Use with Max

Part of the fun of using Max is that it’s easy to manage incoming data from devices in performance — not only the usual items (keyboards, drum pads), but unusual controller, as well. In particular, you’ll want to take a look at the built-in “hi” object (human interface), which enables use with a broad range of USB devices, even if not intended for music. More resources from CDM:

Guitar Hero PlayStation Guitar Controller, a prime target for Max hacking

The P5 Data Glove is an inexpensive game controller that works especially well with Max (even though one of my colleagues insists on using it with Macromedia’s Director, which is trickier)

Wacom Tablet External for using a graphics tablet (only works with OS X, though there are other options, too)

USB-to-real-world sensor interface lets you attach sensors, other devices; as an alternative, my personal favorite device in this category is the real world – to – MIDI device, the US$149 MidiTron

Great Max/MSP Projects

Max is the undisputed champ for designing sophisticated experimental installations, instruments, and other prototypes quickly. Here are a few of my favorites I’ve written up on CDM (some combining Max with other software):

Musical punching bag / disco floor

Minority Report-like Virtual Reality Environment (shown at top, navigating the NYC skyline)

Flaming Propane-powered Pyrophone Organ Game (shown below)

String Thing fretless cello-like instrument

Turntable Art

Turntable-Controlled Vibrating Chaise Longue

Coal-Powered, Steam-Driven Power Plant Music plus further details of interfacing coal-powered hardware with laptops

More Max Tools

Worth adding to your arsenal:

Jitter 1.5 and Max/MSP 4.5.5: Starting with the mothership, here’s why you should upgrade to the latest version

Game sound objects for emulating Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Coleco Sound

Cycling ‘74 distributes the Lemur multi-touch control surface, ideal for Star Trek-like control of Max patches; see recent update to the software

Tap.Tools is my favorite Max add-on; an indispensible collection of time-savers at a really low price

Which brings me to my next point: Fabienne’s tutorial will get your feet wet in programming your own circuits, but if you want to skip straight to playing with sensors, consider Eric Singer’s MidiTron, a $149, pre-built board that converts digital and analog sensors to MIDI. With the time you save, you could build, you know, a case. Or have time to make music.

Or you could just skip to buying a pre-built Lunar Module, which, unlike your own handiwork, actually has a warranty.

And of course, that’s the nice thing about all of this: you can start wherever you want, from forging an instrument out of raw iron ore to buying something at the local Guitar Center and everywhere in between.

For the definitive reference to all this sort of stuff, see Tom Igoe’s physical computing page and book.

Updated: Fabienne points out she’s got additional photos, annotated on Flickr with each component labeled. Nicely done!

Flickr breadboard photo stream

Chris O’Shea points us to Ben Hanbury’s project Recycle TV, which combines an old TV set (well, actually, he substituted a picture of one for ease), a Max/MSP patch, and Eric Singer’s real world-to-MIDI interface, the MidiTron. Via copyrighted and open source clips, you can mix together musical phrases constructed from miliseconds-long clips. The beats created are even cooler, perhaps, than the VJ effect of the clips; check out the video. (I especially like those Wookie moments. You’ll see what I mean.)

Best of all, Ben has shared his Max/MSP code; see the project blog. I always like to see how people patch in Max; it’s like a window into different personalities.

As for Ben’s underlying statement about copyright, I’m not entirely sure — he claims the copyrighted text would be public domain because of their age, though I don’t know of any copyright law under which Top Gun would be public domain. On the other hand, Star Wars creator George Lucas (remember him?) was originally inspired by avant-garde filmmakers who raided old film stock. Copyright violations have long been part of the creative process, that’s for sure.