Presentation at SMC 2025
Written on August 6th, 2025 by AH
Tim-Tarek Grund presented our paper “Cloud hands: Three Emanations of a Touchless Musical Assemblage” at the Sound and Music Computing Conference (SMC) 7.-12.7.2025 in Graz (AT).
Title: “Cloud hands: Three Emanations of a Touchless Musical Assemblage”
Authors: Tim-Tarek Grund (mdw–Universität für Music und darstellende Kunst Wien), Alex Hofmann (University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna)
Abstract:
Touchless control of human-computer interfaces in science-fiction has inspired several musical applications. This paper presents Cloud Hands, a touchless musical assemblage that controls sample-based granular synthesis via hand motion. The paper discusses how the assemblage manifests in three emanations: as a sound interface, a digital music instrument and an interactive multimedia composition. A dedicated Python script extracts the hand landmark positions and distances from a camera frame, which are mapped to control parameters of granular synthesis of a sample in Pure Data. A Wekinator patch may extract symbolic hand poses to change samples and playback speed. The emanations use varying modes of visual feedback, from no feedback at all to wire-frame models of the hand to sound material-related segmentation of video material as a reference map. Performance recollections from the first author and other users of Cloud Hands are analyzed in order to identify conveniences and constraints of the sensing technology, mapping, and sound production. Finally, the paper discusses the influence of conveniences and constraints on aesthetics, form and performance behavior.
Full Paper download: pdf
