September 30, 2023 • 30 mins
What does it take to synchronize light and sound? Co-creators Rob Jensen and Warren Trezevant, talk about their work creating Sonic Runway, an art installation conceived at Burning Man. Sonic Runway immerses the spectator in colorful synchronized visuals that animate the speed of sound.
Hear the story behind their meticulous creation process, making the exhibit first for Burning Man in 2003 and how its success grew to transform it into a traveling exhibit to sites around the U.S., England, Canada, and finally to a replicated exhibit in Chengdu China.
Listen in as we explore the myriad ways the Sonic Runway has reshaped the perception of sound for thousands of people around the world. Sonic Runway is a communal experience that has left audiences smiling, marveling and connecting with each other. Watch and listen to the Runway in action here.
More visuals and information about this episode can be found at: https://agilevocalist.com/2023/10/01/watching-sound-t…warren-trezevant/
More about Agile Vocalist, including artist biographies, liner notes and additional visual material for every episode can be found on the Agile Vocalist web site.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You know, music is largely about anticipation and
then having that either surpriseor, you know, having your
expectation met about whatthat's going to be.
And one of the you know, thebeat drop is a powerful moment
because it's the thing that'shad all this build up, and then
we're anticipating and thenthere's often a pause and then
there's that moment of arrivalwhen it finally happens and what
(00:21):
you get with the runway is thissort of like you can peek a
half a second or a second intothe future and you can see it
coming.
And so I think that has thiseffect of like adding to the
satisfaction of that arrival,because you now like it's more
than one sense of arrival andyou're kind of like that
satisfaction is being met, wherethe pattern is being realized,
kind of at the moment, all atthe same moment.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Rob Jensen conceived the sonic runway while observing
the effects of sound at Burningman in 2002.
As a visual artist, engineerand musician, rob has always
been drawn to the intersectionof science and art.
Rob's day job also combines artand technology, where he
alternates between animating andengineering.
At Pixar Animation Studios,warren Trezevant enjoys creating
(01:08):
experiences of wonder.
He's brought characters to lifein movies.
As a former animator at PixarAnimation Studios, he also
brings them to life in the realworld with the stroboscopic Toy
Story, zoey Trope, peterHudson's large scale, zoey
Trope's Charon and EternalReturn, as well as the breathing
for Marco Cochran's Revolution.
(01:29):
Listen to this next AgileVocalist episode.
Agile Vocalist is a podcast andblog about sound and the
performing arts with aCalifornia connection.
Welcome and thank you, WarrenTrezevant.
Did I say it correctly?
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And Rob Jensen for joining me here in this episode
talking about sonic runway.
Is it sonic runway or the sonicrunway?
How do you talk about it?
Speaker 3 (01:56):
I always had it just as sonic runway.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Yeah, our friend.
Our friend, when we built thefirst one, joked and said this
is just a sonic runway.
You could tell already therewould be many.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Ah, so that friend was actually telling the future
with the little, with themodifier.
Yeah, a little bit.
When was that comment?
That's an interesting comment.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
That was from 2003,.
Which was when we built thevery first iteration.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Okay, let's, we're going to talk about that first
iteration in a second here, so Iwant to invite both of you to
take a turn, with your own styleand flavor, to talk about the
runway.
How do you describe it in yourown terms?
What is it?
Speaker 3 (02:42):
Yeah, so the sonic runway is a visualization of the
speed of sound.
So it converts audio in realtime and builds a pattern off of
that audio and then moves itdown a series of arches that
form a corridor at the speed ofsound.
So in essence you're kind oflooking at sound waves moving
(03:05):
through space.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
And the arch is.
So the arches are metal, wouldyou?
Are they a special type of?
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, so I was kind of giving the overview.
I can kind of give you more ofthe physical description.
So our most recent installationis in San Jose, california, and
it's in front of City Hall andit is 25 steel arches that are
about 12 feet in diameter andthey are in.
The interior is ring with LEDsand so they are spaced about 18
(03:37):
feet apart and there's 25 ofthem.
So it goes about 435 feet andwhen you're standing in the
runway it creates this kind offeeling of corridor that you're
in, where you can kind of get asense of the light and the
patterns made from the music.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Anything you'd add or say differently?
Rob about that.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
I think that's exactly right.
It's a yeah, I don't know.
I don't have anything to add atthis moment.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Let's have a little fun with it.
If you were to take theexperience of being in the
runway as an analogy, what wouldyou?
What does it feel like?
Does it feel at certain timeslike being in a white water raft
on a river?
Does it feel like wind in atree that you're witnessing?
Does it feel?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
like watching.
It's a little bit of a spacemountain, more than anything
else, where you're on a darkroller coaster kind of going
through lights.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Okay, okay.
What about for you, rob?
Speaker 1 (04:42):
It's very abstract, I think it's to me.
I've always I feel like I oftensee music when I hear it, and
so this is a way of making whatis otherwise invisible visible.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
That's very cool.
And so in the past, before itcame into your hands, which
created its being, what wouldyou see for music?
Would you say, Was it, you know, like scenery and movies or
something else?
Speaker 1 (05:21):
I mean, I've always been attracted to various
depictions that are somewhatliteral of what's going on in
music.
You know I grew up playing theviolin and in the context of an
orchestra.
You're often you know you'relistening very carefully to all
these other parts that arehappening and there's a lot of
paying attention to how all thedifferent pieces fit together.
So I feel like when I, when Ilisten to music, I can feel it
(05:42):
being deconstructed andpresented in different ways.
You know there's a long historyof different forms of art, from
Fantasia up through all thedifferent music videos that are
portraying you know that aretightly coupling visuals to
music, and I'm attracted to theones that are sort of like they
aren't just like here's thisperson singing this song, but
they're sort of a visualdeconstruction of the audio and
(06:05):
so the runway.
I think one of the things thatit does is try our hand at
putting on one visualization ofthat sound and then, in
combination, not just the soundthat you're hearing right now,
but also how that sound movesthrough space, which is
something that I think is whatis unique about the installation
being involved in something,work yourself into the ground
and forget to eat, forget tosleep, because, I mean, that's
(06:28):
the same thing that happens indepression.
No object.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Rob, can you tell the story of how the idea for Sonic
Runway was generated?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Sure, yeah, the idea was born.
Warren and I have been going outto the desert to go to Burning
man for many years now and weused to camp as part of you know
one of the features of Burningman is there are a bunch of
places that are very large-scalesound installations that
usually have DJs that areplaying music that goes
throughout the night, and therewas one afternoon when we were
(07:30):
sitting in front of the speakerstacks.
There it was me and my wife anda couple other people, and
there were thumps of musiccoming from the DJ that were
playing.
And there was a woman who rodeby on her bicycle she was a
little distance away and she wasreally into the music and she
dropped her bike and she starteddancing and she was a really
great dancer.
It was clear that she wasdancing very rhythmically into
(07:50):
the beat, but from where we weresitting she was noticeably
behind the beat, and so werealized of course that's
because it takes a while for allthese thumps that we're hearing
right where we're sitting toreach where she is.
So she was dancing perfectly intime, but offset, and that's a
feature we're familiar with in avariety of circumstances.
You're at a baseball game.
You hear the crack of the bat,or you see the batter swing
(08:10):
before you hear it.
Or if you listening to ThunderStrike, you're used to waiting
to figure out how far away theThunder Clap is, but it's not
something that you've everreally seen, and so we sort of
have this overwhelming sense ofhearing this desert environment,
where it's a big flat plane,there's really a very clean
movement of sound through space,and then realize it would be a
(08:32):
perfect environment to try tocreate a visualization of that,
of that speed moving across.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That's cool and you talked earlier when we first met
about the inclementenvironmental nature, the sand
and the wind and, I would assume, the dryness or the you know
the level of moisture or not inthe air at Burning man.
(09:01):
Can you say something about howit's built to address those
things?
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, there are challenges at just about every
level.
Trying to build an artinstallation at Burning man and
frankly, that's, I think, partof what draws people to do it in
the first place you know, youget a lot of people sort of like
that seems like a sort ofabsurd challenge.
What could we do?
You know, you're off the grid,you're in this totally
inhospitable place that's likeridiculously hot and dry and
there's no services and anythingbut like what if we could do it
(09:27):
, you know.
So yeah, we got after we hadthis idea.
You know, on top of that, whenwe were first building it, you
know, none of us had doneanything with electronics.
We really kind of didn't haveany idea how to build it.
So we like bought a bunch ofbooks and figured it out and got
a group of friends together tobasically figure out how could
we construct such a thing.
And so by the time it was out,you know, we'd like figured out
how to rent a trencher and burycables and solder our own custom
(09:51):
circuit boards together andbuild a little low-pass filter
that would detect variousaspects of the music, and how to
wire that into the DJ board andhow to do networking and all
the things you need to do inorder to create a start
installation.
I think what Burning manprovides that is pretty amazing
is sort of an open canvas andinvitation to build, kind of
whatever you want and a deadline.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
And so I'm just curious when you first brought
it to Burning man and its firstI guess iteration is a safe word
that was what year and how longdid it take to mount it, to get
it going?
Speaker 1 (10:28):
So that was 2003 when we installed the first one.
It was much simpler than thecurrent incarnation.
The first version that we builtwas just a series of strobe
lights that were mounted on topof steel pyramids.
We probably worked on it foreight or nine months, kind of in
our spare time with friends,kind of in our basements and
various places, and then theactual construction of it on
(10:52):
site took three or four daysprobably.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Yeah, something like that.
How many people involved overthose three or four days?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I mean, that was just the core four of us.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, I mean, there was a there's a, there's a core
of people that are sort ofdeeply committed to the project,
and then part of what happensat a place like Burning man is
you get a lot of other peoplewho cycle in and volunteer and
help out.
That's part of the joy ofbuilding such projects, is the
way that it brings peopletogether.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
For that iteration we attached ourselves to a sound
camp.
So this was a camp that wasthere.
They had built speakers, and sothere were other artists who
were building the DJ booth andother artists who were building
the environment and other artpieces around it.
So we were a little communityof people.
So it was really easy forpeople in that community who may
have been working on some ofthe other art pieces to come
(11:42):
over and help us out as we builtit in, because we were, as a
group, trying to build thisoverall experience that the
runway was just a part of.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
You know, we built this version with strobe lights
back in 2003.
And that was very successful,but it really all it showed was
sort of the thump of the basshappening or the kick drum
whenever it happened, and thatworks great when you're like
it's the early 2000s and peopleare blasting trance music and
it's basically like thumb, thumb, thumb, thumb you can see that
rippling down on the strobelights.
Life intervened in the nextdecade.
(12:13):
We had some kids each on eachside and did some other art
projects, but kind of set asidethis idea of the Santa Conway
until much later, when there wassort of an evolution of
technology and also that mademade, made it possible for us to
build a much more interestingversion of the same installation
.
So in 2016, we brought thisfundamental concept back, but
(12:34):
instead of just showing, insteadof just a single strobe light,
there were now 500 LEDs on eachone of these hoops in the way
that Warren was describing, andthat allows a much richer
visualization of the music,because we've got full color and
all kinds of tricks up oursleeves to kind of paint that,
paint that canvas.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
And so that's the current sort of iteration, from
2016 to now.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Right Is the yeah there have been a few different
physical manifestations of it,but the concept has been the
same since then.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
Yeah, Okay Okay, and in the desert we're able to make
it longer, because where it isin San Jose right now, you know
it's in an urban environment,there's a lot of things near it,
but one of the things we didfor in 2016 is we were able to
put it out and it's 1000 feetlong and each of the hoops are
(13:23):
about 30 feet apart, and so it'sa much longer experience and
you really get that sense of thesound waves traveling down the
sonic runway.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Yeah, at the speed of sound.
It takes about a second for agiven beat or a given sound to
travel that 1000 feet.
So you really have a sense.
You know it has a more majesticfeel at that scale.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
So we built the version in 2016 and then, in
2017, we were able to take thatsame version and put it in for
as a temporary installation inSan Jose so that's the same one.
And then we ended up bringing itback that same one out to
Burning man in 2018.
And so, while the physicalmanifestation was the same, we
(14:31):
improved the software and did anumber of things on the
technology side, but the formfactor and the experience was
the same.
And then we were fortunateenough to discover a touring
company called Krios, which isbased in Montreal, and Krios
tours public art, and so whatthey do is they find art pieces
(14:52):
and then they take possession ofthem, and then what they do is
they reach out to city entitiesor other entities that might
want them and take thisportfolio and show them to the
cities, and then the cities canthen select it for exhibition,
and then Krios will go andinstall it, maintain it while
(15:13):
it's up and then take it down.
And this has been really great,because one of the things that
we've seen emerge is this ideaof kind of a winter light
festival.
So a lot of cities will setthings up, and the runway is
perfect for that, because it cango up.
It's a really nice crowdpleaser, it allows people to
walk through it and it reallyhas a nice presence, and so that
(15:37):
is what's touring and that isthe one that's gone to England
in cities throughout Canada andmost recently it was in Ottawa
in Canada, as well as in Raleigh, north Carolina.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
The version that's currently in San Jose.
That version was not intendedto be a permanent installation,
but the folks at San Jose reallyenjoyed the piece, and so they
commissioned us to fabricate aversion that's intended to be a
semi-permanent installation, sothat one we rebuilt from the
ground up, a version that wasmuch more robust and intended to
actually be self-sustaining onthat site.
(16:10):
So that's the version that'scurrently installed in front of
San Jose.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
I got it, and so there's different ways of
talking about this.
There's permanent,semi-permanent and Temporary.
The touring.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
One is intended to be set up quickly and be there for
a week or several weeks andthen taken down and packed back
into a truck, so it's sort ofoptimized for that.
So it comes apart easily, itplugs together easily, but it's
not necessarily intended to besubjected to the weather and the
whatever for an indefiniteperiod of time without
maintenance.
And we've learned a lot.
(16:45):
The challenges of building fora variety of different
environments is something thatwe've faced.
Burning man has its ownchallenges, temporary art
installations have their ownchallenges, and then we've
learned a lot over the lastcouple of years about what it
takes to build a piece that'sintended to really just stand on
its own and operate every nightwith as little maintenance as
possible.
We should probably throw out anhonorable mention for the
(17:07):
installation that was in China.
Those are really interestingexperience, One of the things
that happens Burning man used tobe a thing that nobody ever
heard of, but now it's a thingthat draws somewhat amount of
international attention.
And so our piece caught thenotice of Thomas Thompson, who's
a French expat working in Chinawho does a lot of different
(17:30):
public art installations andevent organization and whatnot.
So he contacted us and said Iwasn't at Burning man, but I
loved your piece and it would beperfect for this thing that
we're building in downtownChengdu for a particular special
event.
And at first we were like Idon't know what's this about,
Some guy in China wants to buildour thing.
But Thomas is really great andhe convinced us that he had the
(17:51):
wherewithal to actually pull itoff.
So it was a really interestingexperience.
I don't know, maybe you want totake over that part.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Sure, I mean, what was really interesting about it
was, because China was so faraway, thomas thought he could
fabricate it in China.
So that was kind of a newconcept for us and so that was
really interesting to sort ofdevelop drawings and get
everything in place and sendthem to China and have them kind
of build everything.
And in this case they built aplatform that the runway was on
(18:22):
and so it had a platform thathad the rings and had all the
LEDs, but it was all fabricatedin China.
And so basically we're workingwith Thomas and his crew and
they were sending us photos andkind of showing us the progress
and we were like that looks good, I guess this is working.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And then we rolled in with a laptop with the software
.
Basically, they got it all upup but they didn't have it
working because they didn't havethe software and the laptop
that was needed to actuallydrive it.
So we like flew in and walkedout and like, try to plug.
Is this going to work?
You know, everything worked outafter a little bit of debugging
, thankfully.
But the other, the other thingthat was really interesting
about that is that he didn'tjust have it up as a, you know,
(19:02):
as a piece people could comecheck, check out, but he
actually organized.
There was a whole event, kindof kickoff event that happened
and, in particular, one thingthat he that he organized was a
fashion show.
It's like, well, it's not justa sonic runway, it's also a
runway runway, and so there werefour different designers that
had their own lines of clothingand it was a big production with
like cameras and everything,and we actually worked with some
(19:24):
of the designers there to buildpatterns of on the LEDs that
complimented the music that wasplaying and also the fashion
that was part of the collection.
Most Burning man projects arebasically labor of love that's
built by the people who arebuilding them for the purpose of
bringing your friends togetherto make something cool.
You know we do.
We did a fundraiser online toraise some of the funds to build
(19:46):
the initial one.
Thankfully, the variousinstallations that have gone out
into public places have more orless paid for themselves.
So we're not like for both ofus.
This is a hobby project that wedo because we enjoy doing it.
It's not really intended to,you know, send our kids to
college or anything.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
Regarding that, I want to take us back for one
second, just because I didn'tgather it is Warren you didn't
talk about.
Can you talk about your, yourconnection to music and sound
from a, you know, from abiographical perspective?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Yeah, so the instrument I played growing up
was cello.
I played that from third gradeto the end of high school.
So I too was in orchestras.
I really enjoy music.
I, you know, listen to music.
I've tried my hand at DJing butit's not something that has
stuck with me.
But I understand it and I kindof can listen to the music and
(20:39):
everything.
The only thing I can think ofthat I really connect with is,
every year since I was I was 18,I make a little music diary of
that year.
I keep track of the my favoritemusic of that year, and then I
make a mix of that music at theend of the year.
And so after my daughter wasborn, I started incorporating
her music and then it becamekind of a birthday present and
(21:01):
went through that.
So you know, and I use softwareto kind of mix, blend things
together and mix them.
And so for me at the moment,music right now is not only
something I enjoy but somethingI use as a little memory device.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Rob, you're a violinist, Warren you're a
cellist, but you're both justbroadly very into music.
Is that a correctcharacterization?
Of your backgrounds?
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Yeah, yeah, and I think, like Rob, I too really
like that synchronizationbetween image and audio.
I really resonate with that,and so when Rob was talking
about the idea, I instantlyunderstood what that meant and
the impact that that can have onpeople.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
There's a period in MTV's history, kind of in the
late 90s, where there was just asort of explosion of really
interesting creative electronicmusic videos that were getting
made.
This is sort of like, you know,the Michelle Gondry era where,
like around the world and therewas a show that would play from
like midnight to one, orsomething called amp on MTV.
(22:09):
That had just like a wholeplethora of really one more
bizarre than the next, but theywere really interesting in that
they were not so much focused onlike a lot of the daytime MTV
stuff is just like look at thispop star, here they are and here
they are in front of a car orwhatever.
This was more like a reallyunique exploration of like sound
(22:29):
and music and that synesthesia.
Some of them were like reallytightly coupled.
Also, like there were thevideos of them by Cold Cut.
There was one that's calledTimber, I think, where it was
like every little sound had itsown visual representation in the
in the video and you couldwatch it all play out and it was
like oh, I can see the music inthe way that it should be seen,
you know.
So those are all definitelyinfluences that have led to
(22:51):
being interested in this topic.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
What do you think it does for people when they
experience it?
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Well, what's interesting is there's no real
clear signage of what the pieceis or what it is.
So a lot of times people willbe walking down the street and
just attracted to this tunnel oflights, and I think a lot of
people to some degree just seeit as this beautiful tunnel of
lights.
But there's this extra layerwhich is, you know, they start
realizing oh wait, the lightskind of match what I'm hearing.
(23:23):
So all of a sudden you feelthis richer experience because
you feel the connection of thesynchronized lights and sound.
And I don't know if it's reallyanyone can figure it out, but
we do have that speed of soundquality.
You're watching sound wavestravel through space, and so
(23:43):
once either people learn that orthey do figure it out, it adds
a whole other layer to theexperience, because then all of
a sudden, you're looking at thespace around you and
understanding that sound wavesare moving through it.
And so if you're and so the waythe runway works is the sound
kind of starts at one end, andso if you're standing at that
end, you see the sound startingand then moving away from you at
(24:07):
the speed of sound.
And what's really neat is ifyou go to the other end and look
at the runway from the end.
You see the sound start at theother end and come towards you
in the lights and then when thelights hit you is when you hear
the sound.
So you have this really amazingexperience of knowing what the
sound is going to be, becauseyou can see the pattern before
(24:28):
you even hear it.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
And that works particularly well with certain
kinds of music whereparticularly a lot of dance
music tracks are built aroundthis idea of there's a, you know
, an initial phase and thenthere's a breakdown, and then
there's a build up and thenthere's kind of like, the beat
drops again.
And one of the neat thingsabout standing at the far end of
the runway is that you know,music is largely about
anticipation and then havingthat either surprise or, you
(24:54):
know, having your expectationmet about what that's going to
be.
And one of the you know thebeat drop is a powerful moment
because it's the thing that'shad all this build up and then
we're anticipating and thenthere's often a pause and then
there's that moment of arrivalwhen it finally happens.
And what you get with therunway is this sort of like you
can peek a half a second or asecond into the future and you
can see it coming.
And so I think that has thiseffect of like adding to the
(25:17):
satisfaction of that arrival,because you now like it's more
than one sense of arrival andyou're kind of like that
satisfaction is being met wherethe pattern is being realized,
kind of at the moment, all atthe same moment.
So as it was set up at Burningman.
We actually did basically justhave a microphone on the front
of it so if nothing else wasgoing on you could walk up to it
and shout it into it and itwould.
(25:38):
Your sound would be propagateddown, and that was.
We saw many people really get agreat kick out of that
Throughout the night.
We also had there were a seriesof large art cars that would
come up and blast music into itand that would overwhelm any
individual voices that peoplewere shouting into it, because
the sound systems are loud andthey kind of take over the
version that's set up.
In San Jose we have running astreaming you know, music
(26:01):
streaming, programming of ourown choice.
It's not picked up themicrophone.
That's for a couple of reasons.
One, the installation can't bethat loud, and so it would.
I think a microphone would getoverwhelmed by, like traffic and
motorcycles and other thingsgoing past.
It's also just like a littletougher in an open urban
environment, you know, to allowpeople to shout into a
microphone and and who knowswhat's going to come out.
(26:22):
That said, we've been workingwith the folks at the city of
San Jose.
They've been scheduling aseries of events that are hosted
at the Sonic Runway down thereand they're really interested in
using it as an ongoing platformfor various performances.
So there have been a number oflive performances that have been
set up and that's reallyrewarding because then you know
people who are playingpercussion or singing or
(26:43):
whatever have an opportunity tolike see their live audio be
projected onto this installation.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
But it is really nice because, like Rob was saying,
we can connect musicians to it,or DJs, and really allow them
the space to put their musiconto the Sonic Runway.
And something we did recentlyis the city of San Jose invited
a bunch of technologists andartists, visual artists and
performers to come down and wewere able to show them kind of
(27:12):
what we're doing with the audioand how we're turning it into
patterns.
And one of the nice thingsabout the runway in San Jose in
its current iteration is weactually have individual control
over the speakers and all theLEDs, and so we were telling
them that you know, puttingpatterns on there and running it
down at the speed of sound isonly one way to use this canvas.
(27:32):
So it was a really fun time toshow this to other people and
just see what kind of ideas theyhad of what they could do with
the runway.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That's exciting, and so anything stand out in your
mind that they shared other waysof approaching, using it.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Well, I think it was really interesting because some
of them were dancers.
So some of them were thinkingof, like, how could they convert
body motion into signals thatthe runway would could pick up?
So that was one.
I think a few video artistswere just trying to understand
how the LEDs were controlled sothey could kind of do different
things with the lights.
So I think, depending on whatart form the person was rooted
(28:11):
in, they had different ideas ofhow they could use the runway.
And that's one of the reallynice things about San Jose is
that it's there for the publicand it's free, so people can
just walk up to it, they canexperience it.
And we've gone down there awhole bunch to watch people in
it and we see whole families gothrough, we see friends walking
(28:33):
through, we see grandparentswith their grandkids, we see
people stopping to take photos,and it really does create this
space that you can be in andjust enjoy the lights around you
.
I always like to describe it asthis tunnel of smiles, because
everyone is just in it and youjust see them smiling and you
see people acknowledging eachother, because you're just there
(28:55):
all enjoying it together.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Yeah, I would think there's sort of two parts of it
for me.
One is definitely like Warrensays, in terms of what the goal
of the piece is.
I think is really to in its.
What we're aspiring for, Ithink, is to create some sense
of awe, and for me that comesfrom a lot of different places,
but at least one of them is isthere one avenue toward that is
(29:20):
making something that waspreviously invisible visible and
or kind of like giving you awindow into this sort of like
amazing universe that we live in.
You know, this is a powerfulforce of nature that none of us
has any control over.
That is just like all thesemolecules bouncing around doing
their thing and like if we canmake somebody stop for a second
(29:41):
and like appreciate that orthink about that for a second,
or just kind of like feel it,even if they don't quite
appreciate it, that to me isworth it.
One of my favorite things to dois to listen to other people
talk about it without themknowing that we're the ones who
created it.
You know, if you like, go downand stand at the end,
particularly at Burning man,there's usually a little gaggle
of people sitting there talkingabout it.
And then you know there'd belike some people being like oh,
(30:01):
what kind of LEDs do you thinkthey use?
And there are the other peopleyou know talking about that, and
then there's usually a couplepeople that are trying to
actually puzzle out, like what'sgoing on, like how does this
work?
You know, sometimes they'lleven explain it to us, which is
like a particular joy.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
That was inspiring.
Get liner notes, guest photos,subscribe to the newsletter and
more at agilevocalistcom.
You know, music is largely about anticipation and
then having that either surpriseor, you know, having your
expectation met about whatthat's going to be.
And one of the you know, thebeat drop is a powerful moment
because it's the thing that'shad all this build up, and then
we're anticipating and thenthere's often a pause and then
there's that moment of arrivalwhen it finally happens and what
(00:21):
you get with the runway is thissort of like you can peek a
half a second or a second intothe future and you can see it
coming.
And so I think that has thiseffect of like adding to the
satisfaction of that arrival,because you now like it's more
than one sense of arrival andyou're kind of like that
satisfaction is being met, wherethe pattern is being realized,
kind of at the moment, all atthe same moment.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Rob Jensen conceived the sonic runway while observing
the effects of sound at Burningman in 2002.
As a visual artist, engineerand musician, rob has always
been drawn to the intersectionof science and art.
Rob's day job also combines artand technology, where he
alternates between animating andengineering.
At Pixar Animation Studios,warren Trezevant enjoys creating
(01:08):
experiences of wonder.
He's brought characters to lifein movies.
As a former animator at PixarAnimation Studios, he also
brings them to life in the realworld with the stroboscopic Toy
Story, zoey Trope, peterHudson's large scale, zoey
Trope's Charon and EternalReturn, as well as the breathing
for Marco Cochran's Revolution.
(01:29):
Listen to this next AgileVocalist episode.
Agile Vocalist is a podcast andblog about sound and the
performing arts with aCalifornia connection.
Welcome and thank you, WarrenTrezevant.
Did I say it correctly?
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And Rob Jensen for joining me here in this episode
talking about sonic runway.
Is it sonic runway or the sonicrunway?
How do you talk about it?
Speaker 3 (01:56):
I always had it just as sonic runway.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Yeah, our friend.
Our friend, when we built thefirst one, joked and said this
is just a sonic runway.
You could tell already therewould be many.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Ah, so that friend was actually telling the future
with the little, with themodifier.
Yeah, a little bit.
When was that comment?
That's an interesting comment.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
That was from 2003,.
Which was when we built thevery first iteration.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Okay, let's, we're going to talk about that first
iteration in a second here, so Iwant to invite both of you to
take a turn, with your own styleand flavor, to talk about the
runway.
How do you describe it in yourown terms?
What is it?
Speaker 3 (02:42):
Yeah, so the sonic runway is a visualization of the
speed of sound.
So it converts audio in realtime and builds a pattern off of
that audio and then moves itdown a series of arches that
form a corridor at the speed ofsound.
So in essence you're kind oflooking at sound waves moving
(03:05):
through space.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
And the arch is.
So the arches are metal, wouldyou?
Are they a special type of?
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, so I was kind of giving the overview.
I can kind of give you more ofthe physical description.
So our most recent installationis in San Jose, california, and
it's in front of City Hall andit is 25 steel arches that are
about 12 feet in diameter andthey are in.
The interior is ring with LEDsand so they are spaced about 18
(03:37):
feet apart and there's 25 ofthem.
So it goes about 435 feet andwhen you're standing in the
runway it creates this kind offeeling of corridor that you're
in, where you can kind of get asense of the light and the
patterns made from the music.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Anything you'd add or say differently?
Rob about that.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
I think that's exactly right.
It's a yeah, I don't know.
I don't have anything to add atthis moment.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Let's have a little fun with it.
If you were to take theexperience of being in the
runway as an analogy, what wouldyou?
What does it feel like?
Does it feel at certain timeslike being in a white water raft
on a river?
Does it feel like wind in atree that you're witnessing?
Does it feel?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
like watching.
It's a little bit of a spacemountain, more than anything
else, where you're on a darkroller coaster kind of going
through lights.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Okay, okay.
What about for you, rob?
Speaker 1 (04:42):
It's very abstract, I think it's to me.
I've always I feel like I oftensee music when I hear it, and
so this is a way of making whatis otherwise invisible visible.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
That's very cool.
And so in the past, before itcame into your hands, which
created its being, what wouldyou see for music?
Would you say, Was it, you know, like scenery and movies or
something else?
Speaker 1 (05:21):
I mean, I've always been attracted to various
depictions that are somewhatliteral of what's going on in
music.
You know I grew up playing theviolin and in the context of an
orchestra.
You're often you know you'relistening very carefully to all
these other parts that arehappening and there's a lot of
paying attention to how all thedifferent pieces fit together.
So I feel like when I, when Ilisten to music, I can feel it
(05:42):
being deconstructed andpresented in different ways.
You know there's a long historyof different forms of art, from
Fantasia up through all thedifferent music videos that are
portraying you know that aretightly coupling visuals to
music, and I'm attracted to theones that are sort of like they
aren't just like here's thisperson singing this song, but
they're sort of a visualdeconstruction of the audio and
(06:05):
so the runway.
I think one of the things thatit does is try our hand at
putting on one visualization ofthat sound and then, in
combination, not just the soundthat you're hearing right now,
but also how that sound movesthrough space, which is
something that I think is whatis unique about the installation
being involved in something,work yourself into the ground
and forget to eat, forget tosleep, because, I mean, that's
(06:28):
the same thing that happens indepression.
No object.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Rob, can you tell the story of how the idea for Sonic
Runway was generated?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Sure, yeah, the idea was born.
Warren and I have been going outto the desert to go to Burning
man for many years now and weused to camp as part of you know
one of the features of Burningman is there are a bunch of
places that are very large-scalesound installations that
usually have DJs that areplaying music that goes
throughout the night, and therewas one afternoon when we were
(07:30):
sitting in front of the speakerstacks.
There it was me and my wife anda couple other people, and
there were thumps of musiccoming from the DJ that were
playing.
And there was a woman who rodeby on her bicycle she was a
little distance away and she wasreally into the music and she
dropped her bike and she starteddancing and she was a really
great dancer.
It was clear that she wasdancing very rhythmically into
(07:50):
the beat, but from where we weresitting she was noticeably
behind the beat, and so werealized of course that's
because it takes a while for allthese thumps that we're hearing
right where we're sitting toreach where she is.
So she was dancing perfectly intime, but offset, and that's a
feature we're familiar with in avariety of circumstances.
You're at a baseball game.
You hear the crack of the bat,or you see the batter swing
(08:10):
before you hear it.
Or if you listening to ThunderStrike, you're used to waiting
to figure out how far away theThunder Clap is, but it's not
something that you've everreally seen, and so we sort of
have this overwhelming sense ofhearing this desert environment,
where it's a big flat plane,there's really a very clean
movement of sound through space,and then realize it would be a
(08:32):
perfect environment to try tocreate a visualization of that,
of that speed moving across.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That's cool and you talked earlier when we first met
about the inclementenvironmental nature, the sand
and the wind and, I would assume, the dryness or the you know
the level of moisture or not inthe air at Burning man.
(09:01):
Can you say something about howit's built to address those
things?
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, there are challenges at just about every
level.
Trying to build an artinstallation at Burning man and
frankly, that's, I think, partof what draws people to do it in
the first place you know, youget a lot of people sort of like
that seems like a sort ofabsurd challenge.
What could we do?
You know, you're off the grid,you're in this totally
inhospitable place that's likeridiculously hot and dry and
there's no services and anythingbut like what if we could do it
(09:27):
, you know.
So yeah, we got after we hadthis idea.
You know, on top of that, whenwe were first building it, you
know, none of us had doneanything with electronics.
We really kind of didn't haveany idea how to build it.
So we like bought a bunch ofbooks and figured it out and got
a group of friends together tobasically figure out how could
we construct such a thing.
And so by the time it was out,you know, we'd like figured out
how to rent a trencher and burycables and solder our own custom
(09:51):
circuit boards together andbuild a little low-pass filter
that would detect variousaspects of the music, and how to
wire that into the DJ board andhow to do networking and all
the things you need to do inorder to create a start
installation.
I think what Burning manprovides that is pretty amazing
is sort of an open canvas andinvitation to build, kind of
whatever you want and a deadline.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
And so I'm just curious when you first brought
it to Burning man and its firstI guess iteration is a safe word
that was what year and how longdid it take to mount it, to get
it going?
Speaker 1 (10:28):
So that was 2003 when we installed the first one.
It was much simpler than thecurrent incarnation.
The first version that we builtwas just a series of strobe
lights that were mounted on topof steel pyramids.
We probably worked on it foreight or nine months, kind of in
our spare time with friends,kind of in our basements and
various places, and then theactual construction of it on
(10:52):
site took three or four daysprobably.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Yeah, something like that.
How many people involved overthose three or four days?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
I mean, that was just the core four of us.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, I mean, there was a there's a, there's a core
of people that are sort ofdeeply committed to the project,
and then part of what happensat a place like Burning man is
you get a lot of other peoplewho cycle in and volunteer and
help out.
That's part of the joy ofbuilding such projects, is the
way that it brings peopletogether.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
For that iteration we attached ourselves to a sound
camp.
So this was a camp that wasthere.
They had built speakers, and sothere were other artists who
were building the DJ booth andother artists who were building
the environment and other artpieces around it.
So we were a little communityof people.
So it was really easy forpeople in that community who may
have been working on some ofthe other art pieces to come
(11:42):
over and help us out as we builtit in, because we were, as a
group, trying to build thisoverall experience that the
runway was just a part of.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
You know, we built this version with strobe lights
back in 2003.
And that was very successful,but it really all it showed was
sort of the thump of the basshappening or the kick drum
whenever it happened, and thatworks great when you're like
it's the early 2000s and peopleare blasting trance music and
it's basically like thumb, thumb, thumb, thumb you can see that
rippling down on the strobelights.
Life intervened in the nextdecade.
(12:13):
We had some kids each on eachside and did some other art
projects, but kind of set asidethis idea of the Santa Conway
until much later, when there wassort of an evolution of
technology and also that mademade, made it possible for us to
build a much more interestingversion of the same installation
.
So in 2016, we brought thisfundamental concept back, but
(12:34):
instead of just showing, insteadof just a single strobe light,
there were now 500 LEDs on eachone of these hoops in the way
that Warren was describing, andthat allows a much richer
visualization of the music,because we've got full color and
all kinds of tricks up oursleeves to kind of paint that,
paint that canvas.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
And so that's the current sort of iteration, from
2016 to now.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Right Is the yeah there have been a few different
physical manifestations of it,but the concept has been the
same since then.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
Yeah, Okay Okay, and in the desert we're able to make
it longer, because where it isin San Jose right now, you know
it's in an urban environment,there's a lot of things near it,
but one of the things we didfor in 2016 is we were able to
put it out and it's 1000 feetlong and each of the hoops are
(13:23):
about 30 feet apart, and so it'sa much longer experience and
you really get that sense of thesound waves traveling down the
sonic runway.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Yeah, at the speed of sound.
It takes about a second for agiven beat or a given sound to
travel that 1000 feet.
So you really have a sense.
You know it has a more majesticfeel at that scale.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
So we built the version in 2016 and then, in
2017, we were able to take thatsame version and put it in for
as a temporary installation inSan Jose so that's the same one.
And then we ended up bringing itback that same one out to
Burning man in 2018.
And so, while the physicalmanifestation was the same, we
(14:31):
improved the software and did anumber of things on the
technology side, but the formfactor and the experience was
the same.
And then we were fortunateenough to discover a touring
company called Krios, which isbased in Montreal, and Krios
tours public art, and so whatthey do is they find art pieces
(14:52):
and then they take possession ofthem, and then what they do is
they reach out to city entitiesor other entities that might
want them and take thisportfolio and show them to the
cities, and then the cities canthen select it for exhibition,
and then Krios will go andinstall it, maintain it while
(15:13):
it's up and then take it down.
And this has been really great,because one of the things that
we've seen emerge is this ideaof kind of a winter light
festival.
So a lot of cities will setthings up, and the runway is
perfect for that, because it cango up.
It's a really nice crowdpleaser, it allows people to
walk through it and it reallyhas a nice presence, and so that
(15:37):
is what's touring and that isthe one that's gone to England
in cities throughout Canada andmost recently it was in Ottawa
in Canada, as well as in Raleigh, north Carolina.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
The version that's currently in San Jose.
That version was not intendedto be a permanent installation,
but the folks at San Jose reallyenjoyed the piece, and so they
commissioned us to fabricate aversion that's intended to be a
semi-permanent installation, sothat one we rebuilt from the
ground up, a version that wasmuch more robust and intended to
actually be self-sustaining onthat site.
(16:10):
So that's the version that'scurrently installed in front of
San Jose.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
I got it, and so there's different ways of
talking about this.
There's permanent,semi-permanent and Temporary.
The touring.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
One is intended to be set up quickly and be there for
a week or several weeks andthen taken down and packed back
into a truck, so it's sort ofoptimized for that.
So it comes apart easily, itplugs together easily, but it's
not necessarily intended to besubjected to the weather and the
whatever for an indefiniteperiod of time without
maintenance.
And we've learned a lot.
(16:45):
The challenges of building fora variety of different
environments is something thatwe've faced.
Burning man has its ownchallenges, temporary art
installations have their ownchallenges, and then we've
learned a lot over the lastcouple of years about what it
takes to build a piece that'sintended to really just stand on
its own and operate every nightwith as little maintenance as
possible.
We should probably throw out anhonorable mention for the
(17:07):
installation that was in China.
Those are really interestingexperience, One of the things
that happens Burning man used tobe a thing that nobody ever
heard of, but now it's a thingthat draws somewhat amount of
international attention.
And so our piece caught thenotice of Thomas Thompson, who's
a French expat working in Chinawho does a lot of different
(17:30):
public art installations andevent organization and whatnot.
So he contacted us and said Iwasn't at Burning man, but I
loved your piece and it would beperfect for this thing that
we're building in downtownChengdu for a particular special
event.
And at first we were like Idon't know what's this about,
Some guy in China wants to buildour thing.
But Thomas is really great andhe convinced us that he had the
(17:51):
wherewithal to actually pull itoff.
So it was a really interestingexperience.
I don't know, maybe you want totake over that part.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Sure, I mean, what was really interesting about it
was, because China was so faraway, thomas thought he could
fabricate it in China.
So that was kind of a newconcept for us and so that was
really interesting to sort ofdevelop drawings and get
everything in place and sendthem to China and have them kind
of build everything.
And in this case they built aplatform that the runway was on
(18:22):
and so it had a platform thathad the rings and had all the
LEDs, but it was all fabricatedin China.
And so basically we're workingwith Thomas and his crew and
they were sending us photos andkind of showing us the progress
and we were like that looks good, I guess this is working.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And then we rolled in with a laptop with the software
.
Basically, they got it all upup but they didn't have it
working because they didn't havethe software and the laptop
that was needed to actuallydrive it.
So we like flew in and walkedout and like, try to plug.
Is this going to work?
You know, everything worked outafter a little bit of debugging
, thankfully.
But the other, the other thingthat was really interesting
about that is that he didn'tjust have it up as a, you know,
(19:02):
as a piece people could comecheck, check out, but he
actually organized.
There was a whole event, kindof kickoff event that happened
and, in particular, one thingthat he that he organized was a
fashion show.
It's like, well, it's not justa sonic runway, it's also a
runway runway, and so there werefour different designers that
had their own lines of clothingand it was a big production with
like cameras and everything,and we actually worked with some
(19:24):
of the designers there to buildpatterns of on the LEDs that
complimented the music that wasplaying and also the fashion
that was part of the collection.
Most Burning man projects arebasically labor of love that's
built by the people who arebuilding them for the purpose of
bringing your friends togetherto make something cool.
You know we do.
We did a fundraiser online toraise some of the funds to build
(19:46):
the initial one.
Thankfully, the variousinstallations that have gone out
into public places have more orless paid for themselves.
So we're not like for both ofus.
This is a hobby project that wedo because we enjoy doing it.
It's not really intended to,you know, send our kids to
college or anything.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
Regarding that, I want to take us back for one
second, just because I didn'tgather it is Warren you didn't
talk about.
Can you talk about your, yourconnection to music and sound
from a, you know, from abiographical perspective?
Speaker 3 (20:17):
Yeah, so the instrument I played growing up
was cello.
I played that from third gradeto the end of high school.
So I too was in orchestras.
I really enjoy music.
I, you know, listen to music.
I've tried my hand at DJing butit's not something that has
stuck with me.
But I understand it and I kindof can listen to the music and
(20:39):
everything.
The only thing I can think ofthat I really connect with is,
every year since I was I was 18,I make a little music diary of
that year.
I keep track of the my favoritemusic of that year, and then I
make a mix of that music at theend of the year.
And so after my daughter wasborn, I started incorporating
her music and then it becamekind of a birthday present and
(21:01):
went through that.
So you know, and I use softwareto kind of mix, blend things
together and mix them.
And so for me at the moment,music right now is not only
something I enjoy but somethingI use as a little memory device.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Rob, you're a violinist, Warren you're a
cellist, but you're both justbroadly very into music.
Is that a correctcharacterization?
Of your backgrounds?
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Yeah, yeah, and I think, like Rob, I too really
like that synchronizationbetween image and audio.
I really resonate with that,and so when Rob was talking
about the idea, I instantlyunderstood what that meant and
the impact that that can have onpeople.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
There's a period in MTV's history, kind of in the
late 90s, where there was just asort of explosion of really
interesting creative electronicmusic videos that were getting
made.
This is sort of like, you know,the Michelle Gondry era where,
like around the world and therewas a show that would play from
like midnight to one, orsomething called amp on MTV.
(22:09):
That had just like a wholeplethora of really one more
bizarre than the next, but theywere really interesting in that
they were not so much focused onlike a lot of the daytime MTV
stuff is just like look at thispop star, here they are and here
they are in front of a car orwhatever.
This was more like a reallyunique exploration of like sound
(22:29):
and music and that synesthesia.
Some of them were like reallytightly coupled.
Also, like there were thevideos of them by Cold Cut.
There was one that's calledTimber, I think, where it was
like every little sound had itsown visual representation in the
in the video and you couldwatch it all play out and it was
like oh, I can see the music inthe way that it should be seen,
you know.
So those are all definitelyinfluences that have led to
(22:51):
being interested in this topic.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
What do you think it does for people when they
experience it?
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Well, what's interesting is there's no real
clear signage of what the pieceis or what it is.
So a lot of times people willbe walking down the street and
just attracted to this tunnel oflights, and I think a lot of
people to some degree just seeit as this beautiful tunnel of
lights.
But there's this extra layerwhich is, you know, they start
realizing oh wait, the lightskind of match what I'm hearing.
(23:23):
So all of a sudden you feelthis richer experience because
you feel the connection of thesynchronized lights and sound.
And I don't know if it's reallyanyone can figure it out, but
we do have that speed of soundquality.
You're watching sound wavestravel through space, and so
(23:43):
once either people learn that orthey do figure it out, it adds
a whole other layer to theexperience, because then all of
a sudden, you're looking at thespace around you and
understanding that sound wavesare moving through it.
And so if you're and so the waythe runway works is the sound
kind of starts at one end, andso if you're standing at that
end, you see the sound startingand then moving away from you at
(24:07):
the speed of sound.
And what's really neat is ifyou go to the other end and look
at the runway from the end.
You see the sound start at theother end and come towards you
in the lights and then when thelights hit you is when you hear
the sound.
So you have this really amazingexperience of knowing what the
sound is going to be, becauseyou can see the pattern before
(24:28):
you even hear it.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
And that works particularly well with certain
kinds of music whereparticularly a lot of dance
music tracks are built aroundthis idea of there's a, you know
, an initial phase and thenthere's a breakdown, and then
there's a build up and thenthere's kind of like, the beat
drops again.
And one of the neat thingsabout standing at the far end of
the runway is that you know,music is largely about
anticipation and then havingthat either surprise or, you
(24:54):
know, having your expectationmet about what that's going to
be.
And one of the you know thebeat drop is a powerful moment
because it's the thing that'shad all this build up and then
we're anticipating and thenthere's often a pause and then
there's that moment of arrivalwhen it finally happens.
And what you get with therunway is this sort of like you
can peek a half a second or asecond into the future and you
can see it coming.
And so I think that has thiseffect of like adding to the
(25:17):
satisfaction of that arrival,because you now like it's more
than one sense of arrival andyou're kind of like that
satisfaction is being met wherethe pattern is being realized,
kind of at the moment, all atthe same moment.
So as it was set up at Burningman.
We actually did basically justhave a microphone on the front
of it so if nothing else wasgoing on you could walk up to it
and shout it into it and itwould.
(25:38):
Your sound would be propagateddown, and that was.
We saw many people really get agreat kick out of that
Throughout the night.
We also had there were a seriesof large art cars that would
come up and blast music into itand that would overwhelm any
individual voices that peoplewere shouting into it, because
the sound systems are loud andthey kind of take over the
version that's set up.
In San Jose we have running astreaming you know, music
(26:01):
streaming, programming of ourown choice.
It's not picked up themicrophone.
That's for a couple of reasons.
One, the installation can't bethat loud, and so it would.
I think a microphone would getoverwhelmed by, like traffic and
motorcycles and other thingsgoing past.
It's also just like a littletougher in an open urban
environment, you know, to allowpeople to shout into a
microphone and and who knowswhat's going to come out.
(26:22):
That said, we've been workingwith the folks at the city of
San Jose.
They've been scheduling aseries of events that are hosted
at the Sonic Runway down thereand they're really interested in
using it as an ongoing platformfor various performances.
So there have been a number oflive performances that have been
set up and that's reallyrewarding because then you know
people who are playingpercussion or singing or
(26:43):
whatever have an opportunity tolike see their live audio be
projected onto this installation.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
But it is really nice because, like Rob was saying,
we can connect musicians to it,or DJs, and really allow them
the space to put their musiconto the Sonic Runway.
And something we did recentlyis the city of San Jose invited
a bunch of technologists andartists, visual artists and
performers to come down and wewere able to show them kind of
(27:12):
what we're doing with the audioand how we're turning it into
patterns.
And one of the nice thingsabout the runway in San Jose in
its current iteration is weactually have individual control
over the speakers and all theLEDs, and so we were telling
them that you know, puttingpatterns on there and running it
down at the speed of sound isonly one way to use this canvas.
(27:32):
So it was a really fun time toshow this to other people and
just see what kind of ideas theyhad of what they could do with
the runway.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That's exciting, and so anything stand out in your
mind that they shared other waysof approaching, using it.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Well, I think it was really interesting because some
of them were dancers.
So some of them were thinkingof, like, how could they convert
body motion into signals thatthe runway would could pick up?
So that was one.
I think a few video artistswere just trying to understand
how the LEDs were controlled sothey could kind of do different
things with the lights.
So I think, depending on whatart form the person was rooted
(28:11):
in, they had different ideas ofhow they could use the runway.
And that's one of the reallynice things about San Jose is
that it's there for the publicand it's free, so people can
just walk up to it, they canexperience it.
And we've gone down there awhole bunch to watch people in
it and we see whole families gothrough, we see friends walking
(28:33):
through, we see grandparentswith their grandkids, we see
people stopping to take photos,and it really does create this
space that you can be in andjust enjoy the lights around you
.
I always like to describe it asthis tunnel of smiles, because
everyone is just in it and youjust see them smiling and you
see people acknowledging eachother, because you're just there
(28:55):
all enjoying it together.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Yeah, I would think there's sort of two parts of it
for me.
One is definitely like Warrensays, in terms of what the goal
of the piece is.
I think is really to in its.
What we're aspiring for, Ithink, is to create some sense
of awe, and for me that comesfrom a lot of different places,
but at least one of them is isthere one avenue toward that is
(29:20):
making something that waspreviously invisible visible and
or kind of like giving you awindow into this sort of like
amazing universe that we live in.
You know, this is a powerfulforce of nature that none of us
has any control over.
That is just like all thesemolecules bouncing around doing
their thing and like if we canmake somebody stop for a second
(29:41):
and like appreciate that orthink about that for a second,
or just kind of like feel it,even if they don't quite
appreciate it, that to me isworth it.
One of my favorite things to dois to listen to other people
talk about it without themknowing that we're the ones who
created it.
You know, if you like, go downand stand at the end,
particularly at Burning man,there's usually a little gaggle
of people sitting there talkingabout it.
And then you know there'd belike some people being like oh,
(30:01):
what kind of LEDs do you thinkthey use?
And there are the other peopleyou know talking about that, and
then there's usually a couplepeople that are trying to
actually puzzle out, like what'sgoing on, like how does this
work?
You know, sometimes they'lleven explain it to us, which is
like a particular joy.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
That was inspiring.
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