Blair Neal has created an art project installation entitled ‘Color a Sound’ which was set up at RPI’s West Hall Gallery 111 for the month of April 2010.

The installation invites participants to make colored markings on a transparency. Each marking produces a corresponding sound as it passes a sensor.

The user can vary the speed of the composition by changing the speed at which the transparency is rolled, and it can even be played backwards.

To maximize the range of the ‘instrument’, different colors produce different octaves, and it can also switch to using Roland TR-808 drum sounds for some of the notes, allowing you to program rhythms to go along with the notes.

The application is written in Max/MSP and Jitter, and here’s what it sounds like in action:

Color a Sound from blair neal on Vimeo.

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