Pulse
Sound Art is a tricky proposition
unlike a painting for a sculpture
it doesn’t stay put. It is an
unpredictable medium that isn’t
just about the installation of
whatever media player you have
in hand, plus some headphones.
Instead it involves the acoustic
creation of space. When
encountering an object-based
work, the viewer has much more
control over the experience. You
can walk up to a painting to see
its finer details; every so often,
you’re even allowed to touch a
sculpture to appreciate its full
materiality. If you don’t like
what you see, you can just close
your eyes—but there’s no way to
naturally close your ears.
Pulse is an interactive sound and
light installation, that uses a bio
sensor as an input data. The bio
sensor used in this installation is a
Pulse sensor that calculates the
BPM (beats per minute) of the
human and converts it into sound
and a light display. The sensor
was connected to an Audrino Uno
that read the data from the
sensor. Using a code that was
adapted from Joel Murphy and
Yury Gitman to calculate the BPM.
Both the light and sound were
controlled by the BPM. The light
reacts to the BPM  calculated after
every 2 seconds, giving a pulsing
display. The sound was generated
using a c++ software,
openframeworks in XCode. Using
a library ‘Of Maximillian’ to
generate sinewaves that used the
BPM data to change the frequency
of sinewaves. By adding phasors
and multiple sinewaves added
together the resulting sound,
sounded like a robotic tune which
you would never have imagined
your pulse to sound like.
I wanted my audience to be mediums. During the
a widespread as I didn’t aim research I came across an
for it to for a particular set
 interactive light
of audience, it was an installation known as
installation that everyone Aura (Morris,2018) (fig.a)
could interact with. I wantedan audiovisual installation
the outcome to be that materializes
unpredictable where the emotions into a
users have more control perceptible, physical
over the experience. My firstform. As the visitor sat or
vision of the piece was a biglaid down on cushions on
installation however after the floor, a musical
talking to several people I composition played out in
released that since the piecethe background,
will be using personal data Itriggering emotional
should have a more compact responses. The visitors'
and personal design emotional "data" was then
allowing the user to interactanalysed and
with the piece more. metamorphosed into
However, the final piece different forms, colours
ended up being almost the and intensities of light that
same as I imagined it would were beamed down onto
be. them from above. This
project became an
By researching sound and
inspiration towards ‘Pulse’
light both separately and
as I wanted to use human
together, I came across
pulse and convert it into a
projects that had used sound
physical form.
and light as their 
The creative process can be broken Part from having the code
down into four distinct processes, most working the major part was
of which can be fostered and having the final thing set up.
augmented. I will be dividing and Displaying it was major role in
explaining my creative process with how I wanted to convey my
four steps. First message to the user. After
• Preparation: The first step was careful cardboard prototypes I
getting a simple code up and running figured out a way to display it
the Of Maximillian library. After doing perfectly. Using a black acrylic
this I ran the examples which were plinth and a creamy duster box
about twenty in order to understand on top gave it an aesthetic
what and how the library works. Then I outlook. The creamy box on
started using the incoming value from top gave the light a gradient
the sensor and started messing shade when it pulsed and the
around with the frequencies of the headphones gave the user an
waves in the code. intimate experience with the
• Incubation: After looking at different piece itself. The box was put
codes and watching almost every together using brackets and
video tutorial I found online on screws to compliment the
Maximillian I had a vivid idea about sound and give it more of a
what my sound would sound like. I
wanted it to be a mixture of a beating
effect mixed with piano notes. Turning
it into an odd musical.
• Illumination: During this point I had a
sample code up and running after
weeks of finding a perfect sound. I
started to get a flow of the code and
where this was going.
• Implementation: Lastly, I started to
put in the values from the sensor
instead of the frequencies so that the
sound would react to the pulse
instead.
robotic look. The pulse
sensor was placed in the box
with an arrow pointing
towards it, this was done so
that the user figures out how
to interact with the it.
Over time the project kept
changing and things started
to fall in place. When I
started researching about
sound and what I wanted it
to be was different to the end
result. Working with Of
Maximillian gave me a
chance to explore something
new. I hadn’t done or used
physical computing before
this project so this was
definitely a learning process
for me. Connecting the
audrino to openframeworks,
and then using the data to
produce different sound
waves. The data from the
sensor was not steady so
major part of the project
was getting the values as
much smoother as they
could be. I first took an
average of the first and the
last reading and then using
Of Map I mapped the
values of the incoming data
in a range to get a
smoother flow of the
sound. Using if statements
I was able to have more
control over the
sound. During the build of
the box I first tried to glue it
together however that
didn’t work, so i decided
brackets and screws which
turned out to be pretty
cool.
Concluding the
documentation, the project
came out how I imagined
it. People where interacting
took them a while to
understand what was
happening but they liked it.
I know this how because I
talked to a few people who
were interacting with it
when I was there. They
really liked how it was
displayed and how the
arrow pointing towards the
sensor makes them want
to try it out not knowing
what will happen. They
enjoyed the sound saying
“is that my heart beat?”. I
wanted it to be an
unpredictable piece which
would break the barrier
and concept of how are
pulse is perceived in a
medical world and how
comfortable we are with it.
 A link to documentation video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOSGe5N5AY4

A link to gitlab
https://gitlab.doc.gold.ac.uk/asaji001

Madartseattle.com. (2018). We Are All Made of Light |

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https://madartseattle.com/exhibits/we-are-all-made-of-
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Marcuslyall.co.uk. (2018). On Your Wavelength
(Canary Wharf 2017 & 2018) - marcuslyall. [online]
Available at: http://www.marcuslyall.co.uk/work/on-
your- wavelength-canary-wharf-2017-2018/
[Accessed 14 Dec. 2018].
Morris, A. (2018). Audiovisual installation transforms
emotions into beams of light. [online] Dezeen. Available
at: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/11/25/aura-
installation-translates-emotions-into-beams-of-light-
studio-nick-verstand- dutch-design-week/
[Accessed 14 Dec. 2018].
theoryCIRCUIT - Do It Yourself Electronics Projects.
(2018). Pulse Sensor with Arduino. [online] Available
at: http://www.theorycircuit.com/pulse-sensor- arduino/
[Accessed 14 Dec. 2018].