Freesound Forums

Hi,
I searched but didn't see this posted anywhere. Coagula is a program that takes an image and converts it into sound as if it was reading a sonogram. What this means is that if you play the sound back with a program that can display the sonogram it will show the original picture. A couple programs that can do this are Amadeus II for the Mac or Winamp with one of the visualization things going on the Windows platform.
Here's a link to the software:
http://hem.passagen.se/rasmuse/Coagula.htm#Download

Aphex Twin used a Macintosh program similar to this called Metasynth on the song "Equation" or Track 2 off the Windowlicker album. He hide his face in the song. Here's a link to the Wired article. http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,52426,00.html

Here's a link to Metasynth website, they have a demo. http://uisoftware.com/MetaSynth/

Here's an example of a sound I made in Coagula using an image from an old Boris karloff movie. you might need to copy paste as my webhost isn't letting me update my .htaccess file right now.
http://www.thisisnotporn.com/coagula.mp3

I haven't quite figured out the resolution/frequency ratio yet but if you use simple shapes or high contrast images in monotone the output seems to be recognizable if a little distorted. This is a pretty neat thing to play with. One possible application could me watermarking audio.

Not sure, but afaik, they stopped developing coagula in 2003. The latest version has the date 2003 and no updates since then.

Metasynth is cool, but requires a Mac. Damn.

mmhm, spectral audio - is'nt new ...cu

tro

Well, old or not it's still a neat process I hadn't seen anyone beside Aphex Twin using. Evidently it was used in the Matrix, but I can't remember a specific scene where it sounds like it would have been added.

it's used in the "bullet time" scenes. you know, the scenes where everything stops / slows down and then they turn the camera in 3D.

- bram

Huh. I'll have to go watch again. I just thought it was an analog style slow down of everything.

ArtWonk <http://algoart.com/artwonk.htm> is a program similar to Coagula that, although different in its approach, gets updated more frequently and can do more stuff.

There's also a great piece of (Windows) software for "audio spectrum analysis" called Spectrogram <http://www.visualizationsoftware.com/gram.html>. The author has some nice examples of spectral imaging that include sound files (for home experiments) and images. There's even a short blurb (with pic!) about that Aphex Twin thing.

I think Massive Attack, or maybe Plaid, embedded images Aphex Twin-style into some of their music. Anyone else hear of this? I don't remember where I saw it...

And does anybody have pics of that Matrix thing? I've never heard of that one, and I don't have a copy of the movie. Sounds awesome, though.

Actually, Rasmus is working on an update. Talked to him about this about a week ago. The update will be quite major, wish you may excpect after six years , and will consist off a general update off the GIU and allgoritms, additional support on graphics, audio and video. Generating to and from audio, graphics and video. Support for 3D wavetraysing...

Batuhan
Not sure, but afaik, they stopped developing coagula in 2003. The latest version has the date 2003 and no updates since then.

Metasynth is cool, but requires a Mac. Damn.

i still know audiopaint...cya

tro