Turn in (by email attachments or on CD) your programming work in progress for your final project, with comments about your intentions and your working plan, and any questions you have about procedures or problems.
Study MSP Tutorials 16, 13, and 14 (in that order), on the topic of recording and playing back audio. Study Jitter Tutorial 21 on the topic of live video input, and Jitter Tutorial 14 on the topic of matrix positioning (accessing a portion of a matrix).
Present your midterm project to the class. Be prepared to "demo" it in action, and to explain briefly how you programmed it. Turn in your midterm programming project (and any related media files or other files) on a clearly marked CD-ROM. Also, be ready to discuss your plans for your final project, and how it is related to the work you have done so far. Your final project should involve interaction between user and computer.
Come prepared to discuss you plans for your midterm project (and possibly your final project, as well). It's fine to focus primarily (or even exclusively) on visual programming, or audio programming, or MIDI/music programming. You're encouraged to mix media if you have an artistic idea that calls for that, but you're not obliged to do so.
If your project idea calls for use of pre-recorded sound samples and/or pre-recorded video, you need to be getting your source footage now (as I mentioned on the first day of class). It's hard to write/compose/develop an effective program/project if you don't know the content you will be using.
If your project is MIDI/music-related, you can use the sounds of the operating system's built-in synthesizer, and you can still get interesting/attractive effects by choosing sounds carefully, as well as by using MIDI messages other than just note messages, such as pitchbend, modulation control, volume control, panning control, etc. If you want to use external equipment such as synthesizer(s) or Disklavier, you are quite welcome to do so.
Continue studying whichever Tutorial is most appropriate and interesting for you. To continue getting acquainted with all the basic objects and workings of Max, continue with the Max Tutorial. Ideally, you should also be studying the early chapters of either the MSP Tutorial or the Jitter Tutorial to learn (one or both of) those environments.
Study the example from the previous class (Example 5 on the Examples page) and also take a look at the first five examples on the Jitter Examples page from an earlier year.
Using one of the examples given up to this point as a starting point -- or just starting from scratch if you prefer -- make a program that does something interesting musically (with Max+MIDI), sonically (with MSP), and/or visually (with Jitter). Bring your program to class and be ready to explain how it works and ask questions about how to improve or extend it.
Study MSP Tutorials 1, 2, 10, and 16 in the manual MSP46TutorialsAndTopics.pdf and try out the accompanying patches in the "Documentation/Tutorial Patches/MSP Tutorials" folder.
In the Jitter Manual JitterTutorial16.pdf read (probably best in this order) "What is a Matrix?", Tutorial 1, Tutorial 2 (you might never set individual pixels as is done in this tutorial, but it will help you understand how Jitter matrices work), and "Attributes". Don't have the Jitter Tutorial patches in your Tutorial Patches folder? You have to drag them there yourself when you install Jitter. If you forgot to do that, you can redownload just the documentation files from the Jitter download page.
Study the examples from the April 10 class -- Example 3 and Example 4 -- on the Examples page. Try to trace the workings of each patch.
Bring in an example of some work you have done in Max, either a modification of one of the example patches to make it do something different, or something you have built yourself.
Read the article "Digital Audio" by Christopher Dobrian. (This is the same as the chapter "How Digital Audio Works" in the manual MSP46TutorialsAndTopics.pdf.)
Also read the chapter "How MSP Works" in the manual MSP46TutorialsAndTopics.pdf.
Using one of the example patches from class as a starting point for a simple timed structure (counting through a series of events, choosing at random from a set of possible events), elaborate on the existing program to make it do something different (and, one hopes, more interesting). The point is to get experience in conceiving a task, defining it, finding the objects you need to accomplish it, understanding the messages those objects understand, building a program that works (does what you want), and then evaluating the pros and cons of your concept. Be prepared to show your work in class.
Continue to work through Max Tutorial chapters, as many as you can, to get an understanding of the objects discussed in each chapter and to get some ideas about simple programs for accomplishing small musical tasks. Try to complete through at least Max Tutorial 24.
Read Music Programming by Christopher Dobrian.
Make arrangements to come to class with a computer to work on Max/MSP/Jitter. If you can bring your own laptop, download the Max/MSP and Jitter software and all necessary documentation and tutorials to that computer. If you cannot bring a laptop computer, you can use one of the computers in the REALab during class time, and you can use the computers in the Arts Media Center and the Accompaniment Lab for your work outside of class.
Begin studying the instructional materials provided in the Documentation folder of the Max application. If you are just beginning with Max, you should begin by reading the chapter titled "Overview: The Max Application" in the manual Max46Fundamentals.pdf. Then you should begin working through as many as possible of the Max tutorials in the manual Max46Tutorial.pdf, trying out the accompanying example programs in the Tutorial Patches folder (a subfolder of the Documentation folder) as you read; try to complete the first 12 tutorial chapters.
This page was last modified May 24, 2007.
Christopher Dobrian, dobrian@uci.edu