SoundXY4: Supporting Tabletop Collaboration and Awareness with Ambisonics Spatialisation

Anna Xambó, Gerard Roma, Robin Laney, Chris Dobbyn, and Sergi Jordà

Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

Abstract:

Co-located tabletop tangible user interfaces (TUIs) for music performance are known for promoting multi-player collaboration with a shared interface, yet it is still unclear how to best support the awareness of the workspace in terms of understanding individual actions and the other group members actions, in parallel. In this paper, we investigate the effects of providing auditory feedback using ambisonics spatialisation, aimed at informing users about the location of the tangibles on the tabletop surface, with groups of mixed musical backgrounds. Participants were asked to improvise music on SoundXY4: The Art of Noise, a tabletop system that includes sound samples inspired by Russolo's taxonomy of noises. We compared spatialisation vs. no-spatialisation conditions, and findings suggest that, when using spatialisation, there was a clearer workspace awareness, and a greater engagement in the musical activity as an immersive experience.

Citation:

Anna Xambó, Gerard Roma, Robin Laney, Chris Dobbyn, and Sergi Jordà. 2014. SoundXY4: Supporting Tabletop Collaboration and Awareness with Ambisonics Spatialisation. Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.1178985

BibTeX Entry:

  @inproceedings{axambo2014,
 abstract = {Co-located tabletop tangible user interfaces (TUIs) for music performance are known for promoting multi-player collaboration with a shared interface, yet it is still unclear how to best support the awareness of the workspace in terms of understanding individual actions and the other group members actions, in parallel. In this paper, we investigate the effects of providing auditory feedback using ambisonics spatialisation, aimed at informing users about the location of the tangibles on the tabletop surface, with groups of mixed musical backgrounds. Participants were asked to improvise music on {SoundXY4: The Art of Noise}, a tabletop system that includes sound samples inspired by Russolo's taxonomy of noises. We compared spatialisation vs. no-spatialisation conditions, and findings suggest that, when using spatialisation, there was a clearer workspace awareness, and a greater engagement in the musical activity as an immersive experience.},
 address = {London, United Kingdom},
 author = {Anna Xamb\'o and Gerard Roma and Robin Laney and Chris Dobbyn and Sergi Jord\`a},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 doi = {10.5281/zenodo.1178985},
 issn = {2220-4806},
 month = {June},
 pages = {40--45},
 publisher = {Goldsmiths, University of London},
 title = {SoundXY4: Supporting Tabletop Collaboration and Awareness with Ambisonics Spatialisation},
 url = {http://www.nime.org/proceedings/2014/nime2014_471.pdf},
 year = {2014}
}