Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?

Andrew McPherson, Robert Jack, and Giulio Moro

Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

Abstract

The importance of low and consistent latency in interactive music systems is well-established. So how do commonly-used tools for creating digital musical instruments and other tangible interfaces perform in terms of latency from user action to sound output? This paper examines several common configurations where a microcontroller (e.g. Arduino) or wireless device communicates with computer-based sound generator (e.g. Max/MSP, Pd). We find that, perhaps surprisingly, almost none of the tested configurations meet generally-accepted guidelines for latency and jitter. To address this limitation, the paper presents a new embedded platform, Bela, which is capable of complex audio and sensor processing at submillisecond latency.

Citation

Andrew McPherson, Robert Jack, and Giulio Moro. 2016. Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?. Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.3964611

BibTeX Entry

@inproceedings{McPherson2016,
 abstract = {The importance of low and consistent latency in interactive music
systems is well-established. So how do commonly-used tools for creating digital
musical instruments and other tangible interfaces perform in terms of latency
from user action to sound output? This paper examines several common
configurations where a microcontroller (e.g. Arduino) or wireless device
communicates with computer-based sound generator (e.g. Max/MSP, Pd). We find
that, perhaps surprisingly, almost none of the tested configurations meet
generally-accepted guidelines for latency and jitter. To address this limitation,
the paper presents a new embedded platform, Bela, which is capable of complex
audio and sensor processing at submillisecond latency.},
 address = {Brisbane, Australia},
 author = {Andrew McPherson and Robert Jack and Giulio Moro},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 doi = {10.5281/zenodo.3964611},
 isbn = {978-1-925455-13-7},
 issn = {2220-4806},
 pages = {20--25},
 publisher = {Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University},
 title = {Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?},
 track = {Papers},
 url = {http://www.nime.org/proceedings/2016/nime2016_paper0005.pdf},
 year = {2016}
}