A New Interaction Strategy for Musical Timbre Design

Abstract

Sound creation and editing in hardware and software synthesizers presents usability problems and a challenge for HCI research. Synthesis parameters vary considerably in their degree of usability, and musical timbre itself is a complex and multidimensional attribute of sound. This chapter presents a user-driven search-based interaction style where the user engages directly with sound rather than with a mediating interface layer. Where the parameters of a given sound synthesis method do not readily map to perceptible sonic attributes, the search algorithm offers an alternative means of timbre specification and control. However, it is argued here that the method has wider relevance for interaction design in search domains which are generally well-ordered and understood, but whose parameters do not afford a useful or intuitive means of search.