Exformation, an interactive installation inspired by the concept of “exformation,” was developed for a composition by Jesper Nordin performed by the Diotima string quartet and combines musical, luminous and colorimetric scores. Around the musicians, positioned on a technically equipped stage, three aluminium-edged cubes with LEDs mounted on circular rails move and angle their light in keeping with an algorithmic programme based on analysis of the spectrum, timbre and intensity of the music. This sensitive object becomes a total composition, a poetic, digital entity responding to the work played at its centre.

The Rubik’s Contraption
“That was a Rubik’s cube being solved in 0.38 seconds. The time is from the moment the keypress is registered on the computer, to when the last face is flipped. It includes image capture and computation time, as well as actually moving the cube. The motion time is ~335 ms, and the remaining time image acquisition and computation. For reference, the current world record is/was 0.637 seconds. The machine can definitely go faster, but the tuning process is really time consuming since debugging needs to be done with the high speed camera, and mistakes often break the cube or blow up FETs. Looking at the high-speed video, each 90 degree move takes ~10 ms, but the machine is actually only doing a move every ~15 ms. For the time being, Jared and I have both lost interest in playing the tuning game, but we might come back to it eventually and shave off another 100 ms or so.” Ben Katz