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This video captures a live performance by the Carbon Dioxide Ensemble at the Rocky Mountain Synthesizer Meet’s 2023 Halloween Synth Concert.

The trio performed Interdimensional Breach at event, held at the Junkyard Social Club in Boulder. It features spooky sounds on some unusual instruments.

Members of the Carbon Dioxide Ensemble include:

• Thomas Lundy on Copper Heart, articulated with dry ice (with pickup mic for live sampling);
• Victoria Lundy on Theremin and Live Electronics; and
• Mark Mosher on Synths, Live Sampling, and Heart FX performed on iPad Pro M1 with a Scarlet 4I4 interface.

The trio says “Our performances are informed and inspired in equal parts by Pierre Schaeffer and Musique Concrète, and the Krell Electronic Tonalities of Bebe and Louis Barron.

Chapters:

00:00 Part 1 – Initiating Transmission. The set opens with us slowly building Halloween vibes from Boulder Station.

00:47 Part 2 – Warp Bubble. The venue begins to warp as our signals attract energy from another dimension.

03:02 Part 3 – Interdimensional Breach. A breach to another dimension opens just outside the venue. Energy from this dimension reacts to our performance.

10:29 Part 4 – Extreme Heart. Noise from the heart begins to seal the breach.

11:02 Part 5 – Return to Your Normally Scheduled Life. The breach starts to close, and we return back to normal reality in Boulder.

What they shared about the technical details:

Audio was captured as a multi-channel recording on a Zoom L8 and was mixed and mastered in Ableton Live 11. The video was captured using a GoPro Hero 12 in 4K, and an Insta360 X3. Post-production via a MackBook M2 Pro using Final Cut Pro with custom VFX from Resolume.

Cameras and Footage:

Front: 4K GoPro Hero 12 Black

360: 5.7K Insta360 X3 operated by The Aefonic

Side: Audience Mobile footage courtesy of John Rasmussen

Roland’s new augmented reality service enables you place a grand piano in any room. You imagine it and Roland’s new Piano AR service will place it. Just scan a QR code and try a virtual piano out in any room in your house.

Roland Corporation announces Roland AR, an innovative Augmented Reality (AR) experience that empowers customers to visualize and engage with pianos within the comfort of their own homes. This initiative will reshape the way consumers interact with and purchase Roland Pianos.

A large piano, therefore, is not a purchase you take (or lift) lightly. Buying a large piano is a big investment. Roland knows this so is making it slightly easier by introducing Piano AR, an augmented reality service that enables you to see a range of its pianos in situ. A kind of ‘try before you buy’ if you like. Or maybe ‘see before you buy’.

The “Roland AR” tech was created by British AR firm Plop. Accessible through Roland’s website and authorized retailer product pages, the experience allows shoppers to view true-to-scale 3D replicas of Roland’s pianos through augmented reality to see which one best fits their space.

The Piano AR service utilises the LIDAR – that’s Light Detection and Ranging – technology that is found in most mobile phones, which enables users to scan their surroundings. You then use your phone to effectively pick up a piano from the Roland range and place it into the scanned environment.

Roland AR is browser-based so you don’t need an additional app to use it. Just scan the QR code and your phone will do the rest, placing the piano model in whatever room you like.

Roland says: “Customers can virtually walk around detailed, to-scale models with dynamic lighting and reflections, providing an unparalleled understanding of the instrument’s presence in their space. Consumers can interact with instruments in a new fun and engaging way.”

“A piano is a big investment and … it is an important piece of furniture too,” said David Paul, global channel marketing manager at Roland. “So, we wanted to ensure that our customers had the best tools available to make the right choice for their homes and spaces.”

Piano AR is free, so far the service works with the latest Roland GP Series of grand pianos as well as the LX uprights and FP digital pianos. Piano AR is the latest in a series of hi-tech Roland digital piano innovations – the GP series of grands, for example, already utilises an app so that users can remotely tailor their piano sounds. There are more details about Piano AR at the Roland website.

Developer Björn Lohmander let us know that Swumpf Pro-800 – a free patch editor for the Behringer Pro-800 synthesizer – is now available to download.

The Swumpf Pro-800 editor is now also available for download to run offline.

Previously, it was online only, but now there’s the option to run it on your most distant off the grid computers.

Swumpf Pro-800 is an editor and controller, as well as a librarian, where you can copy/paste, import and export syx files. The online version of the editor also features patch banks with sounds from the community.

Swumpf Pro-800 is available now as an online/offline browser-based editor. It is free to use, but you can support its development via a Paypal link at project website.