The standard Herman-grid illusion. Dark patches appear in the street crossing, except the ones which you are directly looking at. (taken with permission from Prof. Michael Bach)
All pieces make use of JScore (see links for further info.)
The following studies are tone sequences which make use of signal processing in the left and right ear. Due to their stereo qualities listening is optimized by the use of stereo headphones/cans. April 2002
1st Study - Grouping
This study focuses on the phenomenon of grouping. Gestalt theory shows that the human brain organizes events by grouping in structures/patterns. This is most evident with visual examples, but psychologists such as Diana Deutsch and Leon van Noorden have explored this in the audio realm.
When listening to this study try setting the JScore applet to loop mode.
Then, using stereo headphones, try reversing the left and right position
of the headphones. I noticed that after stopping playback and reversing
the headphones there would be a different pattern after playback. The pattern
would either be high-low-high-low or low-high-low-high.
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2nd Study - Hemispheres
This study focuses on localization. Interestingly, with this tone sequence, testing has shown that right-handed people most often perceive the high tone to the right ear and the low tone to the left ear, while left-handed people percieve the exact reverse.This happens even if the headphones are in reversed position. The neurological point of view is that in the dominant hemisphere there is more activity in the neural units for the high frequencies, while in the non-dominant hemisphere there is more activity in the neural units for lower frequencies.
When listening to this study try setting the JScore applet to loop mode. Then, using stereo headphones, try reversing the left and right position of the headphones. This provided me with a strange insight as to my dominant hemisphere. It almost seemed as though I was paralyzed, in a very abstract way, by not being able to process information as a "dual process".
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The following composition makes use of the previous studies. Feel free
to change settings such as amplitude and panning. Also, feel free to add/take
away notes/meters, change the tempo or interact with the composition in
any other way. Enjoy.
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