The Augmented Tonoscope

The Augmented Tonoscope is an artistic study into the aesthetics of sound and vibration through its analogue in visual form – the modal wave patterns of Cymatics. Key to the research is the design, fabrication and crafting of a sonically and visually responsive hybrid analogue/digital instrument that will produce dynamic Visual Music based on the physics, effects and manifestations of sound and vibration. This paper describes the first stage of the study – a series of artistic investigations into analogue tonoscope and digital tone generator design integrating light and camera control – driven by an artistic experimental method devised specifically for the project. The paper concludes with future directions for the research: Can the inherent geometries within sound provide a meaningful basis for Visual Music? Will augmenting these physical effects with virtual simulations realise a real-time correlation between the visual and the musical?