IEEE Spectrum - North American - March 2015 - 26

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exactly the most creative job, but I did gain
some useful practical skills there," he says.
"That's how I got to know about oscilloscopes and electronics. I always thought
I should do something with it because it
somehow looks very cool. I like the laboratory aesthetics [that are involved]." After
four years, Ludwig finished his schooling and started studying for a bachelor's
degree in sound engineering. Although
he never finished his degree, he has
taken that knowledge with him toward his
endeavors in electronic music, in particular the oscilloscope projects that began
two years ago.
Ludwig uses an analog CRT oscilloscope-specifically a Tektronix D11 5103N.
When connected to a computer's audio
interface (in the case of the mushroom
video, he used a USB-based RME Fireface
UC operating with a 192-kilohertz sampling
rate), the left audio channel triggers a horizontal deflection onscreen, and the right
audio channel triggers the vertical deflection. "It's like vector graphics," he says.
"Together, they can create certain shapes."
In other oscilloscope works, Ludwig has
created patterns and shapes of all kinds,
including a magenta outline of a girl's face
in a piece titled "Khrang." Typically though,
the visuals are something much simpler
and act to complement his music, whether
it's posted online or played during his live
shows. Ludwig has just come back from a
tour he did in the United Kingdom, where he
trUSt bUt VerIFy: Christian Ludwig used a
high-end oscilloscope and sound card to create his
thinks his performances were well received.
YouTube video [top]. However, even a standard PC
With
suitable hardware and the right kind
audio output and oscilloscope [bottom] can be used
of software for making waveforms (Ludwig
to re-create much of the effect from his sound files.
suggests the Pure Data open-source visual
creates audiovisual experiences, both programming language or the commercial
online and for live audiences around the visual language Max), anyone can emuworld. Ludwig says he used to make "a lot late his work and design their own soundof rock music and other kinds, based on based visualizations.
Still, Ludwig sees this as a temporary
my favorite bands." But more recently he's
been more interested in "experimental interest. "I really want to do an album with
music and noise music, so I've tried to find this and more shows. But I think after a year
some approaches to create something new or so I will go on with something else." In the
meantime, the interest his work has generthat isn't just sound," he says.
As a teenager about 10 years ago, ated is likely inspiring other sound geeks to
Ludwig took time off from school and did experiment with oscilloscopes in their own
a vocational apprenticeship at Heiden- way. We may see more than just dancing
hain, an electronics company. "It was not mushrooms in the near future. -neeL V. pateL

n YouTube, there's a video of

animated green mushrooms
spinning around in a threedimensional field, with a sound track of
strange electronic tones. That premise itself
is nothing extraordinary-the Internet is full
of stranger things than dancing mushrooms.
But what makes this video special is that the
sounds are creating the images onscreen.
Since the video first appeared last year, a lot
of people have been skeptical about the 3-D
graphics effect produced-including the editors here at IEEE Spectrum, until we dug out
an oscilloscope and played the sound file
into it for ourselves.
It's all possible thanks to an old-school
cathode-ray oscilloscope and a concept
that many engineers and physicists will
remember from their undergraduate days:
Lissajous figures.
The mastermind behind the video
is Christian Ludwig, an Austria-based
electronic-music artist who performs
as Jerobeam Fenderson and runs a small
music label called Ordia Muszc. Through
his oscilloscope musical projects, Ludwig
26

MAr 2015

NorTH AMerIcAN

sPecTruM.Ieee.orG

top: JerobeAm fenderson; bottom: stephen cAss

SYmpHonY foR
oSCIlloSCope
JerobeAm fenderson's
music encodes its own
trippy visuAls

http://sPecTruM.Ieee.orG

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Spectrum - North American - March 2015