VoCap Demo Case: Aerial Roots

Aerial Roots is a preview of a solo concert piece composed for a Finnish virtuoso violinist Eriikka Maalismaa. The piece combines violin, video, and electronic sounds. The piece is a VR experience, where one can hear the violinist playing in the middle of the forest and walk around in the VR forest environment. The concert piece is a combination of the sound of the violin and the forest, with the voices complementing each other. 

The piece includes field recordings, gathered in Hong Kong in late February of 2022, during the peak of the catastrophic fifth wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. For example, it was possible to record the creaking of bamboo swaying lightly in the wind in the village of Wu Kau Tang, with nearly zero intrusion from the ambient urban soundscape. 

The demo has been prepared in collaboration with composer Timothy Page from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, violinist Eriikka Maalismaa, and our Collaboratec project funded by the European Regional Development Fund. The demo works as a proof-of-concept experiment in introducing the technology that CIVIT has to offer for the creative digital industries. The demo was first presented during the Collaboratec workshop in November 2022 by CIVIT software engineer Devangini Patel. The recording of the introduction can be seen below.