RGB.VGA.VOLT, 2014 -
RGB.VGA.VOLT is an audio/video synthesizer that enables realtime exploration of the rich materiality concealed beneath the consumer interfaces of cathode ray tube computer monitors. By hacking and improperly rewiring the cables of these obsolete devices to short their video signals, their black-boxed analog infrastructure is liberated and driven by digitally synthesized high-frequency complex waveforms, audio playback, and feedback loops that fully exploit their latent visual spectrum. Inspired by early video tools such as the Sandin Image Processor and the Paik-Abe Synthesizer as well as contemporary programming and error-based approaches to sound and moving image, RGB.VGA.VOLT revives an analog aesthetic that has acquired a renewed power and potency in the present era of digital immateriality.
The instrument combines custom built software, hardware modification, and DIY instrumentation. The PDF guide below includes full documentation of the RGB.VGA.VOLT software as well as the instrumentation used in interfacing the software with VGA computer monitors for realtime synthesis. Because I am interested in not only generating aesthetic experiences with these objects, but also disseminating critical approaches to technology, the documentation is free to copied, repurposed, remixed, etc. for noncommercial purposes. "Copying is as good (I think better from this vector-view) as any way of getting 'there.'"
RGB.VGA.VOLT is built as a general purpose tool that can be repurposed and used with any audio input. I regularly teach DIY Video Synthesis workshops using the RGB.VGA.VOLT DIY hardware and custom software built in Cycling '74's Max. View the presentation from one of these workshops for more information.
I previously released RGB.VGA.VOLT software, but this needs to be updated. Email james.connoll@gmaill.com with questions.
COPY-IT-RIGHT