tag: Chiptune

µChip comes to Birmingham for a 3-day event celebrating Chiptune music, digital art, hacking, modified hardware and unconventional approaches to making music and visual art. µChip 3 will feature hands-on hacking workshops and demos alongside an exhibition of vintage computers, digital art, video screenings, and performances from a range of local, national and international Chiptune musicians. The ambition is to inspire and empower participants of all ages to engage with creative media in new and unconventional ways.

On Saturday 24th October I was at Space Studios in London to attend the Chiptune Marching Band workshop. I was really excited to go to this as I haven’t had a chance to dedicate my time to a single project with my breadboard and Arduino board.

After introductions we got down to making our noise making device. Essentially we were following instructions from a booklet, but more in depth explanations to how the different parts work were available if requested. My device had a light sensor which altered my sound, as shown below.

I’ve been helping run a night at the Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath called 8Bit Lounge. To explain what it is imagine the coming together of beer, Game Boy music/chiptunes and old consoles!

There’s been two nights so far, the most recent being Tuesday 6th October, which you can read about over at fizzPOP.org.uk. We’re somewhat lacking in 8Bit consoles (the lowest bit number was a 32bit Sega Saturn with 10-player Bomberman) but that’s something I hope to remedy when I get my Commodore 64 down from the attic

Project planning can get really tiresome and boring, so I spent the bulk of my evening learning how to use LSDJ better, with help from a tutorial on 8BitCollective. Here are the results:

[audio:Dolphins.mp3]

I’m having a few problems with the volume at the mo. You can probably hear a very quiet noise in the background, and I have no idea how to turn it up… yet.

More to come

I made this quite awhile ago on Trippy H, but only now found the damn cables to show y’all.

[audio:keys.mp3]

It’s essentially just a loop, but that’s one of the limitations of Trippy H. My cart flasher should be arriving tomorrow so I’ll start making actual songs from then.

It’s surprising how hard it is to win a Game Boy from ebay. Nearly everyone wants one and because they’re usually sold in a bundle with other games and accessories it usually goes for about £30. Luckily I managed to get one from the Indoor Market for £5 and the Game Boy Camera for another £5. Schweet!

Like everyone else and their mother I’m hoping to get my groove on and make some music using programs such as LSDJ. I’m gonna get a Game Boy Pocket to make the actual music on, due to it’s bigger screen and better display, but according to some surveys the DMG has the best sound. So I’ll export it all using this one.