RADIATION
An Installation for Short Wave Radios/Computer/Sound System
by Robert Adrian and Norbert Math
(Radio Technology: Oliver Huber)
for
ARS ELECTRONICA FESTIVAL 1998
| RADIO Just over 100 years ago the signals from Marconi's first radio transmission began their journey across the galaxy. Since then radio waves have become as common as air and our planet has become a new source of radio waves in the universe. All the radio signals ever produced - since the earliest transmissions - are still radiating outwards through space. The history of our century exists at the speed of light in the dark spaces between the worlds. |
| The RADIATION PROJECT Concept (please note: italicized links point to Real Audio sound samples) The "RADIATION" project concentrates on short-wave radio - the wave-lenghts used mostly by amateur radio operators, security and espionage agencies, national propaganda and information stations. Many short-wave transmissions are received as bursts of coded or scrambled signal - morse code, fax or image transmissions, secret commercial or political data. The short-wave spectrum contains every human language and every kind of music. Short-wave signals are often distorted by atmospheric conditions, interference from other transmitters or local static - with short-wave radio it is "radio" itself that is in the foreground. Description A computer program controls the output from four Short Wave Radio Receivers and fed over an amplifier into four public-address loudespeakers at the entrance to the Brucknerhaus (Ars Electronica Festival '98). The computer program, written in Linux, listens to the audio output and performs a spectral analysis of the sound quality. It then either keeps the existing array of stations or distributes new channels to the loudspeakers as necessary. Each radio has 40 channels stored in memory which are available for the computer selection process. (text and diagram) The loudspeakers are mounted on 3 meter poles placed 4 meters apart beside the path to the Brucknerhaus. Equipment:
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| RADIATION DEMONSTRATION SOUND Hear a simulation of the installation on Real Audio SHORTWAVE RADIO LINKS Shortwave/Radio Catalog Spy Numbers Stations Shortwave Radio Guide |
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