Talk:Music visualization

Synchronizing With The Music - Few Do!
Early Light Organs (circa 1970) physically plugged into the wires going to the speakers. They actually did synchronize with the music but they had other problems. Now today, with all the sophistication available, few Visualization programs/plugins synchronize with the music in any meaningful way. There is one, however, called GloPlug that really does synch with the music and that feature makes all the difference. Synchronization is the difference between an engaging experience that we constantly come back to and one we abandon after a few seconds. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.91.86.147 (talk) 18:40, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

it looks like a drug induced hallucination
Maybe this article should be put in context with previous visual music instruments such as colour organs, lumia, light sculpture etc.

Also some criticism is needed, the phrase "It also may give the musicians a greater appreciation of their music when they see it in motion as only visualization programs can provide." grates a little. It could also be argued for exaample that these pluggins turn any kind of music into the same visual sludge and are therefor insulting to the richness of music as a form of expression. There are plenty of examples of audio-visual content which give the listener more appreciation of each; in abstract cinema for eaxmple with animations by Alex Ruttterfors, Norman McLaren, SemiConductor etc. Visualisation pluggins are merely the dull tip of the iceberg.


 * While these programs may be the "tip of the iceberg," I think as these programs become more advanced we may be witnessing the birth of something big.


 * 'Also some criticism is needed, the phrase "It also may give the musicians a greater appreciation of their music when they see it in motion as only visualization programs can provide." grates a little.' Why exactly?  That's precisely what I use it for, and when you constantly write you're own new visualization code for tracks you've created it wouldn't just be the same visual sludge now would it?  I know for a fact several artists use Milkdrop for this, including myself, Eo.S., and FishBrain.  I in no way consider visualization programs insulting to the richness of music, and I compose symphonies.  Actually I would say that's as much conjecture as saying a 512 band fast fourier transform 'insults the richness of music', I mean  how insulted is the richness of music?  Might the richness of music cry?  I think what the person was getting at was that Music Visualization programs provide a here and now rendered in real time solution, where as other forms of audio-visual content such as abstract cinema, would often take much longer to create content for.  I'm not saying it's the best sentence in an encyclopedic sence, yet at the very least was included with positive intentions.Eos4life 16:50, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

First Music Visualization software...
Jeff Minter's VLM-0 was developed in 1990, and though not commercially released it was the first VLM software. http://www.llamasoft.co.uk/vlm.php

He should probably be mentioned because his algorithms were emulated by the likes of Nullsoft and such...he could very well be considered the father of music visualizations. Since 1984 he was developing virtual light show apps that were controlled by hand, rather than automatically generated from music input. Like I said, in 1990, that's when he first incorporated audio input to control the visualization.

I apologize if I've posted this in the wrong area or broke some rules, this is my first wikipedia post.

NrXic 22:09, 7 February 2007 (UTC)nrXic


 * The earliest music visualization software I am aware of was written by Gary Shannon for the Apple ][ personal computer. This would have been around 1978. It was written in 6502 assembly language and used the Apple cassette in port (used for loading programs from tape) to crudely sample the audio. The output used the Apple's low-resolution graphics to create a kaleidoscopic display. I later wrote a "performable" music visualizer for the Apple called Kaleidosound that was published through Passport Designs Inc. Kaleidosound included several themes that used the Apple's low-res and hi-res graphics, and keystrokes could be used to control various color and speed parameters in real-time. Ironwolf 22:30, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Uncited synaesthesia comment.
"Synesthetic persons might perceive music visualization as uncomfortable as it contradicts their own feelings towards the visualized music.[citation needed]" How long should we let a comment like that go without citation before just removing it? Anyone have any ideas? Eos4life 16:55, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Proposal for broader scope
As mentioned above, animated imagery semi-automatically generated in response to real-time computer analysis of audio data is a recent development in an art form whose origins go way back --- and whose practitioners appear in various Wikipedia entries. Is there an entry on the art form itself? Without specifying what art form this is, it’s hard to say. It could be "a combination of visual and aural art" but that’s potentially very broad. Does the visual part need to be animated or would it also include paintings that are meant to be viewed while hearing a particular piece of music? Would it include dance choreographed to music, or does the visual part need to be abstract?

The names "visual music," "light music," etc. have been applied to abstract animation, but many artists who apply these to their work intend the "music" part to be taken metaphorically, to refer to visual art that has the abstract, temporal quality of music without necessarily including music (some going even so far as to be actually offended by the suggestion that what they do is merely "visualizing music").

Still, there are people whose aim is precisely to create a visual analogue to (and expressly to accompany) music, and "music visualization" seems like a likely name for what they’re doing. Music visualization may be "a feature found in some music player software," but it is certainly more than that, and it seems like this Wikipedia entry (or some Wikipedia entry with a name like this) ought to present a broader picture, perhaps laid out like this:

Overview of what music visualization is (and is related to), perhaps including a discussion of Principles (metaphor, perception, synesthesia, mapping, psychoacoustics, etc.), followed by a History of its development (Greeks, Newton, Scriabin, color organs, film animation, computers), including or followed by information about its various Practitioners past and present; then, a compendium of Tools that facilitate music visualization (this is where the "feature found in some music player software" would be mentioned), followed by Future Directions (including architectures currently under development for support of music visualization), and of course the usual See Also and External Links.

Who should write this? If William Moritz were alive, he would be a likely contributor. Maybe Ken Peacock could help? Somebody from the iota Center ? I’m no authority, but I’m tempted to put something up myself --- if only to entice better-qualified members of the community to remedy it.

We may indeed be witnessing the "birth of something big," but that’s just the point: it’s only being born; until it’s grown up, there will be a lot more to say about the other, more mature members of the family.

Musanim 02:24, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I can help in some ways, after the main tone of the article is set. I've been scripting and programing visualization software (mostly in AVS, Milkdrop, VVVV, and proprietary software) for 4 years now, and have done visuals in front of crowds in excess of 4 thousand. (I'll stop there because more is just bragging.) But currently I'm tied up trying to help the MilkDrop article (check my user page), as I think it desperately needs to get past stub status. Eos4life 01:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

In addition to the wonderful outline provided above, which by the way I think would make a very cool book that I bet Taschen would publish, a section on Mathematical Functions and Algorithms would be great too. Included would be what functions are used to transform audio into data, what types of data are created, and a discussion of what algorithms are used to represent that data. I imagine that more types of patterns are found and used in transforming audio into visual representations than just those provided by Fourier transformations. 141.214.17.5 (talk) 16:20, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Another comment: watching an orchestra or musician perform also is a form of music visualization. 141.214.17.5 (talk) 16:20, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

RealOne Visualization SDK
Real Player have a Visualization SDK, which is available here, however presently I am having trouble downloading it, as mentioned in my post in the real player forum here. It may be worth while including it in the article as I can't find it in it. --Dave (talk) 20:26, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Walt Disney's Fantasia (film)
Fantasia, a 1940 animated film by Walt Disney, features a segment called "Meet the Soundtrack" which gives audiences a stylized example of how sound is rendered as a waveform. Initially a squiggly line which changes into various shapes based upon the individual sounds played. Josestefan (talk) 03:06, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Music visualization (simulation)
The content in this article provides general context for the original music visualization article, which currently focuses only on techniques and software for visualizing spectral features. Blueclaw (talk) 03:59, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Though there is clearly slight overlap (data can be derived from spectral information), spectral and data visualizations are fundamentally different in their application. The former results in decorative works with low information content (arts and entertainment), the latter graphical models with high information content (culture and education).

I've been frustrated with the limited definition of Music visualization for years. Having recently tried to merge the topics, I can tell you it is very, very difficult. I gave up.

To me, the way forward is definitely disambiguation. My suggestion is Music visualization (arts) and Music visualization (simulation), but am open to better suggestions. MusicVisualisation (talk) 08:22, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

FYI, you can get a better idea of the differentiating features of and potential for Music visualization (simulation) from my blog and Pinterest pages. MusicVisualisation (talk) 09:00, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

A good alternative for disambiguation would be Music visualization (arts) and Music visualization (education). MusicVisualisation (talk) 10:51, 11 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I don't think it makes sense to split topic into separate pages when we can clearly combine the two. Spectral feature visualization/music visualization programs as described on the current page is a subset of the field, and I think it would be good to restructure the article to reflect this. The distinction you've drawn between the two articles is correct, but that doesn't preclude us from restructuring the current article. The discussion above petitioning for a broader scope indicates that the community is open to merging the topics. The issue appears to stem from finding a set of summary sources to draw form. Wikipedia is meant to be an encyclopedia of information, not a collection of essays. We want to avoid claims that don't rely on reliable sources - see W:RS for the Wikipedia guidelines on reliable sources. --Blueclaw (talk) 22:27, 11 July 2017 (UTC)


 * The naming problem stems from the misuse of the title Music visualization in the first place. The general goal of spectral-value-generated imagery as described in the original article is not 'visualization' (in the sense of modeling), but in many cases deliberately abstract and algorithmically generated (originally 'electronic') art, as still explored in many art colleges..


 * Indeed the claim to a "high degree of visual correlation" is, given algorithmic complexity and interworking, in all but the sense of synchronized 'activity', often tenuous.


 * Music-data-driven Music visualization is, on the other hand, exactly what it says: the literal visualization of core musical structures under the impact of data drawn from a musical timeline.


 * Perhaps the better solution in the long run is to correct this long-standing misnomer? If not, it seems to me disambiguation is much the better solution than further compounding the current confusion.


 * Where spectral values are converted to data (such as 12TET note names) or visual correlation is strong (such as audio mixer displays), some citations or images would perhaps be better situated under music-data-generated visualization.


 * These points are at the heart of my longstanding frustration with the title. MusicVisualisation (talk) 09:50, 12 July 2017 (UTC)


 * The core issue is "What are visitors to Wikipedia looking for?" In the past, visitors looking for "Music visualization" would likely have known (despite the misnomer) to expect works within the field of electronic arts.


 * In the future, visitors looking for "Music visualization" will increasingly (and, given the vast subject breadth, exponentially) expect to find examples of applied data visualization. This reflects the gut intuition expressed by a user at the head of this page, namely "I think as these programs become more advanced we may be witnessing the birth of something big".


 * Merging the two will only cause confusion. MusicVisualisation (talk) 11:00, 12 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The core issue of what visitors are looking for is answered by citing reliable sources to reflect the field and it's many parts. As it stands, your article doesn't cite any and therefore won't be approved. A merge requires us to go through and source everything and consider more information than what you've written so far, and therefore appears to be the most reasonable option. --Blueclaw (talk) 15:17, 12 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I disagree on merger (the only suitable word I can find is 'vehemently'). The topics are as distinct as 'art gallery' is to a 'data science website'. Merger will clearly cause many misunderstandings, wasted time and frustration in the long term.


 * As perhaps the only person working on a comprehensive (non-profit and open source!) platform for music visualization, I have many insights to offer, and find withdrawal of the article premature. I said in comments to the article that citations (of which I have many) were coming. Such things take time, and mine is divided between many tasks. A little patience would have been helpful.


 * Wikipedia asks contributors to 'be bold'. Mmm. :-/
 * MusicVisualisation (talk) 17:02, 12 July 2017 (UTC)
 * As perhaps the only person working on a comprehensive (non-profit and open source!) platform for music visualization I have many insights to offer, and find withdrawal of the article premature. So this was promotional in nature for your work & platform? Or was original research/created by you?  In either case that disqualifies it from the site.
 * I said in comments to the article that citations (of which I have many) were coming. Such things take time, and mine is divided between many tasks. A little patience would have been helpful. That's not how Wikipedia works.  Throwing up an unsourced article with vague plans to reference it "some other time," especially when you're apparently the only person in the world who understands it well enough to do so, doesn't work well.  This is a piece of advice I often post to newbies:
 * As some friendly advice, Wikipedia is generally not terribly friendly to partial pages being put up in the main space. If you need time to build a page, you should create the page in the user draft space and complete it before you move it to the main section of the site, or better yet if it's a first article consider using the Articles for Creation system where experienced editors can help out.  Hope this helps!
 * That might be a better path to take if you want to try recreating this. Bold is good, but you still need to follow the basic tenets of the site.  PS when replying to comments generally you want to put a : first to indent it.  Each : indents it one more space, so if someone above you uses one, use two when replying. JamesG5 (talk) 01:54, 13 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I am far from the only person working in music visualization (there are myriad lonely standalone apps, animations and AI applications), but the only one (as far as I know, and I do a lot of monitoring) working on a "comprehensive platform". The threshold to doing that is high, indeed, we are talking man-years of work. As I understand it, that disqualifies me. How very strange.


 * An idea in development is, however, something Wikipedia does not apparently shy away from. The Mars Colonization page exhibits features very similar to what I have tried to present: and emerging idea, motivation, goals, major players, artist's impressions, and a wide-ranging discussion of the ins and outs, hows and whatevers.


 * Supplying citations "some other time" are your words, not mine. I spent two days learning to create an article, and would have had my inputs wrapped up within at most a further two. What happens beyond that point would clearly have been out of my hands. I did, however, have the energy and enthusiasm to make a start, which seems a precondition to Wikipedia's survival.


 * "Promotional material" are your colleague's words, not mine. Other than in this Talk section as an aid to your understanding alone, I have supplied none.


 * My thanks for the advice, though, none of which features in Wikipedia's own quick start guide, probably the most effective location for it.. In a similar spirit, inconsistency and communication issues are the surest way to fritter away positive energies. The achilles heel of many an organization.


 * Finally, I embrace the term newbie. Every thing I do is newbie. Established scientific insights are constantly challenged in the peer review process, but at the cutting edge, often no-one else has the experience to challenge them. Hiding or failing to acknowledge them, however, serves no purpose whatever.


 * Moreover, the world is -at first glance- full of perfection, perhaps the greatest discouragement to others trying their hand. An article with empty stubs is an open invitation.


 * Which is most effective: hiding an article until perfect, or getting it out and squabbled over? ;-) MusicVisualisation (talk) 11:00, 13 July 2017 (UTC)


 * If you need help differentiating between Music visualization (Arts) and Music visualization (Education), a good start is MIT's Mike Bostock, a world-renowned expert on data visualization, and creator of it's crown jewel, D3.js. Though he won't know me by name (I'm careful with identity on an invasive internet), he has provided me with much prompt and decisive help in the past.


 * There. I've cited a source. Happy? :-) MusicVisualisation (talk) 12:31, 13 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Let me fire a seminal quotation at you: "The purpose of visualization is insight, not pictures". Ben Shneiderman


 * Mike Bostock's take on this quotation?


 * "Visualization is a means to an end. A means to insight. A way to think, to understand, to discover, and to communicate something about the world. If we consider only the task of assigning visual encodings, of constructing visualizations, we ignore myriad other challenges: finding relevant data, cleaning it, transforming it into efficient structures, analyzing it with statistics, modeling, explaining our discoveries…"


 * Art is open to more or less endless interpretation. What, then, do these two definitions say about Music visualization (Arts)?
 * MusicVisualisation (talk) 12:51, 13 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Music visualization as it currently stands is a misnomer (indeed, reading the earliest Talk comments, some very scathing language has been used).


 * Academic rigor demands it be corrected, but it is so longstanding as to have passed (albeit fleetingly) into common usage.


 * The only way to deal with this is to qualify, to disambiguate it. Anything else (and especially a merger) will mix:
 * a topic with no regard for data with one absolutely dependent on data quality
 * a topic open to endless interpretation with one with high and very specific information context
 * a topic with entertainment value only with one with educational value only.


 * You really need to justify the merger ("community is open to merging" is not a justification).
 * MusicVisualisation (talk) 14:02, 13 July 2017 (UTC)


 * David McCandless, author the widely acclaimed book "Information is Beautiful",defines successful visualization in terms of data (information), story (concept), goal (function) and visual form (metaphor). Where (other than out on a very wobbly limb) does that definition leave Wikipedia's current 'Music visualization' page? MusicVisualisation (talk) 15:23, 15 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Nobody is questioning that the current music visualization page is lacking in actual disciplinary music visualization content, which is why the merger is the best proposed solution. However, as has been stated, Wikipedia aims to adopt a neutral point of view which means that each claim needs to be sourced by secondary sources to avoid bias toward one viewpoint. As our fellow editor pointed out, it is good to be bold, but it is essential to follow community guidelines, which exist to avoid chaos. Wikipedia has lasted a long time by providing (reasonably) reliable and complete content to its users. It is not a debate forum, a publisher of original thought, a scientific journal, a means of promotion, or a guidebook, among other things. --Blueclaw (talk) 22:46, 15 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The main thrust of my texts above is the attempt to establish a sustainable definition for Music visualization guiding content placement for the future. We both seem to agree that music visualization is simply data visualization applied to specifically musical data. I've referenced a couple of expert definitions which have long guided parent (Data visualization) domain thinking. You now accept that the current music visualization page is lacking in actual disciplinary music visualization content, i.e. that the current contents are invalid. Having given up any expectation that my contribution be accepted, the only remaining issue from my side is that the proposed merger compounds existing content problems. We would seem to be moving away -albeit slowly- from chaos. MusicVisualisation (talk) 09:27, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

Music Visualization for the Deaf
I found that electronic music visualization that is described in this article can be used to enhance the music listening experience for those who are hearing impaired. I wanted to add some examples of this to the article to provide more applications of this technology. I'd use an article about a researcher from Birmingham City University that's developing music visualizations for deaf musicians, an article describing a prototype for a music visualizer display/haptic chair for those who are hearing impaired, and an article describing how visualization in the American Sign Language and English Lower School in NYC can help teach deaf children about sound and music. Please let me know if you have any suggestions about this! Kosskels (talk) 00:20, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Proposed addition to list of visualization software
Add 2 links to software to the "List of music visualization software" listing:
 * Information to be added or removed:

1. VSXu (2002-2021, Vovoid Media Technologies AB) - https://www.vsxu.com

2. Overture (2019-2021, Retrograde Games) - https://overturevis.com/


 * Explanation of issue: just some more possible software to complete the list
 * References supporting change: Both pieces of software are dedicated music visualizers. https://www.vsxu.com, https://overturevis.com/

Jawvvd (talk) 22:57, 3 January 2021 (UTC)


 * ✅ Ferkijel (talk) 12:21, 28 March 2021 (UTC)