The Pack

The Pack is an open world computational thinking and exploration game built by Design I/O in collaboration with the New York Hall of Science.

The Pack score was composed entirely on a Buchla Music Easel semi-modular analog synth. The two-part ambient soundtrack cycles from day to night and is built to loop and crossfade seamlessly as the game moves through time. During gameplay the score is layered with distinct atmospheric sounds for each imagined habitat and point of interest as the player navigates the landscape.

While the final score for The Pack only cycles between two tracks, the process inspired several other compositions that do not appear in the game. These outtakes were also recorded on the Buchla Music Easel, and are evocative of the landscape, passage of time, and overall tone of The Pack as the player moves from day to night.

House 138

House 138 is a sequence of long-form instrumentals played on the Buchla Music Easel and composed as an independent study of the Easel’s distinct sound, mechanics, and idiosyncrasies. Each song was recorded as a single-track first take, run through the two voiced Easel and a basic delay pedal with no post production edits.

Connections Wall

Connections Wall is an interactive projection installation created by Design I/O as the entry experience to Solve For Earth, a new sustainability exhibition at The Tech Interactive. Connections Wall explores our direct impact on the environment, showing a large-scale projected landscape where visitors can tinker with allegorical sustainable systems and examine the ways they connect.

The Connections Wall scenes represent seven major categories of societal infrastructure, priorities, and technologies: Population Density, Water Management, Food Production, Energy Generation, Resiliency, Transportation, and Waste / Reuse. Each scene is assigned a physical dial that visitors can turn to manipulate the corresponding area’s approach to sustainability, setting in motion dramatic changes and chain reactions in real time.

The music for Connections Wall is as layered and complex a system as the installation itself. To capture the vibrant and constantly developing landscape, each scene is assigned two tracks that crossfade according to its dial position between 0 and 100. Continuously blending and adapting as visitors turn the dials, the score builds to a total of fourteen tracks that dynamically mix to evoke the atmosphere, pace, and undercurrent of each environment and its sustainable practices at work.

Punctuated by constant transitions and interactive sound effects, the challenge of scoring Connections Wall was to match the intricate mechanics of the experience without adding elements that distract or become tediously repetitive over time. Over many iterations, the final soundscape was formed with a combination of melodic, rhythmic, and atmospheric sounds. These loops were designed to not overpower when played simultaneously, while maintaining distinct character in any arrangement as the dials turn and move the score between playful blends of ambient and energetic, full and minimal, or warm and cool.

Example clips of individual dials at their center position, with the scene’s two corresponding tracks playing at equal volumes.

Funky Forest

Funky Forest is a projected interactive ecosystem created by Design I/O where children can create trees and route waterways to support the health of an imagined forest.

The sound design for Funky Forest is composed of “Wet” and “Dry” background tracks that fade in and out according to the health of the forest. The Wet track is a simultaneous recording of the Buchla Music Easel’s two timbred voices. The Dry track is a blend of field recordings and intermittent chimes.

Molten

Molten is an interactive projection installation developed by Design I/O to complement the glass blowing studio at the Chrysler Museum of Art. The installation itself is an abstract representation of glass blowing methods, tying true physics and natural elements of heating, cooling, blowing, and coloring glass forms into a gestural, immersive experience.

The Molten sound is primarily atmospheric, layered with sparse melody to reflect the pace and fluidity of the glass blowing process while remaining playful and light. Sound effects are tied to user gestures to follow their movement and articulate interaction points.

Remnant

Remnant is an interactive projection installation developed by Design I/O for the TELUS World of Science that allows visitors to playfully explore the life and death of a star, creating supernovas that leave behind generative nebulae, pulsars, and black holes.

The Remnant music pairs ambient pads with arpeggiated arcs to capture the ethereal and electric nature of our relationship with outerspace. The loop is designed to play continually to give the experience a subtle immersive atmosphere without sounding repetitive or chaotic. When the installation is in use, sound effects are triggered by a range of interactions: collecting matter, forming a star, leaving behind nebulae, and the dramatic impact of creating a black hole.