Stereo music visualization through manifold harmonics

Abstract

Music visualizations are nowadays included with virtually any media player. They usually rely on harmonic analysis of each sound channel, which automatically generate parameters for procedural image generation. However, only few music visualizations make use of 3d shapes. This paper proposes to use spectral mesh processing techniques, here manifold harmonics, to produce 3d stereo music visualization. The images are generated from 3d models by deforming an initial shape, mapping the sound frequencies to the mesh harmonics. A symmetry criterion is introduced to enhance the stereo effects on the deformed shape. A concise representation of the frequency mapping is proposed to allow for an animated gallery interface with genetic reproduction. Such galleries let the user quickly navigate between visual effects. Rendering such animated galleries in real time is a challenging task, since it requires computing and rendering the deformed shapes at a very high rate. This paper introduces a direct GPU implementation of manifold harmonics filters, which allows the displaying of the animated galleries.