Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?

Andrew McPherson, Robert Jack, and Giulio Moro

Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

Abstract:

The importance of low and consistent latency in interactive music systems is well-established. So how do commonly-used tools for creating digital musical instruments and other tangible interfaces perform in terms of latency from user action to sound output? This paper examines several common configurations where a microcontroller (e.g. Arduino) or wireless device communicates with computer-based sound generator (e.g. Max/MSP, Pd). We find that, perhaps surprisingly, almost none of the tested configurations meet generally-accepted guidelines for latency and jitter. To address this limitation, the paper presents a new embedded platform, Bela, which is capable of complex audio and sensor processing at submillisecond latency.

Citation:

Andrew McPherson, Robert Jack, and Giulio Moro. 2016. Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?. Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.3964611

BibTeX Entry:

  @inproceedings{McPherson2016,
 abstract = {The importance of low and consistent latency in interactive music
systems is well-established. So how do commonly-used tools for creating digital
musical instruments and other tangible interfaces perform in terms of latency
from user action to sound output? This paper examines several common
configurations where a microcontroller (e.g. Arduino) or wireless device
communicates with computer-based sound generator (e.g. Max/MSP, Pd). We find
that, perhaps surprisingly, almost none of the tested configurations meet
generally-accepted guidelines for latency and jitter. To address this limitation,
the paper presents a new embedded platform, Bela, which is capable of complex
audio and sensor processing at submillisecond latency.},
 address = {Brisbane, Australia},
 author = {Andrew McPherson and Robert Jack and Giulio Moro},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 doi = {10.5281/zenodo.3964611},
 isbn = {978-1-925455-13-7},
 issn = {2220-4806},
 pages = {20--25},
 publisher = {Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University},
 title = {Action-Sound Latency: Are Our Tools Fast Enough?},
 track = {Papers},
 url = {http://www.nime.org/proceedings/2016/nime2016_paper0005.pdf},
 year = {2016}
}