Contents 1 Underlying Issue 2 Concept 3 Logistic Challenges 4 Design

Underlying Issue

The idea behind this installation is to bring awareness to Venetians that theirs is an aging society. The current average age in Venice is around 50. There are some interesting reasons for this trend. An IQP done in 2008 interviewed over twenty Venetians between the ages of 11 and 45. They discovered that though Venice offers many educational opportunities, there is a lack of corresponding career opportunities upon graduation. Often young people move away to pursue professional jobs.[1] Because Venice neighborhoods have a strong sense of community and a much slower pace of life than a typical major city, the elderly find this city a comfortable place to live. Research performed by another IQP (also done in 2008) found that 70% of the people interviewed were born in Venice, had never left and would not consider living anywhere else.[2] There are certainly many other factors causing the demographic shift, including factors that bring young people into Venice. However, the overall change is toward an older population.

Bells are an important part of the culture of Venice. Since the first bell tower was constructed in the 7th Century, Venetians have heard the message of the bells, a single bell or a combination of bells had its own meaning. If it was a tower belonging to a church, the message might be the time of the Mass, or to announce a wedding or a funeral. If it was a municipal tower the message might be the time of day, an execution, or the beginning or ending of the work day. The citizens could tell by the sound, where the bell was and what it meant. For example the tower of St Mark’s Basilica had five bells and each had a special purpose. The Renghiera (or the Maleficio) announced executions; the Mezza Terza proclaimed a session of the Senate; the Nona sounded midday; the Trottiera called the members of the Maggior Consiglio to council meetings and the Marangona , the biggest, rang to mark the beginning and ending of working day.

An IQP study of the sounds of Venice was done in July 2003. The group collected and catalogued sounds that were heard around the city in an attempt to identify the characteristic sounds of Venice. Included in this study were 120 interviews, questioning individuals about what they were aware of hearing throughout the city. Using this data, this installation could discover the proper tolling of bells or other sounds that would stand out in a person’s mind and thereby make it a more effective conveyance of the message.[3]

The population / demographic of Venice is declining, b/c there are more deaths than births. The current average age in Venice is around 50.

Concept

Beam ultra-directional sound in a place, so that when someone walks by they can hear a toll. There would be one sound for each person who died, and a different sound for each birth that day. these would alternate, then when one count completed, the other sound would continue. These counts can be found online.

Logistic Challenges

1. Find a location
2. Get any necessary permissions
3. Getting information and power to speakers

Design

This installation would require speakers and some sort of source for the audio, at a minimum. Other devices may be added to expand functionality, such as a motion detector to conserve power. The speakers could be directional, such that the sound can only be heard when right in front of the speaker. This would help grab attention, as the sounds will start and stop suddenly. Truly directional speakers tend to be expensive. They can be in the neighborhood of $300 for pseudo-directional, or up to $1700 or more for actually directional speakers. Normal speakers could be used along with shells or cones of various sorts to simulate the effect of directional speakers to a certain extent. This would be the more cost effective option. There are other unusual types of speakers that could be used to make the installation that much more memorable. For the outdoor implementation, weather must be taken into account. While not 'directional', there exist speakers that are designed to be used outdoors that should be considered.

Once the speakers are in place, the source for the sound is needed. Simple mp3 or other recording devices will be adequate if the sound is to be a fixed message or track. If the sound is to be changing daily or otherwise relatively frequently, an alternate method should be considered. A device with a wireless connection and some programmability would be necessary if the soundtrack were to be automatically updated daily with the birth and death counts for the city. The updates could be done manually, but still wirelessly, by having a source device with Zigbee or Bluetooth capability. This would allow one of the installation's designers to discretely approach and update the soundtrack on the device connected to the speakers. A Sun SPOT or certain Arduino devices would have this wireless capability. While neither possess typical mp3 capability, they would be able to produce the sounds with a little work. They could use a digitally sampled version of the soundtrack, and pulse one of the general IO pins at varying frequency to produce the sound. There are many resources, such as forums about how to create sine waves and just about any other shape wave using a pulse width modulated signal and a filter.

The sound played through the speakers could be a combination of two sounds: a bell toll sound for each death of the day, and some more cheerful sound for each birth. The births could possibly be represented with cheerful bells, a baby cry, a baby laugh, or any other sound that could be associated with children. The sounds could alternate until one ran out of counts, or each sound could play its full count time and then have the other play.

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