Stenbroen Festival

May, 2023
Client: Brandhouse

Brandhouse approached us to develop a generative, parametric, audio-based typeface for Stenbroen Festival, a local music festival in Copenhagen.

Using a combination of audio and 3D-technologies, our application is able to render out unique band names based on their own music.

How

The design and implementation was inspired by vinyl records, where microscopic changes in a groove makes a needle vibrate to produce an audio signal.

Each band name is drawn in a continuous curve provided by Brandhouse. We developed a web application that analyzes the waveform of an audio file, and generates a 3D groove that we flow along the provided curve.

The generated typography is used for poster prints and the visual identity for the festival.

Technologies used

THREE.js
Rhino
Web Audio API

Example of festival poster using the generative typeface

Sketches

First groove generated by THREE.js, imported into Rhino

Early sketch of 'A', experimenting with groove dimensions

Scanning Electron Microscopy image of the record 'je t'aime...moi non plus' with Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg. To the left is shown a stub with a piece of the record mounted with double adhesive carbon tape and sputter coated with gold. To the right is shown two different magnifications of the surface. In the rightmost image note the epithelial cell (most likely from the mouth) sitting in the groove on the lefthand side (arrow). Imaged at the Core Facility for Integrated Microscopy, University of Copenhagen.

Electron microscopy of vinyl record by Tbraunstein, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (modified)