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Journal Article

Toward Emotionally-Congruent Dynamic Soundtrack Generation

Authors: Williams, Duncan

Journal of the Audio Engineering Society · Volume 64 · Issue 9 · pp. 654–663 · September 2016

Abstract

Real-time control of the emotional content of sound has utility in video game soundtracking where the player controls the narrative trajectory, and the affective attributes of the sound should ideally match this trajectory. Perceived emotions can be represented in a 2-dimensional space composed of valence (positivity, e.g. happy, sad, fearful) and arousal (intensity, e.g. mild vs strong). This report is a speculative exploration of measuring and manipulating sound effects to achieve emotional congruence. An initial study suggests that timbral features can exert an influence on the perceived emotional response of a listener. A panel of listeners responded to stimuli in a set with varying timbres, while maintaining pitch, loudness, and other musical and acoustic features such as key, melodic contour, rhythm and meter, reverberant environment etc. The long term goal is to create an automated system that utilizes timbre morphing in real time to manipulate perceived affect in soundtrack generation.

Details

Publication
Journal of the Audio Engineering Society
Volume
64
Issue
9
Pages
654–663
Publication date
September 6, 2016
Affiliation
Interdisciplinary Centre for Computer Music Research, Plymouth University, Devon, UK (See document for exact affiliation information.)
Type
Journal Article