ICLC 2025 Catalogue

Gencaster - A platform as an instrument Ontologies of a multi-directional non-linear audio streaming framework

Dennis Scheiba, Vinzenz Aubry

Was presented at:

Abstract

In today's landscape of diverse sound generation methods we shifted our focus to inspect novel and auditory experiences through the distribution of bi-directional streaming for storytelling and generative sound synthesis. We embarked on constructing the platform Gencaster which is aimed at live-streaming dynamically generated non-linear compositions and stories in a multi-directional and ways over the Internet without the need for an app. This state of a stream can either be influenced by the listener (e.g. position or other user input) or can also be shaped by an editor through a graph-editor in real-time, allowing to code for multiple divergent states (each stream has a unique state) and also merging them, which we want to focus on in this paper.

By using a mixture of Python, SuperCollider and a browser-based GUI as the basis to shape a program we hope to target not just a broad audience of listeners (which do not need an app) but also creators, with the aspiration for the platform to function akin to an instrument.

The structure of the paper presents the Gencaster (gencaster.org) project, outlining our initial motivations, pivotal decisions influencing its development, and insights garnered in the field of live coding Gencaster and future ideas.