The Art of Alice: Adding a Musical Component

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The Art of Alice Adding a Musical Component

• ALICE Symposium - June 2009

www.alice.org
Debra L. Smarkusky Penn State University Worthingt
on Scranton Information Sciences and Technology
(IST) Department dls102_at_psu.edu
Sharon A. Toman Penn State University Worthington
Scranton Music Department sat11_at_psu.edu
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Penn State Worthington Scranton

• 1,400 students
• Average class size 23
• 45-acre campus
• 62 full-time faculty
• 46 part-time faculty
• Baccalaureate and Associate Degrees
• First two years of a Penn State bachelors degree
  in over 160 programs

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Student Experience Using Alice(Overview of
Programming Languages Course)
Question Strongly Agree or Agree Un-decided Strongly Disagree or Disagree
Alice allowed me to be creative 85 9 6
Alice was easy to use 91 6 3
Alice animations were fun to create 79 9 12
I learned a lot about animation using Alice 76 12 12
Alice was more exciting when we included music 73 15 12
I was able to correlate my animations with music 76 15 9
I wish I knew how to create my own original sounds 76 12 12
I wish I knew how to compose my own music for the animations 85 6 9
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Integrative Arts Course in Music and Animation

• General Education Guidelines
• aid students in developing intellectual
  curiosity, strengthened ability to think, and a
  deeper sense of aesthetic appreciation
• Motivation
• Interdisciplinary course in music and animation
• Active Learning exercises to aid in the retention
  of knowledge
• Excite students about using technology while
  being creative

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Integrative arts students

• Many are first-generation college students
• No technology background
• Mix of mathematical and problem solving abilities
• Freshmen or sophomores with knowledge of music
  and/or technology ranging from none to extensive
• Majority had an interest in one or both
  disciplines
• Decide on a potential career
• Enforce what they already knew
• Provide them with additional knowledge that they
  could apply to another course or project

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The art of alice (Creativity)

• Interface, methods, control structures
• Camera controls and event-handling
• Background music
• Music that will play for entire animation
• Sound effects
• When using playSound method in a sequence or
  other logical structure
• When using playSound in a DoTogether tile
• Using the duration parameter of playSound method
  to adjust time of the sound effect

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Positive student experiences when using alice

• Easy-to-use, fun and creative canvas
• Express their creative ability and produce
  animations quickly
• Abstractions, drag-and-drop interface, and hidden
  syntax
• Opportunity to use programming constructs without
  having to learn the intricacies of a programming
  language
• See and manipulate objects directly avoiding
  frustration and confusion with learning a new
  programming language
• Engaged in their creations and eager to add
  additional components and complexities to their
  worlds

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Music Software

• Sibelius is a music notation program designed to
  write and play music in a variety of styles

http//www.sibelius.com/home/index_flash.html
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Music Software

• Sibelius allows students to explore digital music
  through the use of technology
• Sibelius uses
• A basic point-and-click format for the insertion
  of musical notes
• Editing tools for the management of notes,
  graphics, and texts

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Music Software

• The musical sound file created by Sibelius can be
  easily converted to a WAV or MP3 file by using
  any sound converter tool such as Switch

http//www.nch.com.au/switch/
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Learning Process

• The process of learning musical concepts is very
  similar to that of learning animation concepts
• Students are introduced to the theoretical and
  fundamental terms
• And then required to apply what they have learned

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Music theory

• Basic concepts of music theory are introduced
• Pitch
• Rhythm
• Time signatures
• Major/minor scales
• Major/minor key signature
• Intervals
• Chords
• Proper set-up of a musical score
• Music terminology

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Musical Math

• Students work to problem-solve musical concepts
  through active-learning exercises created in
  Sibelius
• Students complete Musical Math problems to
  learn the basic rhythmic values in music

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Integrated Project

• Music Requirements
• Required to re-create note-for-note,
  concept-for-concept a musical score in Sibelius
  that is the same as shown on a piece of sheet
  music they have been given
• Additional instruments into the final score
• Guitar line
• Bass line
• Drum line
• Animation Requirements
• Select a theme with three scenes (beginning,
  middle and end)
• At least 5 different types of logical control
  structures
• Event-handlers for at least 5 different objects
  and/or key strokes
• Utilize the camera controls
• Students must integrate their complete musical
  score into the Alice World using the proper
  methods and coding procedures
• A students grade for this project is based on
  their completed musical composition, the
  technical components of the animation, and their
  creativity in selecting a theme, adding
  additional objects, animations, and sounds.

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Similar development processes

• Sibelius allows students instant feedback on the
  quality of the musical score they are composing
• Students realize that creating a musical score in
  Sibelius is comparable to creating animations in
  Alice
• Both follow development process which includes
  analysis, design, implementation, and testing
  phases

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Student Comments

• It is a different type of class that helps to
  teach you about the different types of software.
  It also teaches you new skills.
• Its a new experience. Even if your major has
  nothing to do with what you learn using Alice, it
  is fun and interesting.
• I learned a ton and would describe it as a good
  time and a great way to learn music and
  animation.
• I have an increased interest in music theory
  after taking the class.
• I believe that it can be a fun course and lets
  you be creative. Also, Alice is not that hard to
  use. I also think that this class can help with
  different majors offered on campus. Alice is
  also very different from other Art courses. You
  are able to do more what you want and it is an
  art course that lets you use computer programs
  and not many art courses really do that.
• Alice is very user friendly, easy to understand,
  and simple to fix an error.
• Alice is a great tool for teaching someone the
  basics of animation and object oriented
  programming. I had a great time experimenting in
  Alice and using it to strengthen the fundamentals
  of objects.

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Demonstrations

• From Sibelius

• to Alice

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Future Efforts

• Positive feedback from the students and the
  admissions staff
• Average female enrollment of 25 in our course
  each semester
• Summer STEM Academy (ages 13-15) to teach
  Sibelius and Alice with 50 female enrollment
• Comparison of 3-Dimensional musical animations in
  Alice with 2-Dimension musical animations in
  Flash

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Questions or Discussion