AV-Live

Live coding audio-visual performance system built around a SuperCollider sound engine, an openFrameworks oscilloscope visualizer driven by a real Hantek 6022BL USB scope, and a macOS menubar launcher that ties it all together.

15 scripted demoparties, 41 fullscreen visual backgrounds, 35 3D parametric meshes, 14 retro OS pixel-art tributes, 1099 SynthDefs across 345 tracks, all driven by FFT analysis of the actual audio physically passing through the scope probes.

                                  AV-LIVE
              ┌──────────────────────────────────────────┐
              │        AVLiveLauncher.app (menubar)      │
              └────┬───────────────┬──────────────┬──────┘
                   │               │              │
           ┌───────▼───────┐  ┌────▼─────┐  ┌────▼─────────────┐
           │ sclang +      │  │ node     │  │ oscope-of (oF)   │
           │ scsynth       │  │ web ui   │  │                  │
           │ sound_algo/   │  │ :3000    │  │ Hantek bulk USB  │
           │ 1099 SynthDef │  │          │  │ FFT 2048 audio   │
           │ 345 tracks    │  │          │  │ 41 backgrounds   │
           │ humanize+sig  │  │          │  │ 15 demoparties   │
           └───────┬───────┘  └────┬─────┘  └──────┬───────────┘
              :57121 OSC       :3000 HTTP     :57123 OSC in
                   │               │              │
                   └───────────────┴──────────────┘

Features

🎵 Sound engine — sound_algo/

• 1099 SynthDefs auto-loaded (acid_v1..v19, bass808_v1..v19, lead_v1..v19, kicks, drums, world, fx, master)
• 23 albums × 15 tracks = 345 tracks ready to play
• Subtle humanize : timing ±3.5 ms, velocity ±10 %, micro-detune ±3 cents per note
• Synth rotation : cycles through 19 versions of each SynthDef every 8 notes
• Auto layering : 3 voice layers parallel to melody/harmony/acid
• 15 album signatures with per-album palette, FX drives, layer config
• OSC bridge to oscope-of on :57123 (kick/snare/melody/lead/bass/bpm)
• Web UI on :3000 with live coding control surface

📺 Visualizer — oscope-of/

• Hantek 6022BL real USB oscilloscope capture (1-48 MS/s, 2 channels, 8-bit)
• AudioAnalyzer : downsamples Hantek to 48 kHz, FFT 2048 (~23 Hz/bin), bands bass/lowMid/mid/treble/kick/snare
• 41 backgrounds : tunnel 3D, starfield, metaballs, voronoi, twister bars, plasma FBM, rotozoom, truchet kaleidoscope, SDF tunnel raymarched, KIFS fractal, fire, perspective grid, tunnel cubes, caustics, vortex, octahedron chrome, vector cubes, plus Möbius/Klein/trefoil/Lucy/helix/catenoid/Boys/penrose/sphere/icosahedron/dodecahedron/torus/twisted torus/lemniscate/hopf/Lorenz attractor/Enneper/hopf link/supershape/gear/cone/pyramid/rose3D/geosphere/DNA helix/sphere wave 3D
• 5 OS pixel-art shaders : Workbench (Amiga), Mac OS Classic, Atari Fuji, Ocean Loader, Win95
• 14 OS logo PNGs with demoscene FX (mirror reflection, ghost trail, RGB chroma, twister wobble, scanlines, glitch tear) : Win 1.0/3.11/95, Lotus 1-2-3, MS-DOS, Apple Rainbow, Amiga WB, NeXTSTEP, BeOS, OS/2 Warp, IRIX, ZX Spectrum, C64, Atari
• 10 scroller styles : Classic, Wavy3D, Rainbow, Mirror, Glitch, Neon, Cascade, Chrome, Bouncy, Squashy
• Demoscene FX : sine scroller from greetings.txt, copper bars, logo bobs, starfield with motion blur
• Post-FX shader chain : ACES tone-map, bloom, chromatic aberration, hue rotation, scanlines, vignette, grain, pixelate, kaleido, feedback FBO, glitch displacement, all GLSL 150 GL 3.2 core

🎬 Demoparties — 15 narrative demos

Each demoparty is a multi-act scripted show with unique scroller text, background sequence, scroller style, and SuperCollider album track :

Key	Demo	Acts	Album
1/&	AMIGA TRIBUTE	6	M chiptune_madness
2/é	C64 LOWLIFE	5	N phonk
3/"	ACID JOURNEY	8	A acid_journey
4/'	TUNNEL VISION	5	P industrial
5/(	FREQUENCIES	7	I liquid_dnb
6/§	GLITCH WORLD	6	V glitch_idm
7/è	AMBIENT VOID	7	J ambient_cinematic
8/!	RAVE	7	T hardcore_gabber
9/ç	MEMORY LANE	8	U vocal_trance
0/à	GREETINGS	18	W dub_techno
F6	FRACTAL DREAMS	7	O asian_cinematic
F7	INFERNO	6	E vietnam_hard
F8	OUTRUN	6	R synthwave
F9	CUBE STORM	8	Q neurofunk_dnb
F10	GRAND FINAL	8	L future_garage

Each act lasts 12-55 s, transitions between acts trigger flash + glitch postfx + audio swap. Demos loop on their first act after the last.

🎛 Live FX control (Mac AZERTY FR friendly)

• a z e r t y u i o p — 10 background scenes (BoingBall, Tunnel, Metaballs, Voronoi, Twister, KIFS, Fire, Mode7, Octahedron, PlasmaC64)
• s d f g h j k l m + w x c v b n , ; — 17 FX parameters (speed, kick, roll, pan, curve, tile X/Z, dir lerp, bloom, chroma, kaleido, scanlines, pixelate, hue, grain, vignette, saturation)
• ↑ ↓ — adjust selected parameter (× 1.20 / × 0.83 multipliers, or ± 0.05 absolute)
• : — reset all FX
• \ or * — toggle beat-sync (queue demo trigger to next kick)
• q / Esc — exit narrative, default to SphereWave 3D live background
• Espace — manual glitch pulse
• F1–F5 — fullscreen / GUI / postFx / autoglitch / reload shaders

🌐 Real-world data feeds — data_feeds/ + web_realart/

• 9 live sources ingested by data_feeds/bridge.py and broadcast as OSC /data/<source>/<sub> to SC (:57121), oF (:57123) and the web bridge (:57124) : USGS quakes · NOAA SWPC (solar wind, Bz IMF, Kp, X-ray flares) · Mainsfrequenz.de · RTE eCO2mix · Blitzortung lightning · OpenSky ADS-B · Bluesky firehose · Bitcoin mempool · GitHub events · GCN astrophysics · YOLOv8 webcam pose
• SC presets sound_algo/examples/16_data_feeds.scd and 17_data_feeds_more.scd map each source to synthesis : Schumann cavity drone (foudre), aurora additive pad (Bz/wind/Kp), Netzfrequenz pulse kick, RTE 8-op carbon FM, OpenSky granular swarm
• Web standalone web_realart/ ports the visualizers and synths to the browser for real.art.saillant.cc :
  • WebGPU + three.js TSL globe with quake/strike/flight particles (auto-fallback WebGL2)
  • Web Audio ports of 5 SC SynthDef presets (cavity, mix, geo, aurora, pulse)
  • Hydra with 7 data-driven patches (aurora, quake, lightning, flightmap, gridpulse, solarwind, bskyrain)
  • All three layers share feeds_client.js (window.feeds) over one WebSocket

📡 Audio reactivity pipeline

Hantek probes → bulk USB → ScopeRing CH1/CH2 (1-48 MS/s, 8-bit)
                                ↓
                        AudioAnalyzer.update()
                                ↓
                    Downsample box-filter → 48 kHz mono
                                ↓
                  Hann window + FFT 2048 (23 Hz/bin)
                                ↓
        bands : bass(20-200) / lowMid(200-800) /
                mid(800-3200) / treble(3200-16000) /
                kick (transient bass) / snare (transient mid+treble)
                                ↓
                    drives every visualizer parameter

Quick start

macOS install

# 1. Clone
git clone https://github.com/electron-rare/AV-Live.git
cd AV-Live

# 2. Dependencies
brew install --cask supercollider
brew install libusb node
# openFrameworks 0.12 : https://openframeworks.cc/download/  (extract to ~/of)

# 3. Build the launcher (universal binary arm64+x86_64)
cd launcher && bash build.sh

# 4. Build oscope-of (one-time symlink for oF make)
ln -s "$PWD/../oscope-of" ~/of/apps/myApps/oscope-of
cd ~/of/apps/myApps/oscope-of
make OF_ROOT=$HOME/of -j4 Release

# 5. Run
open AV-Live/launcher/build/AVLiveLauncher.app

The launcher autostarts sclang + oscope-of + node (web UI) on launch. Open the menubar icon for status, logs, restart controls.

Without Hantek hardware

oscope-of works without the scope plugged in. It falls back to synthesized signals from the OSC /sync/* metadata sent by sound_algo. You lose the audio-derived FFT but the demoscene visuals + narrative demos all still play.

Demoparty mode

Press a digit (1-9, 0) or F-key (F6-F10) to launch a 1-3 minute scripted demoparty. Each one is a journey through audio + visual transitions, with greetings to the demoscene legends along the way (Fairlight, Razor 1911, ASD, Conspiracy, Farbrausch, TBL, Mercury, TPOLM, Loonies, Hokuto Force, IQ, Knighty, Smash, Gargaj…).

The 0 GREETINGS demo cycles through 18 acts including Boing Ball, plasma C64, dot tunnel, twister bars, copper bars, fractal KIFS, Möbius topology, then a parade of OS logos (Win 1.0, Lotus 1-2-3, Atari, Apple, OS/2 Warp, IRIX, ZX Spectrum), ending on a roll call of demoscene groups.

Architecture details

Component	Path	Tech
Sound engine	sound_algo/	SuperCollider 3.14+, ~12k LOC .scd
Sound web UI	sound_algo/web/	Node Express + WebSocket bridge OSC↔HTTP
Visualizer	oscope-of/	openFrameworks 0.12, GLSL 150, ~6k LOC C++
Launcher	launcher/	SwiftUI universal app, sentinel-based restart
Audio FFT	oscope-of/src/AudioAnalyzer.{h,cpp}	downsample + Hann + FFT 2048
3D models	oscope-of/bin/data/models/	35 PLY parametric meshes
Sprites	oscope-of/bin/data/sprites/	14 PNG OS logos + 5 SVG sources
Shaders	oscope-of/bin/data/shaders/	33 GLSL frag+vert shaders

OSC ports : scsynth :57110 · sclang :57121 · node web :57122 · oscope-of :57123 · http :3000.

License

GPL-3.0-or-later. See LICENSE.

Credits & homages

Built by L'Électron Rare (Clément Saillant). Greetings to all the live coders, the demoscene legends, the openFrameworks community, the SuperCollider community, the Saillans festival 2026 artists, and everyone keeping the phosphor alive.

The GREETINGS scroller in oscope-of/bin/data/sprites/greetings.txt is the soul of the project — edit it freely and make it yours.

*** Press 1-0 + F6-F10 to start a demoparty ***
*** Keep the scene alive — 1985 to ∞ ***