Sònar+D 2018 is being held from 13 to 16 June in Barcelona and is an international conference to explore how creativity changes the present and imagines new futures, in collaboration with researchers, innovators and economic leaders. Since 2013, it has attracted to the city renowned artists, creative technologists, musicians, filmmakers, designers, thinkers, scientists, entrepreneurs, makers and hackers to participate in a carefully selected programme focusing on inspiration and networking.

Jointly organized by the Music Technology Group (MTG) of the Department of Information and Communication Technologies (DTIC) at UPF, the Sònar+D Innovation Challenge (SIC) area is a virtual and presential platform for creative minds at the cutting edge of experimentation. Technology companies launch challenges to a select group of artists who will have been working for five weeks on the prototypes that will be shown at Sònar+D. 

EyeHarp, a tool for learning music designed for people with motor disabilities that allows controlling the musical performance with the gaze

One such challenge is the project EyeHarp, an application created by Zacharies Vamvakousis, a researcher with UPF’s MTG who has developed a tool for learning music designed for people with motor disabilities that allows controlling the musical performance with the gaze. “The program performs a mapping of the gaze through a video games camera and, like all instruments, you have to practise a lot to master it, and yet more so for people who cannot speak or cannot walk and do not have such a sense of rhythm”, said Vamvakousis. For this reason the project team is working on tools that promote the practice of musical perception and rhythm.

Catalan startups present their innovations for the future

Voiceful, a set of tools that uses the voice to generate new forms of expression; to generate spoken content that includes emotions; that transforms the voice in real time or that creates unique and customized artificial voices

In this edition of Sònar 2018, twenty-five Catalan startups are presenting their innovation in Sònar+D’s Startup Garden space. One of them is Voctro Labs, a startup created on the basis of the research carried out at UPF’s MTG that applies artificial intelligence to generate voices (both speaking and singing) for use in applications of video games, virtual reality, music, video, advertising, social apps and IoT devices.

One of its most recent creations is Voiceful, a set of tools that uses the voice to generate new forms of expression; to generate spoken content that includes emotions; that transforms the voice in real time or that creates unique and customized artificial voices. Available for web, mobile, and tablet.

More information on Voctro Labs:

Aiats Agustí, “A garden of startups”, elMón, VIAempresa, 25 May 2017.