The ATLAS Creative Technology & Design focus in Digital Music and Immersive Experience offers both mentoring in creative inquiry, and science and engineering training for students interested in inventing within the space of music, sound, movement, AR/VR and other media. Our MS course sequence is built for flexibility and rigor, allowing students with prior experience in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering and other technical disciplines to transfer their skills toward their creative interests, and for students with music performance, composition, and other creative backgrounds to develop technical skills that they may bring to technical careers after graduation.
This program is anchored in a unique research community and space, the B2 Center for Media, Arts & Performance, which offers multiple, networked research and production spaces, and state-of-the-art multichannel immersive audio, video projection, and motion capture equipment. We offer a core course sequence that familiarizes students with the theoretical and practical applications of these tools for the creation of immersive experiences, including courses in Immersive Audio & Ambisonics, Motion Capture for Performance, Interactive Sound, and AR/VR. Additional courses from our partner programs at CU Boulder, including Music, Integrative Physiology, Computer Science, Environmental Design, Physics, Neuroscience, and Speech and Hearing Sciences offer an opportunity for in-depth exposure to a topic of specialization.
ATLAS is home to a network of research labs devoted to the invention of the next generation of these technologies. Researchers in the Brain Music Lab explore how the brain and body react to music to better understand why music elicits an emotional response from those who listen. Projects underway in the THING Lab investigate new applications of motion capture technology, and the ACME Lab community is devoted to the development of new paradigms for human-computer interaction, with musical performance and creation as a favorite application.
Additional facilities are available to support student researchers in their creative projects. The ATLAS Institute’s BTU lab is a hackerspace equipped with physical computing and digital fabrication hardware. The AF Lab is a support space for Creative Technology and Design students for the exploration of sound design and music instrument creation. In the College of Music, the CRUNCH Lab is a full electronic music project studio optimized for computer music research (including live interactive performance systems) as well as sound recording and editing projects and audio/video production.
ATLAS and College of Music together provide a community of researcher-creators that welcome our MS students. ATLAS students share their work in the Soundworks concert series-forum, a meeting space for the creation and performance of new and original works by student composers, improvisers, performers and collaborators in the College of Music and CU Boulder community. Soundworks values a broad aesthetic range of sound-based art that is inclusive of all genres and manners of music making.
