Smart Atlantic Buoys Project
Smart Atlantic Buoys are located along the Atlantic Coast, constantly collecting and sharing real-time weather and ocean data to support coastal and ocean management efforts. The Smart Atlantic Buoy located in the Halifax harbour is used by the Atlantic Pilotage Authority to determine if conditions allow for safe entry into the harbour. DeepSense is working on creating a predictive machine learning model to help support management decisions if the Halifax Harbour buoy was to go offline. Learn more about Phase one of the project by clicking here and Phase 2 of the project by clicking here.
The Work
Using the historical data collected by the Halifax Harbour Smart Atlantic Buoy, Brigitta created music using wave height data before, during, and after Hurricane Fiona (September 2022). The song you hear is created by assigning wave heights to different pitches.
The music is then matched with imagery that shows Hurricane Fiona above Nova Scotia, captured by NASA satellite.
The glitch moments that scatter the image happen when the music reaches a specific pitch, ie. an extremely high wave caused by Fiona.
Sound Waves: A Case Study of the Hurricane Fiona Project and Sound Exploration
I got involved in the Smart Atlantic Buoy project a while later, and the CSV file (a text file that has a specific format that allows data to be saved in a table structured format) I received spanned the years 1988 to 2023. My initial instinct was to explore the data specifically concerning Hurricane Fiona.
The buoy sits at the mouth of Halifax.
SmartATLANTIC Consortium deploys its first inshore weather buoy to support Halifax port operations and scientific research. (n.d.). The Atlantic Pilotage Authority (APA).
Smart Atlantic Buoys are located along the Atlantic Coast, collecting and sharing real-time weather and ocean data to support coastal, shipping, and ocean management efforts. The Smart Atlantic Buoy located in the Halifax harbor is used by the Atlantic Pilotage Authority to determine if conditions allow for safe entry into the harbor. The research group from which I obtained the Halifax offshore weather data, was concurrently developing a predictive machine-learning model. This model aimed to facilitate management decisions in case the Halifax Harbour buoy went offline, a situation that typically occurs during severe weather events like Hurricane Fiona.
Using the historical data collected by the Halifax Harbour Smart Atlantic Buoy, I created music using wave height data before, during, and after Hurricane Fiona (September 2022). The song is created by assigning wave heights to pitches. The higher the wave, the higher the pitch. The glitch moments of the visual happen when the music reaches a specific pitch, which was the extremely high waves caused by Fiona.
Fiona Happening
A video still from the Smart Atlantic Buoy project. 2023
Influencing my approach may have been my background in traditional painting, particularly an extensive study of pre-19th-century oil paintings, especially Renaissance Old Master paintings. The concept of "The Vanguard and Zenith of Humanism" resonated with me, along with a broader belief in art as the epitome of human expression — a celebration of the interconnectedness of humanity. Now it also brings out the question of why my love for the ocean is also my love for humanity. Does it have anything to do with the fluid matters in our brains, in our bodies, in the oceanic space of the womb where we all lived before we were born? In the heart-pumping echoing sound that resembles the sound of ocean tide? Regardless, it was important to me that the sonic elements of the composition I co-created with the data retained a softer, non-threatening quality. I wanted it to be alluring as well as thought-provoking, not terrifying., and more or so in the text-data project (CBC Climate Change News, thanks for all the help), and the just-for-fun of the AIS boat location project.