ENSEMBLE Performing Together Apart: Enhancing Immersive Multi-Location Co-Performance in Real Time

沉浸在世界级音乐家的现场表演中，无论是对观众还是对表演者本身来说，都是一种非常吸引人、非常宝贵的文化体验。歌剧、管弦乐表演和音乐剧很受欢迎，吸引了大批观众，但它们的制作成本高昂，资源密集，尤其是最有才华的表演者往往分布在全球不同的地方。先进的视听流技术可以潜在地提供解决方案和新的创造机会，爱丁堡纳皮尔大学处于这项实验工作的前沿。然而，ENSEMBLE项目将提供一个互补的、以人为本的重点，关注相对较少探索的体验方面。ENSEMBLE项目将着眼于音乐家如何在一起现场表演，即使他们相隔遥远，也可以通过尖端的连接技术进行协调。ENSEMBLE将主要从表演者本身的角度，使用定性和分析方法，研究支持高质量表演体验的主观、经验和背景因素。随着超低延迟网络连接的出现，音乐家、歌手和演员在多个远程地点实时一起表演的可能性已经出现。延迟方面对音乐家来说是一个特别的挑战，即使是30毫秒的延迟也可能导致性能的显著下降。随着这些延迟技术障碍的解决，关于共同表演者及其观众的远程表演伙伴表示的细微差别，出现了更多的经验挑战。用最简单的话来说，这个问题就是表演中的远程参与者，无论是合作表演者（如指挥家和管弦乐队）还是观众，如何才能最好地相互呈现（视觉、听觉和动态），从而为所有参与者带来最吸引人、最快乐、最身临其境的体验？ENSEMBLE项目试图通过探索新兴技术的潜力来回答这个问题，例如多人沉浸式穹顶环境（IDEs），在多地点和分布式音乐和戏剧表演中实现、增强、扩展和沉浸表演者和/或观众的实时体验。这反过来将有助于深入了解远程合作表演对表演者和观众体验的影响参数，从而能够建立UX（用户体验）和技术框架，为在临时和永久物理表演空间和场景中设计、开发和部署此类技术提供最佳实践信息。

SummaryThe feeling of being immersed within a live performance by an ensemble of world class musicians can be a deeply engaging and highly valued cultural experience for audiences, as well as for the performers themselves. Operas, orchestral performances and musical theatre are popular and attract large followings, but they are costly and highly resource intensive to produce, particularly when the most talented performers are often located in different locations across the globe. Advanced audio-visual streaming technology can potentially provide solutions and new creative opportunities, and Edinburgh Napier University is at the forefront of this experimental work. However, the ENSEMBLE project will provide a complementary, human-centred focus on relatively under explored experiential aspects. The ENSEMBLE project will look at how musicians can perform live together, seamlessly as a group even though they are separated by distance, mediated through cutting-edge connection technologies. ENSEMBLE will examine the subjective, experiential and contextual factors that support high quality performance experiences, primarily from the perspective of the performers themselves, using qualitative and analytical methods.With the advent of super low latency network connections, the possibility has emerged for musicians, singers and actors to perform together in multiple remote locations in real time. The latency aspect has been a particular challenge for musicians where even a lag of 30 milliseconds may have an impact resulting in a significant deterioration in performance. With the resolution of some of these latency technical hurdles, additional more experiential challenges have emerged regarding the nuance of representation of remote performance partners of both the co-performer(s) and their audience. In its simplest terms, the question is how best should remote participants in a performance, be they co-performers (e.g. conductors and orchestras) or audience members, be represented to one another (visually, aurally and kinetically) to result in the most engaging, joyful and immersive experience for all involved?The ENSEMBLE project seeks to answer this question by exploring the potential of emerging technologies such as multi-person immersive dome environments (IDEs) to enable, enhance, extend and immerse performers and/or audiences in real-time during multi-location and distributed musical and theatrical performances. This in turn will provide insight into the parameters of influence of remote co-performance on both the performer and audience experience, in turn enabling the establishment of UX (user experience) and technological frameworks informing best practice when designing, developing and deploying such technologies into temporary and permanent physical performance spaces and scenarios.