Sound Shapes

Overview

Sound Shapes is a series of short vertical clips where a sound draws its own picture. Two notes a fifth apart trace one figure, a minor chord another. A clave rhythm becomes a polygon on a clock face. Sandhill cranes recorded in Yellowstone, slowed four times, light up a band of pitch above rippling water. Watch them on Instagram or on [YouTube Shorts](https://www.youtube.com/@soundshapeslab).

Each clip carries one idea you could say in a sentence ("every rhythm has a shape"), with plain labels on screen naming what you are hearing. The shape is computed from the audio, frame by frame. One honest edge: in the rhythm clips the sound places each beat, but the length of the bar is set by hand.

The sound is either made in the lab or taken from a credited public-domain recording, never commercial music. The lab that makes the clips is not public yet, so there is nothing to download or sign up for.

Why I built it

I follow a few people on Instagram who post shapes made of sound - lines that pulse and move with music, bird song, a single beat. I wanted to know how they worked, so I started a lab to try it myself and post the ones worth sharing. The rule I keep coming back to: the sound has to draw the picture, and you should see why. For now it lives as clips, not an app you can open.

How it works

1. Pick a clip - each one shows a single idea, like every musical interval, or one note played by six different sounds. 2. Listen and watch - the shape is computed from the sound itself, so what moves is what you hear. 3. Read the label - plain words on screen name the note, chord, rhythm or bird you are hearing. 4. Come back tomorrow - a new shape goes up most days.

Feature highlights

• Music theory you can see - intervals, chords, rhythms, loudness, melodies and stereo placement, one idea per clip.
• World rhythms - son clave, rumba clave, bossa nova clave, habanera, cinquillo and a West African bell pattern, each drawn as its own shape.
• Bird calls, slowed down - sandhill cranes from the National Park Service's public-domain Yellowstone sound library, slowed so you can follow each call.
• Drawn by the sound - every frame is computed from the audio, so a louder note draws bigger and a higher one draws farther out.
• Rights-clean audio - sound made in the lab or a credited public-domain recording, never a commercial song.
• Short and vertical - each clip runs under half a minute, made for a phone screen.

Notes

• For whom: Anyone curious what a chord, a rhythm or a bird call looks like.
• How it's built: A small browser lab analyses the sound and draws each frame, then renders it to vertical video.