Northern Static

Northern Static began with a shortwave receiver left running overnight on a balcony in Lisbon. Between the stations there was a hiss that never repeated. The project asks what that noise might look like if you could stand inside it — an experiment in listening, built to run in a single browser tab.

Audio is synthesised in real time with the Web Audio API: filtered noise, a handful of detuned oscillators and a long convolution reverb. The same signal drives a WebGL field of particles that drift like aurora and tighten when the signal peaks. Move the cursor to tune between bands. Hold still, and the piece slowly settles into silence.