Does anyone even know about the Inception iPhone app? Movie tie-in apps and games are generally something to be wary of; once the hype from the movie wears off, they are cast aside as marketing shovelware. Inception was an awesome movie, but was not immune to this. There was an Inception world bending app that took pictures from your current location on google maps and overlaid them on the sky from a photo from the phone’s camera. It was gimmicky and didn’t work very well. Once the hype from the movie died down, it was deleted.
However there was another movie tie-in app, simply titled “Inception”. This one is different. It’s nothing like any other app I’ve ever seen on any platform. Explaining it is a little difficult as it loses something in translation. Much like the Matrix, you have to see it for yourself. Or, more accurately, hear it for yourself. In essence, it’s a really awesome way to experience the Inception soundtrack. There are many “dreams” to choose from, and each dream is unlocked by different means. The unlocking methods are quite varied and use just about every feature of the iPhone. The “Action Dream” is unlocked by moving the phone around a lot, while the “Still Dream” is unlocked by keeping it still. The “Traveling Dream” is unlocked by traveling, tracked by GPS; there’s also dreams unlocked by being at the airport, or in Africa (yes, seriously). There’s a dream unlocked by making a lot of noise, no noise, after 11pm, in bright sunshine and on the night of a full moon. There’s also one unlocked by listening to other “dreams” for a long time, or by other people dreaming at the same time. Am I missing any?
So what are these “dreams”? Essentially they’re mixes of scores from the soundtrack. But they’re also so much more. Each dream also listens from the microphone (in-built or headset) and plays the sounds back in the dream in weird and wonderful ways. Echoes, delays, pitch changes… All in a way that really compliments the mood of the music. Using headphones to listen to the sound enhances the experience greatly, and it almost sounds as if the music is the soundtrack to your life for real. Myself and my partner played around with one of the more quiet dreams, just talking normally, and it sounded like a scene of reminiscence from a perfect time. It was nostalgic and happy, something hard to achieve with music alone. Another great example is the action dream. With the phone in my pocket, walking down the street feels like an action scene in a movie. When the music hits the crescendo, I feel like I should be breaking out into a run. But it reacts to the amount of movement. If I have to stop at traffic lights, the music dies down and drops layers, exactly as would happen in a movie during a lull in the action. It’s this reactiveness that adds a depth to the music you normally only get while watching the movie.
I’ve gotten into the habit of listening to the Inception app on the commute home from work. It’s fun inducing different dreams and playing with ordinary sounds in the environment (eg, tapping on a fence, or a strangers conversation) just to hear what they sound like in the dream world.
I want more dreams, more tracks to play with, and not just Inception tracks. I’d love to digitize the world around me with the Tron Legacy soundtrack, or any other decent movie soundtrack for that matter. Or maybe not just movie soundtracks. Maybe music from artists like the Chemical Brothers. I’m sure they could do some awesome stuff with the technology.
I don’t want this to be it. There’s a lot of possibility with augmented sound. There’s probably some potential for augmented sound games, too.
Please, let this be the beginning of a new era of music and sound.
