Welcome to my little slice of the digital forest

My name is Luke Child

I am a 25-year old, white, bespectacled male with short, mouse-y brown hair and usually with a bit of a bushy brown beard. My pronouns are he/him. I originally hail from the 'city-but-it's-like-a-town' of Worcester, Worcestershire in the West Midlands. UK, and now reside in Bristol, UK.

Figure 1 - A photograph of myself against a plain grey background in a tie dye t shirt from the brand RipNDip with the logo edited out. I'm smiling and looking to the left of the frame.

I started life as a lil' computer nerd who liked playing guitar

(...he's still in here somewhere)

My earliest tech memories are from this PC. I remember watching my cousin play through games such as Star Wars: KOTOR and Heroes of Might and Magic 4 and being obsessed with games ever since then. I wasn't one of these child prodigy hacker programmers at this stage, instead getting my first guitar, a beautiful 3/4 sized hand-me-down from said cousin along with a bunch of 90s/2000s nu metal mixtapes. This was a formative time for me.

A photograph of a primary school-aged me sat at a desk in my parent's porch. I'm turned around on the chair and smiling at the camera.
On the desk is an old PC monitor, floppy disk and CD drive setup, with some unknown CDs in the background. — Figure 2 - A photograph of a primary school-aged me sat at a desk in my parent's porch. I'm turned around on the chair and smiling at the camera. On the desk is an old PC monitor, floppy disk and CD drive setup, with some unknown CDs in the background.

Then comes the emo punk angsty electric guitar and more games phase

(...he's also still in here somewhere)

And by a formative time for me, I mean that it defined my entire music taste and fashion choice. I got into learning heavy guitar riffs and solos from the likes of Bullet for my Valentine and Trivium, started to play drums and got interested in odd time signatures and Biffy Clyro (more on them to come) and discovered my eclectic and colourful side. I also got into audio technology here and began recording my own music, releasing my first instrumental EP in 2016 and *aquiring* my first copy of Cubase, along with a Behringer C1 and a Roland UA-25 audio interface.

A self portrait of me as a teenager with shoulder length straightened hair and a surprised expression
holding a pair of Travis Smith signature Ahead drumsticks crossed in front of my face. The background is a series of posters pulled from
Kerrang magazine and Blu-Tac'd to my wall, featuring bands such as Blink 182, Trivium, Motionless in White, New Found Glory and You Me at Six. — Figure 3 - A self portrait of me as a teenager with shoulder length straightened hair and a surprised expression holding a pair of Travis Smith signature Ahead drumsticks crossed in front of my face. The background is a series of posters pulled from Kerrang magazine and Blu-Tac'd to my wall, featuring bands such as Blink 182, Trivium, Motionless in White, New Found Glory and You Me at Six. I head to college to do Music Technology, smashing a triple Distinction* (oh stop it you) out and finding my calling for game audio and music.

Then the adventure REALLY begins and we venture towards Bristol for university

Am I now a southerner?

I travel down to the University of the West of England doing a BSc in Creative Music Technology and discovering a love for coding wacky things, game audio and acoustics/reverberation, under the fantastic guidance and friendship of Phillip Phelps. I then realise I'm actually a bit of a nerd for academia and decide to take on an MSc at UWE too in Creative Technology, studying under Dr Dan Buzzo and Dr Natanya Ford, writing a thesis on applying elicitation to lister perception of reverberant spaces from memory, and publishing my first paper in 2021 at the Audio Engineering Society's 150th conference!

A self portrait of me with the title page for my masters thesis folded into a paper aeroplane. I'm gesturing to throw it
to the right side of the image while giving my best 'Blue Steel from Zoolander' pouting face — Figure 4 - A self portrait of me with the title page for my masters thesis folded into a paper aeroplane. I'm gesturing to throw it to the right side of the image while giving my best 'Blue Steel from Zoolander' pouting face.

And that brings us to now... who the 'eff is Luke Child?

Enjoyer/Destroyer/Maker/Creator

So where does that leave us now? Currently, I'm an associate lecturer at the University of the West of England, working towards starting a PhD in audio accessibility studies and making a whole bunch of wild and wacky things, destroying their processes and enjoying the things I find out along the way. My research looks into how audio can be implemented into digital media and games, and how interfacing with audio mechanics and phenomenons can help in bringing media experiences to folks with visual and aural considerations.

Figure 5 - A slit-scan image of myself pulling a series of weird faces to form an abstract self portrait.

I never did give up my musical side (see the music navigation option) and perform as Cosmic, a space-obsessed, lo-fi, polyrhythmic alt-jazz rap project making out of this world music and visuals. To date, I've released an EP called Gravitate and an LP called Touchdown through Birmingham/Bristol collective Satori Records. I'm also in a punk band with fellow researcher Corey Ford, but we haven't released anything... yet...

Figure 6 - A photograph of me in my garden pretending to be abducted by aliens. The background and sky have been altered to have a swirling pink nebula overlayed on them.

When I get free time, you'll find me obsessing over Biffy Clyro, the best band in the world. If it's not that, then I'm usually making questionable art, playing board games, sweating games of ARAM on League of Legends, or trying to play something stupid like a 17/16 polyrhythm (I'm not that good... yet.)

Figure 7 - A photograph of me forming a triangle with my hands while focussing/squinting into the camera lens.

Enjoy things. Destroy things. Create the absurd. Make yourself heard.