The history of the fourMs Lab can be traced back to the Musical Gestures project, led by Professor Rolf Inge God?y. The project explored music-related body motion in various ways and needed a setup for recording dancers. The researchers borrowed the video studio of the UiO Intermedia group (now LINK) and performed the first set of recordings with a bluescreen in 2005.
The initial video recordings were the start point for many years of empirical investigations. The researchers also developed several different software solutions for extracting information about music-related body motion.
In need of a better motion tracking solution, an electromagnetic tracker from Polhemus was purchased and set up in a small room in the basement of the Department of Musicology in 2006. The Polhemus system was used in studies of pianists' motion, and particularly the effect of coarticulation in music performance. This lab was also where the first sound-tracing studies were carried out.
The project Sensing Music-related Actions started up in 2008, as a collaboration between researchers from the Department of Musicology and the Department of Informatics.
With more researchers, the need for a larger lab space became apparent. The lab was moved to a larger space on the north side of the Blindern campus called Veglaben (a building that has been torn down to give space to the new UiO:Life Science building).
The updated lab needed a name, and fourMs was suggested by Rolf Inge God?y. The aim was to explain that the group's focus was on the intersection of the four M's in "Music, Mind, Motion, Machines".
The first marker-based motion capture system was purchased from Optitrack, and the researchers also worked with various types of custom-built electronics. Funding was secured for purchasing a state-of-the-art motion capture from Qualisys, which was installed in 2009.
The lab moved back to the ZEB building in 2011. A former seminar room on the ground floor was turned into a "black box", and a multichannel audio rig was installed together with the motion capture system. The researchers from the Department of Informatics moved to the new informatics building, but collaboration continued. An application for a Norwegian Centre of Excellence was submitted under the name fourMs, and received top grades in the evaluation, but was eventually not funded. Still, "runner up" funding secured continued research activities in the lab.
The collaboration in the lab expanded to include also researchers from the Department of Psychology. A new application for a Centre of Excellence between Departments of Musicology, Psychology, and Informatics was submitted in 2016. The application was successful, and RITMO Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Rhythm, Time and Motion was established in 2017. It was decided that RITMO should move into Harald Schjelderups hus on the northwest side of the Blindern campus.
The fourMs Lab moved into a new custom-built facility in August 2018. The old lab space in the ZEB building was converted into the MCT Portal for the new master's programme Music, Communication & Technology.