Justin Troutman
@justintroutman.bsky.social
southern drawl. applied crypto. disinfo research. tradecraft historian. street baller. bats left. electric + bass player. trail runner. 4x dad. 2 dogs. erdős-bacon #6. cryptography @ duke. security @ panw. justintroutman.com
Some thoughts on dialing in entropy for Portrait of Tracy McGrady:
November 8, 2025 at 9:20 AM
Some thoughts on dialing in entropy for Portrait of Tracy McGrady:
portrait of tracy mcgrady — upcoming EP
tracy mcgrady’s 13 points in 35 seconds, reborn as motion and melody. the eruption translated into arpeggiated synth and harmonic tension, seasoned by the influence of jaco pastorius’ portrait of tracy.
tracy mcgrady’s 13 points in 35 seconds, reborn as motion and melody. the eruption translated into arpeggiated synth and harmonic tension, seasoned by the influence of jaco pastorius’ portrait of tracy.
November 3, 2025 at 7:09 AM
portrait of tracy mcgrady — upcoming EP
tracy mcgrady’s 13 points in 35 seconds, reborn as motion and melody. the eruption translated into arpeggiated synth and harmonic tension, seasoned by the influence of jaco pastorius’ portrait of tracy.
tracy mcgrady’s 13 points in 35 seconds, reborn as motion and melody. the eruption translated into arpeggiated synth and harmonic tension, seasoned by the influence of jaco pastorius’ portrait of tracy.
but can there really be too much Power in the Point (c. 2021)
October 25, 2025 at 11:18 PM
but can there really be too much Power in the Point (c. 2021)
Time to get some gear and plan a trip to the Tuolumne. (8/8)
October 4, 2025 at 9:27 PM
Time to get some gear and plan a trip to the Tuolumne. (8/8)
At the studio in Oakland.
August 31, 2025 at 5:30 PM
At the studio in Oakland.
It's coming along. #music #basketball
August 22, 2025 at 6:26 AM
It's coming along. #music #basketball
Modeling a new kind of function: tonality processor. Inspired by round functions in block ciphers but made for mapping basketball sequences to chord progressions, with granular control over modal qualities.
August 21, 2025 at 1:51 AM
Modeling a new kind of function: tonality processor. Inspired by round functions in block ciphers but made for mapping basketball sequences to chord progressions, with granular control over modal qualities.
Early sample from refining midrangeOS for preset-configurable diatonic enforcement vs. borrow-enabled voicing, for controlling balance around tonal centers.
August 19, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Early sample from refining midrangeOS for preset-configurable diatonic enforcement vs. borrow-enabled voicing, for controlling balance around tonal centers.
I’m going all in on basketball sequences as chordal progressions, and it’s called midrangeOS. It’s kind of like cryptographic round functions for music theory, where you control consonance, dissonance, modes, and motifs. Some audio to follow soon, and an instrumental EP planned for spring 2026.
August 16, 2025 at 6:33 PM
I’m going all in on basketball sequences as chordal progressions, and it’s called midrangeOS. It’s kind of like cryptographic round functions for music theory, where you control consonance, dissonance, modes, and motifs. Some audio to follow soon, and an instrumental EP planned for spring 2026.
Combining flash fiction and interactive fiction with field ciphers; students authenticate and decrypt field entries from a cipher clerk they follow through a collaborative narrative. Call it "vicarious fiction." #flashfiction #interactivefiction #duke
May 10, 2025 at 5:17 AM
Combining flash fiction and interactive fiction with field ciphers; students authenticate and decrypt field entries from a cipher clerk they follow through a collaborative narrative. Call it "vicarious fiction." #flashfiction #interactivefiction #duke
Why be a cryptographer when you can be a warlock in Theoretical and Applied Thaumaturgy? *whips cloak and fades behind a stack of Springer books* An inspirational gem from Callimahos. Source: t.co/yb6orCRfSs
May 2, 2025 at 7:00 AM
Why be a cryptographer when you can be a warlock in Theoretical and Applied Thaumaturgy? *whips cloak and fades behind a stack of Springer books* An inspirational gem from Callimahos. Source: t.co/yb6orCRfSs
Testing out "trail mix," a human-parsable notation system for capturing the structure of field ciphers, with cues from chocolate ("sport," "dark," and "reserve") and music ("sharp," "natural," and "flat"), as a means of fine-tuning the balance of simplicity and security, palatably. (Cont'd)
April 28, 2025 at 3:23 AM
Testing out "trail mix," a human-parsable notation system for capturing the structure of field ciphers, with cues from chocolate ("sport," "dark," and "reserve") and music ("sharp," "natural," and "flat"), as a means of fine-tuning the balance of simplicity and security, palatably. (Cont'd)
field ciphers dot com // officially launching june 2025 to kick off the third edition of “the adversarial game of cryptographic design” summer course at duke // I’ve reached the summit of my life’s work in cryptography and now it’s time to let it fly . it’s gonna be so rad .
March 31, 2025 at 1:54 AM
field ciphers dot com // officially launching june 2025 to kick off the third edition of “the adversarial game of cryptographic design” summer course at duke // I’ve reached the summit of my life’s work in cryptography and now it’s time to let it fly . it’s gonna be so rad .
Simple LaTeX memo class with fancy ligatures I'm workin' on, with swappable colorways.
March 16, 2025 at 7:17 PM
Simple LaTeX memo class with fancy ligatures I'm workin' on, with swappable colorways.
Some early movement/SFX testing of a minimalist game that's RDR2 map motif meets Cold War field crypto; it'll be a key part in how my students interact with the coursework this summer. Headlamps, flashlights, and flares light the way, but avoid the GRU (geo reconnaissance unit) at all costs.
February 24, 2025 at 2:32 AM
Some early movement/SFX testing of a minimalist game that's RDR2 map motif meets Cold War field crypto; it'll be a key part in how my students interact with the coursework this summer. Headlamps, flashlights, and flares light the way, but avoid the GRU (geo reconnaissance unit) at all costs.
February 11, 2025 at 4:02 PM
Periodic reminder:
January 25, 2025 at 9:36 AM
Periodic reminder:
when LaTeX goes badness 10000 one too many times and you’re like “you know what”
January 25, 2025 at 12:48 AM
when LaTeX goes badness 10000 one too many times and you’re like “you know what”
mount d from the tassajara ridge at 1am
January 21, 2025 at 7:17 AM
mount d from the tassajara ridge at 1am
And now randomized stars, because I like some texture; 18 lines of TikZ. This is a pretty fun and focused device; at least for how I'm using it, the minimalism nudges you towards productivity, rather than getting lost in features.
January 15, 2025 at 8:14 AM
And now randomized stars, because I like some texture; 18 lines of TikZ. This is a pretty fun and focused device; at least for how I'm using it, the minimalism nudges you towards productivity, rather than getting lost in features.
Wrote a little TikZ function in LaTeX to draw randomized grainy lines for constructing "bento"-like tables, which I've exported as a Remarkable Paper Pro template, because crypto notes are only really crypto notes if *everything* has entropy.
January 15, 2025 at 5:15 AM
Wrote a little TikZ function in LaTeX to draw randomized grainy lines for constructing "bento"-like tables, which I've exported as a Remarkable Paper Pro template, because crypto notes are only really crypto notes if *everything* has entropy.
Leveraging music theory (e.g., polyrhythms, microtones, negative harmony, et cetera) within round function design as a means of granularly controlling dissonance, such that ciphertext can be unpredictable, while playable (with a sense of tonality) as music notation. www.instagram.com/p/DEdjQ-OSfQF/
January 6, 2025 at 7:37 PM
Leveraging music theory (e.g., polyrhythms, microtones, negative harmony, et cetera) within round function design as a means of granularly controlling dissonance, such that ciphertext can be unpredictable, while playable (with a sense of tonality) as music notation. www.instagram.com/p/DEdjQ-OSfQF/
From basketball plays, to bass lines, to block ciphers: an exploration in the mathematics of movement (www.instagram.com/p/DDrNaDOxLoM/).
December 17, 2024 at 10:02 AM
From basketball plays, to bass lines, to block ciphers: an exploration in the mathematics of movement (www.instagram.com/p/DDrNaDOxLoM/).
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December 10, 2024 at 5:32 AM
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