By participating in the first session of the ACTOR Project’s Contemporary Orchestration Research Ensemble (CORE), I composed a short work for a heterogenous chamber quartet that included a violin, a bass clarinet, a vibraphone and a trombone. These instruments had been pre-selected by ACTOR researchers to observe and compare how their particularities would be exploited by various composers throughout several academic institutions. In my case, the chosen approach was to present specific timbral approaches or effects in successive sections or blocks, sometimes in a very literal manner, all of which were based on a short melodic phrase which was developed prior to the composing phase in a series of experimentation sessions with the performers. As the project evolved it became apparent that a strategy of juxtaposed stylistic references was being used to present very clear and contrasted elements. This approach ultimately determined the composition’s general structure. This text presents the process that led to this composition’s production, discusses its objectives and succinctly presents its different segments. It attempts to describe how timbral strategies can have a determinative effect on the construction of a work, particularly in the context of a research-creation project.