four rum week ten

creative computational creations

ordeeoe

acoustic guitar experiments coming

fourim 9

Seb - boundaries/milkcrates Works on the basis of two principles - contextualisation (taking things out of one context and using them in another). - limitations (maximum output, minimum input). The first composition Seb played us consisted of an 11 millisecond sample of sound. Using samples and a Max patch he turned this into 20 minutes worth of music. As incredible as this is, I can't seem to find any value for this style of composition beyond the gimmicky, it always has a similar sound - spacious, too alien to be pleasurable. Then Seb spoke at length about his milkcrate project. Sound hackers gather in a specified location for a 24 hour music making stint using only materials they can fit inside a milkcrate. (This fitting nicely with his ethos of context and limits). I find it interesting that, given the capacity to make sound with no limitations, people create limitations for themselves... Darren Curtis - IS MAKING MONEY FROM SOUND/COMPOSITION GOOD GRIEF we should bring him back for the career management class! This guy is the mastermind behind the 'Music of the Spheres' Fringe event. He actually created this experience to investigate the effect of sound on the brain/people in environments. So, very intriguing, cymatics - wave phenomena (galaxy patterns). Sound has an effect on sand, stuff, surely water, and so probably us. The question is how? Well, Darren doesn't quite have the conclusion to that yet but he outlined how he made his composition based on scientific findings (space makes music, F#, A and C# in fact). These frequencies can be found as standing waves in pyramids too (and there is a pyramid in Mexico where, if you stand at the base in a certain spot and clap, the echo returns as a bird call. REALLY COOL STUFF).

creative compy

audio arts wk 9

Once again failing to get in specifically to record drums and post production them, I have for you instead some drums I recorded and worked earlier.... Standard micing used: Kick - beta 52 Snare - SM57 closed miced top and bottom Toms - beta56s closed miced overheads - KM87s a, b formation post production process went something like.... pan overheads left and right (60%), pan snare to the left (36%), tom1 (20%) to the left, floor tom to the right (40%). apply smiley EQ to kick trying to boost thump and click sounds. Apply lots of compression. EQ snare to reduce ring and magnify typical snare sound, use a noise gate (trying to remove ring still). EQ toms extensively in search of typical tom sound send all drum tracks down a bus and into an auxiliary channel where the whole lot get even more compression applied. The result, a drum track that has a bit of drive to it (finally). Photos of some of the plug in settings coming as soon as I'm at uni next as is a mix down

britney comes to forum

Well, this forum was absolutely jam packed with information. Our guest speaker, Peter, had two, entirely different topics to speak about and we got to hear of both. Topic one: Doing a live recording of a 20 piece big band ensemble, how the heck to approach it... PRE PRODUCTION!!!!! Peter couldn't stress enough the value of solid pre production when you have 20 odd people hanging around expecting everything to go smoothly. Handy/obvious advice included confirming with the band and booking your recording space well in advance of the recording day, inspecting the studio resources so to know what you have to play with. Coming in personally to assess the space and equipment/checking everything listed in the resources is physically present. Establishing how you want the band located in the room and making a diagram (which stays in the room). It seems that protoolsing things up is inevitable. Peter found that the trumpets and piano player might nail their parts straight up but the trombonists sound better on the fifth take, he spent a bit of time afterwards mixing and matching takes until he had the best of everything. He also extensively cleaned up spill on the various tracks. The second hour was spent talking about sound production in the advertising industry (where the money is). So the secrets to these super smooth, highly produced sounds....compression, LOTS of it, auto tune/rhythm (Peter says no advances have been made in audio fidelity over the last 10 years, just corrective plugins - how sad). Engineers cut away the gaps in between vocals to make the singer seem even bigger than life. Engineers working on big advertising projects get to use huge protools sessions capable of supporting 190 tracks. There can be potentially 5 or 6 different mixes of the same song stacked on top of each other. The reason for this is because Advertising executives and the so forth are probably in the control room with the engineering and wanting to listen to all available options so as to be able to choose their preferred mix. It seemed to me that this would prove to be an organisational NIGHTMARE. Peter stays on top of things by using markers

creating

nothing

Audio Drums

Well, I didn't get a chance to come in and experiment with recording drums for this week's task which is annoying. I was keen to try some different mics on the toms and play with the placement of overheads and after reading everyone else's blogs, I am definitely going to have to start using a room mic as well. So, I have for you a drum recording I prepared earlier.... kick - beta 52 as inside the drum as I could get it and pointing at the beaters snare - SM 57s top and bottom Toms 1, 2 - Sm 57 close miced Tom3, floor - Beta 56s close miced overheads - NT5s left and right using rule of thirds The Kick drum has been EQed using the smiley curve to try and make it as clicky as possible. Drum track

Forum out at sea

In brief, today's forum was a tribute to the recently deceased Tristram Cary who, among many other illustrious things, finished building the Adelaide uni EMU and then taught here for many a year. It seems this non household namer in parallel with other modernist composers, carved himself out a niche as a pioneer of electronically generated music. In fact, teamed up with another fellow, creating one of the first synths was an exercise in raising capital (cash). When he wasn't making his knowledge of electronics and music work for him he was creating avant garde compositions. In fact, his composition provides the music for the early episodes of Dr Who. Eventually he ended up teaching Music tech at Adelaide uni. It's a nice city, the living is cheap, certainly, he would have had no competition here. Anyway, the idea that most interested me was in post presentation discussion time. Something about music in context, the masses might not put on an album of Tristram Cary compositions on but they will enjoy his music in the context of Dr Who. Likewise, a Raver probably won't sit still and listen to Drum and Bass, the will consume this product in the context of the Rave. I haven't any opinion on this phenomenon yet, it's just interesting to note.

Creative

Sigh

Wk 7 oddio B b b b bass

Before I brought an amp into the equation, I recorded something straight into tools using the avalon. This sound is has the most definition. Unfortunately, this definition comes with an excess of finger and fret sound which ultimately makes it undesirable choice (with a good bass/player/the intermediary of an effects pedal, this would probably cease to be an issue). Avalon Next I miced up an amp in the live space with the 52, 414, an SM 57, Neumann and the random pick of a Senheiser MD421. Beta 52, 414: comparatively bassy/booming sounds SM 57, MD421: less low-end boom, more defined image Neumann: room sound (still maybe a good choice in a dead room…though there would still be fret sound). All mics bar the 414 pick up amp hum making none of them the preferable choice. The hum on the Neumann is the least offensive but who has one of those just lying around! The option of blending sounds remains. With my objective being a sound that seems powerful but retains definition, i would probably blend the 414 with the 57 or the MD 421 (blending with the neuman sounds fine too but I'm thinking realistically here). 414 with Neumann I have 3 other audio samples but box net refuses to load them. I give up. Bye Bye