Category: Y1 CREATIVE PROJECT: NATURAL MECHANICAL HARMONY

‘Ive been away but now im back’

Mixing-

I set the project outputs as surround to allow 3D movement of sound, I then watched the video and recreated the movement of particular trees in the space relative to the camera. This was quite a repetitive task but I found mapping the area interesting. A problem I faced was overcrowding of sounds, this was intended as I wanted the piece to be immersive, however it does get difficult to differentiate sounds from each other at some points. After about 30 minutes I developed a method to make it easier to mix, I first automated volume based on distance from the camera, i then would go to the beginning and pan the audio based on direction.

‘Ive been away but now im back’

Natural sound reflective writing-

I found it quite easy to create the vocal sounds in sound grain as I’ve worked with it before. I did however try to create less perfect harmonies than I did previously, as I feel that this suits plants and nature better, there is a sense of imperfection or not adhering to a particular order. I created four tracks, differing in pitch and harmony (though only slightly), I plan to assign these to plants in the environment. Hopefully the four tracks are diverse enough to avoid melding into one. If not I’ll have to record more later in the mixing process. 

Mechanical Sound reflective writing-

I found it very easy to record the guitar string rattle, however the finished result wasn’t quite what I had hoped for. I thought it would blend in with the vocal sound a bit more, but it seems to stick out in the mix. Also I noise gated this sound with the side chain input as the leaves rustling, this did not produce the effect I wanted. The sound wasn’t as defined as I would hope, it just sounds like its being turned up for a few seconds. I didn’t manage to record the metal sound I wanted due to time constraints, however I will try to record it at a later date. 

‘Ive been away but now I’m back’

Sound walk reflective writing

Im very glad I took the time to plan out the walk. I wanted the recording to feature some specific things, moving through a place surrounded in plants, a close up of plants with interaction, and a change of environment (moving from woods to a clearing). I didn’t think about the fact that all the elements I’m trying to vocode and manipulate are all contained in one audio file, should’ve realised this early to be honest. So I’m going to have to record a few elements separately and mix them in. Also my interaction with the plants didn’t produce as much noise as I hoped, so I will have to record this separately. One more problem is the wind gets quite distorted when I walk into the clearing, I should have used a better microphone with a deadcat on it. Im very glad I recorded a video as its really helping me gage the geography of the walk. 

‘Ive been away but now I’m back‘

Mechanical/Natural Harmony

The plan is to attach particular sounds to a point in the environment (eg. A tree or plant). I’ll do this through quadraphonic mixing, then exporting as stereo allowing front to back movement of sound. To keep track of plants placement in the environment I will take a video. I have my method of mixing, I need to now determine the sounds I will use. 

I will be trying to reflect the idea mechanical/natural harmony. Im going to build a collection of mechanical and natural sounds separately, then marry the two. 

Natural sounds: 

Vocals- I think I will use soundgrain to sustain the audio, making for a smoother more permanent auditory environment, by this I mean I hope that it will strengthen the geographical permanence of the sound. 

Wind- Hopefully this will be picked up in the sound walk recording, however if it isn’t prominent enough, I’m prepared to record wind separately and mix it in. 

Plants rustling- I think this will be picked up in the sound recording, I might interact with the environment to produce these sounds (running hand through leaves). This interaction could be interesting to explore, although I’m not sure what the meaning or purpose would be (maybe to reflect the human/nature relationship). This reminds me of a sound piece by TomuTomu on YouTube called ‘Plant sounds’.  

‘The plant’s “state” is represented through sound, primarily frequency. The plant responds to changes in its environment such as humidity, temperature, light, and touch. The micro-voltage fluctuations of the plant are detected by Ag/AgCl electrodes. The voltage is amplified and sent into an Arduino to be digitized. The numeric values are sent to oscillators, resulting in the soundscape.’ 

Im not going to pretend I understand how this works, I have no idea. However, I will research this at a later date. It would be interesting to recreate this piece and use the audio in my project but I don’t think I have the time to do it. I will however use the audio as a reference for my ‘artificially created’ sounds. 

Mechanical Sounds:

Vocoding- I think a sharp, mid to high pitched synth would reflect the mechanical side of this project. To geographically anchor this sound I will vocode parts of the environment, possibly the wind and maybe the rustle of leaves. 

Rattling guitar strings- Placing an ebow very close to a guitar string causes the string to rattle against the plastic casing of the bow, harmonically layering this sound results in a harsh yet clean and crisp sound. This sound also has a very metallic quality, probably due to the metal guitar strings. 

Rubbing metal together- Personally I love this sound, very high pitched and smooth. It evokes the feeling of movement with minimal friction. The problem with this sound is that the length of it is restricted to the length of the metal, however I plan to solve this by placing the audio in a sampler and using the alternate looping setting, alternating forward and reverse. 

‘Ive been away but now I’m back’

As a group we brainstormed ideas for out collaborative project. The future seemed to be the prevailing theme, specifically using the future to represent or reflect the past or present. We settled on the title being a quote from the bar scene in the movie ‘the shining’,  as the past and present seem to melt together in this scene. The quote is ‘Ive been away, but now I’m back’. To me this title evokes nostalgia, change or development of self, a strong sense of environment and a sense of harmony or balance. 

My Track: 

I think I would like to create a soundscape, possibly built from a sound walk. My intention is that hopefully using a recording of a sound walk will ground the listener in a familiar reality, everyone knows the sound of walking through nature. By using this familiar base, I can hopefully build a subtle soundscape around it, invoking these themes I named above (nostalgia, change….). I also want to use an auditory pallet that reflects my idea of the future, clean, crisp, a harmony between mechanical and organic. I might also experiment with sampling songs, specifically songs that have strong place in my memory, a particular album places me at a specific moment in my past every time I hear it. This might be a fun avenue to explore but I’m not quite sure how I can utilise this yet.