One from the archives… Tower guide wires on a mountain top in central Portugal resonating in the wind. Recorded in 2008 with a pair of contact mics while in a residency at Binauralmedia in Nodar.

Report from the New Maps of Time sound workshop Calgary Canada

‘New Maps of Time’ is a project and workshop about mapping architectural structures and urban spaces using sound as a means to analyze and express actions within a space. read more…

Workshop organized by EMMEDIA, artist-run project space, from April 20th – 23rd, 2010. Special thanks to Tomas Jonsson and the helpful crew at EMMEDIA for coordinating this event and to Eesti Kultuurkapital for travel support.

Click the image to see the Calgary Sound Map on Radio Aporee

Some notes… Calgary is a modern city that sprawls out on the plains of western Canada just east of the Canadian rocky mountains. On the surface the usual urban soundscape of car traffic and construction noise blankets the subtleties of the larger environmental context that could potentially link the city’s relatively close proximity to nature (there are few industrial relics downtown). An abundance of paths along the river and an active public life offer more space to more diverse aspects of navigating the city. This where I found some of the more unique elements explored during the workshop. There were two pedestrian suspension bridges over the river that are highly dynamic structures rich with sonic qualities. The pedestrian network downtown known as the +15 walkway system is a feature of the city that blurs the boundary of public and commercial space. A study of the bridges of the +15 system gave a different sonic and visual perspective than the standard street level counterpart. This can be seen in the videos compiled below.

The Sound Locations channel on Vimeo has 3 videos made during the workshop. All sounds were left as they were recorded (no effects or processing done during post production):

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

B/W, 57 minutes
PAL HD, 16:9

filmed/recorded: 2006-2009
edited: 2009

concept, camera, editing: John Grzinich

additional sound: Patrick Mcginley

collaborative recordings made with: Patrick McGinley, Jim Haynes, Toomas Thetloff, Maksims Shentelevs, Kaspars Kalninsh, Eamon Sprod, Hitoshi Kojo, Evelyn Müürsepp

equipment and support: MoKS – Center for Art and Social Practice, Mooste Estonia.

Sound Aspects of Material Elements reveals how our sense of hearing can use non-linguistic signals to communicate, interpret and build relations to the world around us. Using sound as the primary signifier, the film shows a specific approach to the artistic use of sound, covering a 3 year period of the authors personal research and collaborations with a number of close colleagues. The film documents in-situ processes of exploration and sonification of the landscape along with the numerous objects and structures found there.

All the sound recordings emphasize how the combinations of certain materials (metal, wood, glass) with natural elements (water, wind fire), take on alchemical characteristics as we listen in. We experience aeolian metal wires in the wind, structures affected by fire, water, snow and the casual effects of human interventions in insect worlds. The sonic outcomes can be subtle and sometimes below our common perception so a variety of experimental recording techniques were employed. Contact microphones are placed on surfaces shifting our attention toward the internal resonances of the materials themselves while mini microphones reveal spaces normally inaccessible by our ears. What we hear is what we see, yet is sometimes translated through amplified means.

With its minimal editing style and durational shots, Sound Aspects of Material Elements shifts our attention toward and extended view of time and place, of the ever changing micro-processes that hint to eternal growth and decay inherent to cycles of nature itself. The possibilities to intercept, shape, disrupt, recombine and capture the elements through creative experiments is what this film attempts to illustrate in the interest that it may inspire the viewer to listen in new way.

premiere screening April 17th, 2010 : CUFF – Calgary Underground Film Festival

additional screenings: galeria entropia Poland, Pacific Northwest College of Art USA (5.10), Altes Finanzamt Berlin (9.10), Estonian National Museum (11.10), Haus Der Kulturen der Welt Berlin for the Über Lebenskunst Festival (8.11) Audio Kino by SoundFjord, London (10.11) Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival, Scotland (10.11)

DVD release info coming soon…

During the week of April 7th-15th 2010 I was fortunate enough to be able to stay at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Marin just north of San Francisco.

animate structures #4

Click here to view the embedded video.

this video features a set of specific locations where aspects of the land, abandoned structures and forces of wind come together.

just some of the materials and textures to be found in the areas around the headlands.

Travel support provided by Eesti Kultuurkapital.

Contact microphones are actually piezoelectric transducers and are mostly used for producing sound as buzzers, beepers and small speakers in electronic devices. If the signal is reversed using a piezo transducer as a mic, you’re actually picking up vibrations and having it produce voltage. Connecting this to a recording device or mixer allows you to hear the vibrations as sound. Piezo transducers come in all shapes and sizes, the most common ones ranging from 25-50 mm in diameter. They can be ordered from electronics components distributors such as Maplin in the UK or DigiKey in the US. As for what kind of disc to buy this is a question of great debate, but I generally stick to mid sized discs of 30-40mm with a resonant frequency of 1khz. Best of all they are cheap, usually 50 cents or so.

As for building contact mics, the process is fairly simple. A soldering iron and raw solder is needed. Some flux paste is helpful for getting the wires to stick more firmly. As you can see some piezos come with leads already attached. All you need to do is connect then to a wire and the appropriate plug. The center circle of the disc is the ceramic piezo element (what produces voltage). The ‘hot’ lead needs to be connected to this and the ground needs to be connected to the outer metal part.

What plug you use depends on what kind of device you use for the signal. Most likely you will connect your contact mic to a mixer or directly to a recording device such as a flash recorder (Sony PCM-D50, Edirol R-9, Zoom H4 etc.) or Minidisc. I often work in the field and connect my contact mics as a stereo pair to a flash recorder with a 1/8″ mini-jack.

To make a stereo pair, simply solder up two single discs and attach the ‘hot’ leads to the two center signal leads on the mini-jack plug. Be sure to insulate any contact to avoid shorting the signal.

Finalizing your contact mics is an important step. Piezo transducers tend to be fragile. If the ceramic crystal is damaged in any way you’ll immediately know it. At the very minimum its good to put some kind of glue over the back of the disc to protect the crystal. I sometimes put the felt furniture pads that are used on chair leg bottoms over the crystal to protect it then I cover the whole disc with electrical tape. I also glue a thin piece of wood to the front side with epoxy. This is to make sure the disc does not bend and crack. The wood also “softens” the sound as piezos tend to have a sharp metallic sound (since they are actually made of metal). Some people also coat their mics with something like plastidip which makes a nice clean protective finish.

Another reason to protect the piezos is because they tend to work better when a bit of pressure is applied. The sensitivity increases and you tend to get much better bass response. With the felt furniture pad backing and wood front I’m not afraid of bending the disc or crushing the ceramic part when using clamps or clips. Its also handy to use something like blue-tack to make a firm connection to the surface of what you are trying to record.

It is good to carry around a number of different clips and clamps for the materials and situations you might encounter. Most of these are cheap and lightweight and can be found from most building supply stores.

Lastly, this is a device I often use when recording with my contact mics. The FEL Microphone Amplifier is small, runs from a 9V battery and can boost a stereo signal up to 50dB. This really helps when the source is more quiet or you want to pull some bass out. Most of the time I need to boost the signal about +15-30dB, but occasionally you need more.

For examples of my recordings using contact mics check the posts with the tag *contact mics*

The two digital recording devices used are the Edirol R-09 and a Sony PCM-D50. For some some microphone tests and personal commentary on these check here and here.

Hopefully this helps anyone who is interested in working more with contact mics. Most importantly, remember there are no fixed rules about the best ways to use contact mics and it a matter of continuous experimentation. I will update this page if more questions or info comes in.

*UPDATE*

I made a simple set of contact mics for XLR plugs. I search around for some basic designs and didn’t find much. Here is what I came up with for a setup. I used 2 piezos instead of 1. The center ‘positive’ leads of each piezo are connected to the 2 and 3 leads of the XLR cable, while the outer ring (ground) of both piezos are connected to the 1 (ground) lead of the XLR cable. The diagram can be seen in the first photo. Some have noted that this wiring should ‘phase cancel’ yet for some reason it works. If you encounter problems, simply use a single piezo and do not connect anything to the negative #3 lead.

The tops faces of the piezos are turned inward toward each other. On each face is a self-adhesive felt circle (for furniture legs). Once the two felt circles are in place they can be glued together with a semi-flexible glue like ‘moment glue’. In this case the felt circles were smaller than the piezos so I wrapped the edges with nylon string and filled it with epoxy for strength. When this was done and all glues were dried I wrapped everything with electrical tape. The result is sensitive, low noise, contact mics. All this (good cable, neutrik plugs, piezos, felt) still cost lest than 20 euros.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Recording a suspension bridge (above).

Below is a video from MAKE Magazine about building a contact microphone that includes the schematic plan for a 9V powered amplifier. The amplifier can be handy if you don’t have a suitable amplifier on your recorder.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Recording fences in Avebury UK (below).

Click here to view the embedded video.

What you hear is a live sound mix made in my backyard using both live mics and contact mics, run simultaneously through a portable mixer. No post-processing or composing was done. The video was edited from hand held material recorded on a panasonic digital camera.More videos available on my Vimeo page.

Formica aquilonia or Red Wood Ant is a species of ant commonly found in the area where I live. The ant colonies are easily recognizable by the large mounds that they build out of debris from the pine forests they inhabit. The mounds also tend to be clustered together. I’m not sure what is the relation between the mounds, but the activity between them can be so frequent that “ant highways” or noticeable paths form on the forest floor. Ants are in the Family Formicidae meaning they give off formic acid when defending a territory through biting or spraying. Formic acid happens to be highly corrosive to some piezo transducer materials. This I know because one of the contact mics I used to record the ants was unprotected and went bad after about 15 seconds after I placed it on a mound.

The recording method here is something of an intervention and is not scientific in any way. If anything it is quite a provocation for the ants as I place the mics on the surface of the mound. They take it as a foreign object (which it is) and attack it. So the sound is a combination of biting, scratching and walking on the contact mics. To add some variation I used two different kinds of piezos and attached some thin brass wire to the discs. I do my very best not to harm the ants or their mounds especially since they are under a mild form of environmental protection due to threats from pollution.

contact microphone intervention with formica aqulonia – red wood ants (3:26) mp3 file

and here is a video I made about these ants:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Gathering inspiration from the metal fence highlighted in the previous post, I spent a few hours wandering Tampere to search for other metal fences and railings with similar resonant qualities. There were many, each with their own characteristics. The two I highlight here stood out. But there was also a practical reason for not recording more, it was windy and the temperature was just below freezing. In these conditions your fingers and equipment starts to go out fairly quickly. I’ve ruined numerous rechargeable batteries, nearly given myself frostbite and I suspect caused some dead pixels on my digital camera sensor because of working in below freezing weather (as a warning to others who might find themselves working in the cold).

metal railing beside highway (played lightly with a mallet): mp3 file

metal railing under highway bridge (untouched): mp3 file

Just under these railings was the kind of dirty roadside snow that usually indicates the beginning of the muddy spring thaw time when the white crystalline image of winter starts to fade. Rather than see this as a mildly depressive image I found it to be a fertile environment for investigating macro landscapes.

And as I was taking the ferry from Helsinki to Tallinn we past through the final remains of the frozen Baltic sea, a large field of ice pieces broken into a tapestry of cracks that were seemingly held together by subtle magnetic forces. For some reason my camera enhanced the cyan spectrum, casting a blue light over the sea-scape.

During a recent revenant sound workshop in Tampere, Finland we took some time out to introduce a few basic recording techniques used in the field (it is good to remind ourselves that “field recording” is more a technique than a genre). This was to show what kind of things we do in practice to the participants who seemed more than curious to know. So we went out just to explore the territory and do some sound hunting for one hour. It didn’t take long to make some discoveries as well as understand the ambient noise levels due to traffic. I’m posting these recordings for the benefit of Michael and Jenni, the two participants who I went with on this excursion and to show what what kind of sounds can be found by randomly walking around.

short binaural recording in a nearby park: download link

contact microphones on a metal roof (melting snow): download link

metal sign picking up traffic sounds and radio interference: download link

magic metal railing on the side of the road: download link

It’s winter and the temperatures are not friendly for recording outdoors. In Dresden, where I’m in residence for several weeks at 7.stock, it’s been around -5 – 0 C during the day (not including the wind). I mention the wind because I’ve been working on the 7th floor of a building. While the view is great, the chilling winds are not. Regardless, I’ve made some attempts to construct simple installations out of wires and found objects, for exposing to the elements. One element that’s difficult if not impossible to communicate through sound is temperature. Without my telling, the recordings below, might easily pass as being made in a desert. There is still enough inspiring conditions for me to experiment even if its for 20 minutes a day. An old satellite dish provides a great resonant surface from which to capture vibrations from the humble system of stretched wires and dangling objects. If it warms up, even just a bit, I hope to have more material to share. The rest depends on the weather.

animate structures #2a (3:34 160k mp3): download link

animate structures #2b (4:12 160k mp3): download link

video of a revenant sound action made in the hollow metal shell of an electrical substation on lake peipsi near the russian border. the participants are eamon sprod (tarab), maksims shentelevs, kaspars kalnins and myself.

recorded november 16, 2008. note the sound of ducks flying overhead towards the end.

In the last 8 months I’ve made a number of recordings of old, and as far as I can tell, abandoned telegraph lines. My friend Toomas has a step-grandfather who was a telephone repairman during the Soviet times and kindly let me borrow his old pole climbing “shoes” (which are metal claws made from old gun barrels that you strap to your boots). On a good day, with the right wind velocities and direction, the wires “sing”, creating aeolian harp and other effects that clearly resonates down through the dried wooden body of the pole. The sound quality is obviously different depending on if you attach contact mics to the pole or directly to the wires. With a good dry pole that picks up the resonant drones it’s even possible to record the sound acoustically.

What can be seen and heard here is a clear reminder of the amazing work of Alan Lamb. Alan Lamb has been working with recording telegraph wires since the mid-1970s when he set up an experimental lab on a piece of land he bought in the outback of Western Australia (thanks to Camilla and Eamon for relaying stories). His research continues to today at the WIRED Lab which has some thorough documentation and recordings of aeolian wires (and more). I first heard Alan’s work on Primal Image released in 1995 on the Dorobo label, a landmark CD which continues to inspire to this day.

Fortunately there is an abundance of locations to choose from around South Estonia and I try to make regular visits to the sites depending on the weather conditions. From experience I can say that all poles and wires have their unique qualities making the recording process a constant field for exploration. The recordings are below are direct except for some minor equalization and level adjustment.

harmonic remains at Ruusa – contact mics on wires (4:28): harmonic remains at Ruusa

harmonic remains at Luhamaa contact mics on pole (4:47): harmonic remains at Luhamaa