found fences, spring drifts

john grzinich — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 12:32:42 +0000

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.

sound objects in the landscape

john grzinich — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 21:38:09 +0000

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

phase space » metal structures

found fences, spring drifts

sound objects in the landscape