Monthly Archives: November 2021

Code, Data and Network Audio, Sound For Film

Granular SYNTHESIS IN SuperCollider

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Recently I started learning granular synthesis in SuperCollider, reading help sheets and reviewing patches from other artists. Mainly I’ve been using the UGen: GrainBuf and then experimented with different samples and modulators. I’ve mainly used samples of human voice, for example some ancient Arabic chants or even a recordings of my own voice. With human voice, the effect of the grains becomes really interesting because it shifts between understandable words to weird experimental glitches. Also with slow modulation rich evolving textures are created, a great source for ambient material.

Above is a picture of the script I was experimenting with. I used a sample of me reciting a poem in Spanish and then inputed that buffer into GrainBuf, where with different algorithms manipulated them. I use both Impulse and Dust to trigger the sample. The outcome of this experiment was outstanding, I’ve never heard sounds like this and I thought it could be a great sound Fx for the film of Sound for Screen.

I used the same scripts as a move but with a lot of different sample to compose the end section of the film. I jammed testing different parameters while the scene was running, that way I could react with what was happening in screen . For this part I didn’t use any generative practice because I wanted to focus more in each individual sound, exploring the capabilities of layering a bunch of different granular sample, to create a thick layer and a more precise composition. Sound and image managed to intertwine quite well for my last scene, the granular sound helped convey the industrial atmosphere of it and it’s harsh glitch helped express the mood of the main character.

Sound For Film

Pervert’s guide to Cinema – Slavoj Žižek

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Pervert’s guide to Cinema is a documentary by Slovenian philosopher and psychologist Slavoj Žižek where he analyses films through psychoanalysis concepts, to argument how Cinema is a medium where humans express their deepest and darkest desires. Žižek in this documentary also includes sound and music to his analysis and how it evidences his point. When watching this documentary I became aware of psychoanalytical traits in the narrative of the short film I am scoring and I decided to approach the sound design for it with this concepts in mind.

The most important concept and idea I learned from the documentary was between the 14:10 min and 31:00, where he discusses the role of the voice in films and connecting it to Freudian concepts. Žižek references films like The Exorcist, Mullholland Drive, Alien and Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator. In a short summary Žižek argument that the voice is not an organic component of the body and that the voice works as an autonomous entity that live inside of us, humans have been constantly trouble by the internal conflict between the self and this autonomous entity and this concept is currently expressed in films. For example in The Exorcist, the voice of the demonic being possessing the girl changes from her normal voice and by so separating the two individuals. Žižek finishes his point explaining that the only way to get rid of the autonomous entity is to become it, referencing the psychoanalytic concept of catharsis.

Now connecting what I learned to my own project, in the movie I’m using the main character is always in conflict with the figure of the city and the isolation it provokes. There is a distinctive separation between the character and the city, this can be seen by a reoccurring motif of a building every time the character is in distress. At the end of the film the character faces the building and it that way becoming it, achieving catharsis. Even though the scene I’m working on is not the ending scene it is important to acknowledge this concept, specially because the whole film including my scene has no dialogue but only narration, that is in a way the voice that Žižek was referring to. The way I’m going present this sonically is to alienate the narrative voice to make it sound fake or unreal, but the effects I will use will be very subtle, so the audience only perceive it in the subconscious and not be distracted it. Aesthetically I’m gonna achieve this with some slight pitch modulation and phasing manipulation.

Sound Studies and Aural Cultures

Rebecca Lennon

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Rebecca Lennon is a London based artist that blends together different forms of media like video, sculpture and sound to create pieces of heavy symbolic meaning and aesthetic . Her work takes the form of video and sound, to create multichannel audio visual pieces in galleries, she is extremely flexible across the field of contemporary art.

One of Rebecca Lennon most common compositional tools is the voice. She explores how rhythm, timbre and texture of a voice can shape an art piece and express its themes and concepts. Communication is an important focus in Lennon’s work, she investigates the role of the voice in communication and expose psychological pathologies that are hidden in the structure of the way we communicate.

Liquid i – Is a multichannel sound and video exhibition piece that took place in a primary school in Nottingham. In the gallery a massive screen was positioned in one of the back walls of the space, in the screen a video art piece was played. The video displayed several images and short videos of different symbolic elements, that where placed in an ambiguous narrative. The videos showed images that had a connotation to liquid: mosquitos drinking blood, a fish spitting water and some performers mangling water in their mouths. Sound mirror the images, emulating the rhythms of the mosquitos or the texture of water flowing. All the sounds where created using the voice and then being edited to create complex rhythms. Spoken poetry was also a part of the soundtrack, hinting the themes of the video, with symbolic words and phrases. The correlation of audio and sound in Liquid i refers a lot to the theories of Michel Chion, added value and sincresis are currently happening across the exhibition, making the audience get deeper into the world created in that space. Place and space are carefully chosen in Lennon’s work and always in someway the space takes a place inside the narrative and themes of the piece. For example this piece was exhibited first in a primary school and then in an old abandoned church, everything except an art gallery. This could represent some of the concepts in the video, for example a fish out of the water to an art piece outside of an art gallery.

Its interesting to see audio-visual techniques used to build up a gallery piece because it helps consolidate all the senses in a single space. In the future I want to attempt designing my own sound gallery and inspired from Liquid i, I think I will have to think about a visual aspect in my gallery, and how it connects to my sonic intention.

Code, Data and Network Audio, Sound For Film

Aether- First part of the score

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As discussed in previous posts I will score a scene of a short film created by a director friend of mine. In this project I will use code as my main compositional tool, creating desired textures through genereative made music. In a short sum up of what happens in the first scene, the main character is walking through London to get to his job and then back home. The movie deals with the theme of isolation inside a big city and the social alienation that can occur because of it. The scene starts with a long shot of the main character walking through a wide street to get to his office. The shot is designed to seem as an optical illusion creating an endless pathway from the character to its destiny. For this first scene I composed an ambient generative piece called Aether using Supercollider.

Aether works as a medium to convey the theme of dreams and reality, creating a trance inducing feeling. I was inspired to take this approach from David Toop’s book Ocean of Sound that I have discussed in a previous post. I used different techniques to create this aesthetic, first of all and already mentioned I used generative practices to create the music. The hypnotic static nature of generative music helps convey a feeling of floating, creating an additive value to the optical illusion of the walk. The second technique I used to achieve the aesthetic is using the pelog scale, characteristic of Gamelan music. I’ve been recently obsessed with it and it is also mentioned in Ocean of Sound, because of its spiritual use and its implications inside the ambient canon.

Above is a draft recording of Aether. Heavy compression have been used with the same objective of creating the static aesthetic, limiting drastic dynamic changes through out the composition. Compression also helped to regulate levels of each individual synth voice, I have found adjusting volumes in Supercollider quite hard, making it hard to create a decent mix.

The picture above is a small snap of my script when composing Aether. I mainly used SynthDef’s and Pdef’s to create and sequence my sounds, this gave my the opportunity to create multiple synth voices that added texture and harmony to the piece. I also experimented using filters, both inside my oscillator and as an external effect. I found out the MoogFF.ar filter that is an emulation of the Moog ladder filter, it has a great sound and I used it through the piece. To further develop the use of filters I also added random numbers to decide the cutoff frequency of the filter, adding a more complex generative technique. The script uses extensive randomness parameters that are the main tool to create the generative nature of it. I modulated mainly patterns, from the steps used to the output sent, this was useful to play with panning and make the piece more interesting.

Aether will be used only in the walking scenes before the character gets inside of the underground. The music will be mixed very quietly in the overall soundtrack of the scene, so both the music and the atmosphere field recordings can be heard. This has the purpose of using aether as just a tonal colouring technique, hinting a melancholic emotion to the listener perceived mostly by the subconscious. For the next scene I will use another piece of music also created in Supercollider, but it will have a more aggressive aesthetic that will contrast the sound and music of the first scene for a narrative development purpose.

Code, Data and Network Audio, Sound For Film

Menschen am Sonntag- Benoit and the Mandelbrots.

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In 2012 Benoit and the Mandelbrots (a live coding band) rescored in a live performance the classic 1930 pre-war German film Menschen am Sonntag, in Karlsruhe. This performance is one of the few examples of a film soundtrack created with code, in this case Supercollider.

The combination of 1930 black and white german film with modern algorithmic synthesis techniques create a unique audio visual composition, creating a dream like texture and subtly hinting the theme of nostalgia; evoking profound emotions to the listener. The sound track for the most of the film, is composed of long evolving electronic drones and unreal sound effects that contrast the aesthetic of the film but mirrors its mood. The film translates to The Men of Sunday and its a classic romantic comedy featuring the Berlin summer and its lake culture. The evolving dream like drones fit perfectly to the narrative of the story and it successfully represent the pleasantness of the summer. Such sounds progress slowly in time, changing its timbre instead of its tones across a long range of frames. The video was retimed to match the sound so even unconsciously the effect of sound can be perceived in the image. This film its a portal back in time to pre-war times and its utopic nature. Berlin is not corrupted by the fires of fascism and men can enjoy a warm Sunday. Even though video is retimed to sound, the soundtrack fits so well with the film because it portrays the dream land that Berlin would be without the war. The hypnotic qualities of the music hint nostalgia because of its dreamlike aesthetic, a distant fogy memory floating in the aether of a pre war world.

It’s rare when a film sound track is composed through an improvised performance instead of pre-composition, and in this case code gives it an incredible versatile source of sound design. This approach inspired me to use improvised live coding to compose some scenes in the short film I’m working on. Electronic music in general could be categorised as not very expressive due to it’s robotic perfectionist nature. By performing myself instead of just programming the music, the sound will endow a more expressive voice communicating better the themes of the film.

Sound For Film

Foley Session

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Last Saturday I had an intensive foley session in the studio, where we manage to record the essential foley material under three hours. We where two sound engineers in the control desk and one foley artist in the foley room. It was my first time in the studio as well as for the foley artist so our approach was very intuitive instead of methodical. The recording went through all of the film, recording steps, clothes, breathing and some special effects like the movement of cutlery and plates. We managed to be very efficient in our work, I think this was due our great communication throughout the session, we regularly spoke on the talkback and everyone shared ideas equally.

For the session we used a stereo pair of Neumann KM 184, positioned in the lateral sides of the foley room, and a Neumann U87 in the centre. It was crucial to use condenser microphone to get a very clean signal, specially for the high end of the sounds. The film is going to be mixed down to stereo because it is intended for streaming platforms, so low end was not really needed.

In the picture above you can see the right position KM 184, the centre U87 and the foley artist dealing with some props in the middle (guy with grey shirt). In several occasions we made use of the foley pits that the studio has to record footsteps and other sounds, for example in the picture we can see a box over the foley pit that created a specific sound when moved around.

For recording the steps taken on an electric staircase, we used a small steel lather with metal steps and some old prop shoes. This gave us a very realistic result that was what we where searching for. Also in the picture above you can see the left KM 184 that could not be seen in the first picture. I don’t know yet if I’m going to mix some of the foley stereo but it is nice to just have the recordings for just in case, those recordings could even used to create special effects in scenes where the main character is walking through specific environments.

Finally we recorded everything into a single session. In the picture above you can see that we projected our film in the tv of the studio, this made the recording process much more comfortable since I had only worked on a laptop before.

The next step in the production is to correctly organise all the sounds recorded in the sessions in clearly named tracks, so it’s easier to work with. Then I will have to edit each audio clip to be correctly synced with the film, this might take a while because we recorded a lot of sounds and after that the diegetic sound section of the film will be completed.

Sound For Film

Plan for Foley Session

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To get ready for my booking in the foley room and sound studio, I decided to rewatch the film with the reference sound recorded in the camera (which was used in the filming). When watching it I notice with more attention the subtle details of the foley sounds (steps, the rumble of clothes, etc.) and then plotted them in a timeline corresponding the sequence of each sound. I did this with the purpose of having a check list of all the sound I needed when recording in the studio, to be more prepared for recording. I also added some tiny notes to not forget while recording, for example the material of the clothes in a specific scene or if it was raining in a scene (the footstep would sound a bit wet).

I then showed the check list to the director of the film and he approved it, he also suggested me to focus in specific sounds in different scenes to contribute to the aesthetic of the film. I noted down his suggestions and was ready to record.

Sound Studies and Aural Cultures

Plan for Audio Essay

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Introduction: Explain relationship of sound with calmness, introduce ideas and references to artists that have worked with this theme (Deep Listening, Ambient Music and Sound Walks). Then set contextual approach- DIY, Anti-materialization of the practice and unconscious tendencies. This segment will be mirror by an ambient music texture that I will compose.

Present stages: every space where my interviews will take place will be presented by a calm field recording of the place. This is important to create a better description to the listener.

Interviews will focus in these questions but each subject of the interview will have a unique set of questions, to get a wider perspective of fields. Questions will include: Have you ever notice sound in this space? does the sound of this space makes you calm? Is this calming activity a common practice in you’re life? Do you think about sound often? Why do you practice this activity?

Three interviews will take place:

1st Random sound walker of a park.

2nd Meditation Guru (active listener).

3rd Sound performer.

Conclusion: Analyze the relationship of each interview subject to their surroundings and background. Pinpoint of the natural relationship of the practice, how sound affects the unconscious. Explore importance of the practice and which are the limits.

Structure:

Introduction (ambient music)

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Interview 1- random listener(Set field recording first)

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Interview 2-Meditation Guru (field recording comes after interview)

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Interview 3- Performer (Performance field recording)

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Conclusion

Sound Studies and Aural Cultures

Andrew Pierre Hart

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Hart’s work focus in the intersection or mix between sound arts and visual arts such as paint. Painting and fine arts are the backbone of Hart’s creative processes but because of its early influences with music and sound, he is aware of the concrete sound that surround his works and finds a way to experiment with it.

A recurring symbol in Hart pieces is the bicycle, the object has a deep significance in Harts upbringing and he often associate new themes to the bicycle. Rhythm is one of the main points of focus regarding the bicycle, he compares it to the rhythmic nature of a vinyl player, another object with great symbolic value for Hart. In a search to further understand objects, Hart translates image to sound and sound back to image, finding correlations between the physical forms of such objects. From this theory of form translation, Hart has further advance his practice to creating interpretations from experiences, more specially social phenomena, searching justice. Referencing the Black Lives Movement manifestations in front of the white house in 2020, Hart closely listened to the ambience created by the mass of people and its rhythm. Then represent such noises in paintings that are build up in abstract shapes and textures, to pay tribute to the nature of sound. His painting don’t fail to express and describe the anger and frustration of the communities affected by racial injustice and discriminations in such manifestations and correctly express the atmosphere of the event.

Hart has a variety of paintings in the sound painting series and has collaborated with sound artist to develop this practice. He has lately explored generative practices, coming up with the idea of improvising improvisation.

The idea of translating forms of art resonated a lot with me, the concept reminds me a lot to the interaction of the physic world with the human mind and body. How we as humans explain natural phenomena through different cognitive modes, for example using analogies as techniques of communication. It speaks of an invisible language that surround every form of expression and that its interactions between these forms have endless capabilities.

Sound Studies and Aural Cultures

A synthesis of health benefits of natural sounds and their distribution in national parks

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The title above is the name of a research article taken place in the US to explore the relationship between health benefits and natural parks, more specific in national parks. This study has a scientific methodology and concludes with actual data calculated by complex data meta-analysis techniques, cross sectioning from data of studies of several parks across the country. This article is quite different to other sound research articles I had read in the past. I had focused more in art orientated research and experimentation, that focus more in empirical knowledge and art aesthetics. In the other hand this article is scientifically based and its analysis is very methodological.

The article evidences that listening to the sound ecology of a national park can bring health benefits. The study demonstrated that when noise pollution levels are low and a wide variety of natural noises dominate an ecology, an individual can reach calming moods by a reflection of the non-threatening environment.

An important objective of the article is to demonstrate the importance of the sound ecology of a place and that it should be taken into consideration in natural conservation projects. The article explains that it is really easy to disrupt the sound ecology of a place and that in some recordings done for the research of the article, they found out that even in natural reserves, traffic noises could contribute with over 80% of the sound ecology. The article also highlights that it is proven that audio pollution can have damaging effect on health.

After reading this and learning the health benefits of a natural sound environment, I decided to focus my field research to natural areas across London. This will increase my chances of finding people that actively practice their own DIY sound practices. I also want to ask to these people if they think that sound can create health benefits, to see if their practices have health as an objective.

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/14/e2013097118