silence box

i originally wanted this box not to haev sound, but only show the vibration of the particles. it seems you cannot have one without the other. it was really quiet the other day when i tested it, but now that they are in a resonance chamber, the sound is amplified and sounds like whatever i'm playing through it. though it is intersting to note the connection between feeling the sound and the sound.
its still a tactile object, and my marquettes reflect that.
unfortunately, it looks a bit apple, and may make people think that all i wanted to do was to build a fancy speaker housing. they will be satisfied that i ahev failed, and that it sounds tinny. though they might eb a little impressed when they feel the vibrations. i hope so.
i think i will have to do a little more sound editing and cutting, understanding the physics of the vibration, before i can take the sound and make it purely touch. i think i was right in the first place thinking about little surface area.

interactive kiosk

heres our model for the australia post interactive kiosk.
i always tried to put up all the work i'm doing but its proving to be hard.

fake hand

heres a prosthetic hand i'm constructing for cloudstreet.
there will be makeup on and hopefully it might look like smithies fingers have really been chopped off.
b

book2

marquettes

Resin casting my marquettes is a great technique. I'm now 'meditating' on the sound in the city (i dont want to talk too specifically because i dont want to sway your view of the marquettes). I can medititate and form objects out of clay. These objects are left to dry and i get a chance to review them before i sand, then cover them in latex, cast, then sand again, and polish. its a lot like creation, and then a long affirmation session. i know i want the original pieces the way i want them because there is so much effort in getting them to the final stage that i dont want to start with a poor idea.
this is the first one cast. the rest will be in black.
here are the clay positives and their latex moulds.
a sample of one which is in latex now, and i may cast tonihgt.
the next 3, shaped in clay in one session. these 3 are sisters within the group of marquettes.

3d mapping

the 3d depiction of the sound mapping. i'll try and bring it in

resin casting

here are some photos of my recent experiments with resin casting bracelets. i am also doing some rings and other shapes for studio, but here are the best ones.

time spending

I’ve mapped the things I’m renouncing together on one page. One of the outcomes of all the renouncements is leading to me having more money or time. This is shown with the box in the middle. The questions are, what should I spend my money and time on, should i spend it at all, and should I earn it more. Consuming is spending, and to take yourself out of the cycle of consuming we must stop spending, both money and time. To effectively take ourselves out of the cycle, we should limit our earning to only that which we need. So there is some argument to say if I save time then I should not spend it earning money, because I’ll only have to spend it, and re-enter the cycle.
The slow movement aims to get people to slow down their lives, to achieve ‘connection to people - ourselves, our family, our community, our friends, - to food, to place (where we live), and to life.’

I think that slowing down is a great concept, but it is too hard for most to give up their fast paced lives in one go. Some suggestions for becoming slower are on the Wikipedia entry for slow movement, also see here and here. I think I would prefer to live a slower life, but I enjoy being busy. I’m not sure if I live the fastest life anyway, because the busyness in my life allows me to relate to people, and interconnect during activities. I accept that I could spend more time doing nothing, or something relaxing, or chatting with people (I often feel I am always in transit), but why not connect with people over dinner, during a futbol training or while rehearsing for a play.
I like that the slow movement’ main facets is the belief of the right to pleasure. Its not a restrictive movement which requires people to do nothing at all, but take up something slower. Even some things which we consider ‘doing nothing’ now may be considered as slow, such as knitting, talking with friends, reading for leisure etc.

I still haven’t decided how or if I will spend my remaining time.

sim urban

check out sim urban, a virtual city block model creation program with rendering and realtime animation including sound and light. could be useful for our programs. i wonder if sial has had a look at this?
here is the pdf on the details of the program.

in other news, make your own speaker

recording

I cycled around the city today with microphones strapped to my head in a mock binaural recording. Here are the photos of the device.

first recording
second recording
3
4

there was a kid who said there is a street drummer in new york too.
i plan to do the same thing again sometime, with a video camera strapped to the rack, and with stereo input.

gab

here
acoustic ecology
i know that the heaters at work make a sound. people have told me they do. so when i see the heat waves rising off them i know they're making a sound.
similarly with a dripping tap. people tell me that a tripping tap is annoying, but i can't hear it.
i hate the sound of a tram turning a corner.

hearing

thoughts

Today I thought a lot about silence. And what it means to be silent and to have silence. In my experience, i think of a beat in theatre. It’s a pause placed somewhere in the script to give meaning to the words around it. Its as though by pausing at this point you’re saying something, or letting something sink in. I thought about this spatially, as an idea emanating from the person taking the beat like a wave of realisation expanding from their mouth, trailing the sound of the message.

I also talked to a friend of mine who is partially deaf. Potential complete silence! How do you describe sound to someone who knows only silence? Surely we can talk about it scientifically, and reason why someone cannot hear. But how does someone who doesn’t know sound think of sound in a city? I know that this is a primitive and patronising way to think of sound and people who are deaf - but i don;t know how it feels to be deaf.
My friend thought that there must be a way to transfer sound into something that deaf people can ‘hear’. She talked about transferring the meaning of something (a physical apple) into a description(saying an apple), and communicating this spatially through sign language. Would there be a way to communicate this apple spatially through another avenue?

I think I’d like to take the sounds of the city and transform them into something which is silent, but communicates sound.

sound art
speech database

One day in class the boy heard something he had never hear before. It was as if the building was groaning, moaning under some immense pain. It was a sound he could have made only if he’d been breathing in. it could be a ship creaking underwater. He glanced around at the faces of his friends, but they registered nothing. Now it was as if he was listening to only this sound and silence, everything else was absorbed by it.
Pulling his chair from underneath him, he stood up slowly, and walked to the door, opened it and left the room.
In the corridor, the sound was thicker, and oozed through the cracks above the walls like honey. That’s where it was coming from! Above the walls, cracks dividing the wall plaster and the ceiling, and it was gettgin stronger. Excited he ran down the corridor where it was draftier still. And there in the wall was a door he;d never seen before.
Checking over his shoulder to scan the empty corridor, he turned the handle to find it unlocked, and on the other side a brisk breeze. He stepped out into the space. Here he couldn’t believe what he could see. Through his building, in his city, there was a giant hole thrown through the middle of all that concrete, barged through, like a bulldozer of air. It was clean and fell away at both sides, and in the distance he could see the buildings. The air rushed past, as it would around the buildings, and vibrated in the cavern.
Something was different. On one side it was still day, as he’d left the building before. The clouds hid the sun, and a flock of birds flew past his cavern. But on the other side it was night. The city suddenly still, lit from its windows, instead of the other way around.
Suddenly he felt a chill, brought on by the air and sound enveloping him, rushing one side to the other, like time.

from the boslers house

in class

silnce walk

a while since last time

well, its been a while since i've typed anythign of significance here. so whats happened?
I'm back in sunny/rainy/blowy/snowy melbourne and having a ball... when i have time. i was suprised to find i have 2 days off from uni during the week, and thank god, cos i'm needing it.
firstly, uni.
studio is confusing and light on. its quite conceptual at the moment - relating to sound, pauses and how they effect us. Its basically answering a commission by the city of melbourne to research sound in melbourne city. i think we might be heading towards some sort of installation. its interesting though, and i'm discovering more about hearing/listening.
studies is hard on with soumitri leading the charge. i've been with a group out to naomi's house to check out their consumption. we found interesting parts of their ownership of items, but not so much their purchasing, as they haven't much room to purchase for!
tech is interesting, with saera and daymith (two ethnics and a white boy). we're designing an interactive kiosk for australia post. is coming along well, but will be a lot of work in the next 4 weeks.
college
lots of fun to be had. lots of time spent. hectic.
cloudstreet, our play this semester is in production and on in 4 weeks. i have to learn my lines, and am also assistant directing. hectic is the right word.
i'm also heading over to tasmania in the september break to walk the overland. yum


http://music.hyperreal.org/artists/brian_eno/oblique/oblique.html
http://sketchup.google.com/
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/cat_design.php

giving up

This class is not about the impact we have on the world by giving up something. Perhaps if Melbourne became vegetarian or ceased to drive then something dramatic would result. The real aim here is to teach us what we are capable of giving up. In doing so, we realise how much more aware we are of our ecological situation and how destructive our consumptive nature is. Giving up something does not have the aim to make us miserable, but to make us free from wanting something we do not need.

I intend to give up:
1. All transport aside from bike and public transport. This will have more of an effect than you may think. I intend to travel to 21st celebrations around Victoria this semester so this will mean taking a train to the closest station and riding to the town or farm. I also originate from Canberra, so to get home I’ll need to ride – something I intend to do at the end of the semester. Until then I’ll stick with my bike. This sacrifice will limit my carbon footprint, emissions and make me fit.
2. Modern Pharmaceuticals (except in extreme cases). Dependence on pharmaceutical companies increases already large revenues, forcing out competition and market share. This can lead to exploitation of wider fields, natural and human resources (Ray Moynihan, Alan Cassels: Selling sickness: How the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies are turning us all into patients". Nation Books, New York, 2005) I will endeavor to use natural therapies by local doctors when I have to.
3. Television. The most evil of all medias does not itself consume more than energy, but propagates commercialism and consumption.
4. All clothing purchases. Like others in the class, I sometimes have things on my mind I want to buy, not because I need them, but because I want them. NO more.

You can follow my progress on lagomdesign.blogspot.com