I'm currently working on the sound for my animation. I want to use quite subtle, ambient noises so I set out on Friday to collect some sounds of the city. I felt a bit conspicuous at first walking round with all of the kit - headphones, furry microphone, the recorder and a mess of cables, but I soon got over the embarrassment. I started near London bridge and recorded some traffic, building site and train noises and then recorded some sounds on the underground. I wanted to record some crow sounds too so I went to a park near college. At this stage I really did look like a crazy - chasing crows around the park with a furry microphone!
One thing I noticed, especially in the park was that these sounds are around us constantly but I never hear them because I never listen to them. This everyday 'soundtrack' is made up of a cacophony of noises some of which are natural, but most of which are man-made. The crow sounds I was trying to capture kept being swallowed up by the sound of over head planes. But it was the constant interruption by human voices which proved the most troublesome. Even in quiet places it was near impossible to get more than a few seconds of ambient sound before the interruption of human activity - talking, shuffling past, chatting on the phone. The whole experience made me think about how population dense large cities like London are and how we live all tightly packed into this grid. As the world continues to urbanise, this phenomenon becomes more and more prevalent.
5 comments:
these are really interesting thoughts. its interesting that you want to capture city noises, cities being made up of people, and yet you are frustrated by their interjections. i understand the ambient noise thing but perhaps you could make a dense layer of human voices... layered and thick like ambient noise. just a thought...
hmmm....might try try that out, I have a lot of sound layering work to do this week. It's be a lot of trial and error.
I did a lot of industrial soundtracks for my old film work....try recording a washing machine or other appliances and slowing it down...u can get some really eery and interesting compositions....As for the recording sounds like you need a high window to record out of or a roof?...good luck
good subtle understanding of our surrounding sounds. both manmade and natural noise create a hybrid of urban street lounge . can try to play with the tempo of the traffic sounds to match with those of birds or vice versa for interesting low key ambience..just a thought.
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