Audio Recording is a two quarter sequence in which I was introduced into audio recording and its relation to modern media. In Fall quarter, our focus was oriented around the prehistoric yet modernly fashionable world of analog recording techniques. Fall quarter began with an introduction to what sound is through both a scientific and artistic perspective. We put these ideas to use for the first project as we collected sounds from our natural environment with field recorders. This project offered me a fun, new avenue with which to perceive sound because prior to this assignment, I hadn’t recorded with any equipment besides my iPhone.

After hearing a story from my dad about cutting ear ears in the bottom of styrofoam cups and then fashioning them around his ears, I decided to practice this idea out in the field. I made casings our of styrofoam for mics and walked around in the forest while listening to the feed from the field recorder.

There was an abundance of rustling, but I did end up picking up a nice directional fade while approaching and walking around from a creek.

The Wk 10 project of Fall quarter was to create a multitrack recording on tape of a piece of music. This was an exciting project for my because I got to play audio engineer for the first time. I had my first opportunity to work with artists and record a piece of music in a studio environment with professional microphones. My goal for this project was to experiment with multiple microphones and microphone placement and brgin developing a relationship. Before this project I didn’t have any history with the sound that the various types of microphones bring to life. The project was recorded during a live take and the vocals were done by overdubbing. After listening to all the microphones that I had access to I decided on a few:

Equipment:

Mandolin:  TS-2

Guitar: Cascade Fathead and RE-15

Violin: TS-1 L/R (overhead)

Vocals: KSM-32

The aim of the project was to do everything using analog equipment. I recorded the project onto an OTARI 8-track tape machine and did the final mix on a TOFT 16 channel mixing board. After finishing this project I gained a world of respect for analog recording. With tape, your always trying to minimize the amount of tracks you’re using. Precision and utilization is key. This forced me to be more systematic with the steps of recording. I envision future analog projects to be somewhat premeditated in the sense of thinking about what kind of sound I am looking for and then figuring our how I can get that sound before recording. This style of recording will help me develop an ability to make and figure out those decisions because, unlike digital, once a tape track is recorded you cannot go back and make an edit without opening up a can of worms. As I become more systematic with recording I will learn about what moving the microphone actually does as I will be able to hear the difference.