Many people are put off doing field recordings because it sounds like an expensive hobby. Most of us don’t have the hi-tech kit nor the budget to travel to distant lands to record rare and untouched landscapes. Award-winning sound artist Frazer Merrick specialises in more creative and attainable approaches to field recording, which still create incredible results. He explores environments closer to home, using solar panels to turn light into complex rhythmic and harmonic patterns, contact mics to extract rich sounds from simple objects, and simple in-ear mics to make cheap and discreet binaural recordings.
In this 3-part workshop (spread across 3 weeks) you will cover, how to build your own mics (optional), planning a field recording trip, creating your own sample packs, as well as exploring creative methods for composing with field recordings. You will become comfortable with the methods, equipment, and practices that professional field recordists use to achieve incredible results without the need for extremely expensive equipment. Led by a professional sound recordist and artist, you will be guided to conceive of and develop a project with the opportunity to ask questions and develop your ideas in a supportive group of fellow enthusiasts.
Participants who wish to build their own mics should purchase the following pack in time for the first session
Parts:
- Piezo disc (any 35mm piezo disc will do, ones with pre-soldered cables help save time)
- Impedance transformer
- 1m 1/4” mono cable (any 1/4” mono jack cable will do, not that we’ll be cutting off one end).
- Felt discs (any will do, so long as they are 35mm)
Equipment:
- Soldering iron and solder
- Wire cutters
- Recording device with XLR input and phantom power
- XLR cable
- Hot glue gun
