Okta 5: Under Winter Skies [sounds being made!]

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

Listen to the past volumes here!

Let's do this again! Shout out if you are interested!

Very important: there is no baseline qualification of how "good"/"experienced"/"skilled" you have to be to participate. If you want to make/shape sounds and have the means to do so, you are welcome!

The proposed "soundworld" is generally more on the minimal/floaty/airy side of things — "okta" is a system for measuring the cloudiness of the sky, so that's a good guiding image, giving a range from peaceful wisps to portentous rumbles. In the past we've done this summer-ish, so let's contrast this with some winter sky vibes?

In the past, we did this as a two-stage project. First, folks generated a collection of sounds (less processed/produced being better), then everyone used other folks' stems as source material to wrangle into finished tracks. (I like this process, but it's not written in stone!)

Anyway, this is meant to be low-presh and fun, and a chance to interact with some of your fellow ILF-ers. It'd be cool to have old hands and new faces taking part, so let's see what sort of interest is out there!

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

People who have expressed an interest:

Paul_C
moid
dubkitty [tech pending]
lumena
cantremember
Heraclitus Akimbo

coldbrightsunlight

----------
The first batch listed above expressed an interest in the old thread — please confirm over here!

[dubkitty]

i'll work on it. seems like i should be able to export .wav or .aiff files from the phone, but i have to figure it out. the utter lack of a manual is not helpful because i can't be Googling "how to record" while actually recording. that's even too aleatoric for me.

[coldbrightsunlight]

I'm in!

[lumena]

I am super ready (and in)

[moid]

My son and I are both up for this Thanks Heraclitus!

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

Okay! Sorry for the delay! Let's do this!

I think we've found in the past we need to find the sweet spot for time limits of being far enough away to get work done but not so far that you don't feel like starting now. So, say, six weeks-ish?

Tentative Phase I deadline: Sunday, March 24th

What are we doing in Phase I?

The goal of Phase I is to create stems that other participants can manipulate and construct into complete pieces. So the idea is to keep them fairly "minimal" and unadorned. Basically, keep in mind someone else is going to process and refine these! As for length, shorter is often better, but it really depends on the density of the material and how it might be used.... to a four-bar sample that's going to be looped makes sense, but so does a five-minute drone that might be a pad.

Experience has shown that field recordings of all kinds are popular as source material, so I encourage everyone to try their hand at gathering some sounds from the world around them. (Hint: you are probably carrying a device on your pocket that can record sounds decently enough!)

There will be a shared google drive where folks can upload their stems. (Or if that's difficult for you for whatever reason, as long as you can get files to me I can make sure they are accessible to everyone.)

Questions/discussions/etc. are most welcome here!

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

Visual thinking is also encouraged! If anyone on ILF wants to contribute some sky-appropriate photography, that's cool!

if you've been aching to make a video for someone out of whatever footage you have laying around, this is your chance!

Cover art? Yes, we'll need some!

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

And most importantly: there's still time to sign up!

And remember... you don't have to have a certain number of posts, or a certain number of ILF cool points, or whatever!

If you are on the forum and you are interested, you are qualified! If you've been lurking but want to lurk less, here's a chance to interact with other folks.

Don't worry if it's not good enough / for anyone else to hear / just drone / drone along!
La la la la la / la la la la la la / la la la la la la la

[dubkitty]

i think i'm gonna be able to do something...i have a Tascam DR-07 MKII handheld PCM recorder i inherited as an abandoned test item when they remodeled the Creative Department offices that's been sitting around the apartment since sometime in 2020 (i guess it had been sitting around the office since they were new, possibly as long ago as 2011!) and dug it out today. it appears that once i get a mini SD card i'll be able to record to the DR-07 and run a USB out to the work computer to transfer them to sites. may not have it sorted for a few days, but it's definitely happening. i can even run the looping board straight into the Tascam via its 1/8" audio input. meanwhile i've been playing with the Stereo Memory Man With Hazarai i got from ILFSS and coming up with weird new noises. last night i played through the ring modulator into squarewave tremolo with a moderate duty cycle and the modulation on the Soft Focus up a bit and it sounded like electronic crickets. i'm in love with the SMMH because not only does it have the only useful reverse echo i've ever used, but you can get a pseudo-loop going with any of the delay functions with repeats maxed out, step on the left switch, and record the delay content as a true loop at whatever length you like. you then have options with the loop and whether to keep the delay going or change it. i had a sound last night that would have made a perfect pad looped but i haven't got the SD card working or i could probably put it up. i'll go get a card after work.

[dubkitty]

holy crap, i lucked out. the Tascam not only records 48k and 44.1 WAV files, it also has a bigger bag of tricks than Felix the Cat. first of all, you can overdub on it. i don't know how many layers, but i'm going to find out. it also has a 3-way level control function that does peak reduction and auto-leveling (meh) but also has a limiter function (yay!). there's also SIX onboard reverbs, and you can time-stretch a recording from 50% to 150% of normal while retaining pitch. i had no fucking idea this thing was so powerful. i could have been recording loops on this unit years ago.

[Paul_C]

i think i'm gonna be able to do something...i have a Tascam DR-07 MKII handheld PCM recorder i inherited as an abandoned test item when they remodeled the Creative Department offices that's been sitting around the apartment since sometime in 2020 (i guess it had been sitting around the office since they were new, possibly as long ago as 2011!) and dug it out today.

Everything I've recorded since 2018 has been via a MK1 DR-07 sitting in front of my amp, including all my Okta contributions

I've got almost all my pedals packed away at the moment, so I might create all my sounds using my iPad (and the Beebo which is currently my entire FX set up).

[dubkitty]

i'm thinking of running the looper board straight into the DR-07 like i used to do in 2012-14 running the Headrush/Ditto/Flashback into a little hockey puck of a converter and then straight to HD. i also want to try to record the 5 AM ambient noises here out my bedroom window, which often include loud, low-pitched metallic banging assumedly from garbage trucks and always several species of birds. i also figured out how to make my guitar sound like frogs calling. i'm starting to have fun. i have a weird loop sitting on the SMMH that i need to transcribe made up of various degraded backwards echoes augmented by the Flashback's stock oil-can Toneprint chattering away at a different tempo and frog calls made by running the ring modulator into the Zvex Sonar tremolo doing hard chop at just the right duty cycle and speed.

[Heraclitus Akimbo]

Yay dubs, glad this has prodded yr process in a productive manner!

[dubkitty]

i'm bummed...i started using the DR-07 this morning and it didn't go well. first i fucked up the morning bird samples by not configuring the recorder properly and recording them with a ton of not-wonderful room reverb turned on, then once i got everything relatively sorted and was going to record the loop with the backwards guitars and frogs (BTW you need to record the frogs in reverse delay mode for them to work) i had sitting on the SMMH but hit the wrong switch and lost it. oh well. i'll come back to in Thursday when i have some time...i'm going to be in and out of the house for gf family shit the next 2 days. i'll get it, though. and i already have a 3.5 mm stereo-to-1/4" adapter so i can run straight out of the pedalboard. i miss my old handheld Sony cassette recorder from the 70s with the condenser mic built in. this is the opposite of that in that it's not the least bit simple.