(16/04) Today we were allocated to our group for the recording assignment. We allocated our individual tasks and mine was to get the zoom recorder from the library.
(22/04) Today’s weather was perfect for recording – not too cold and not too hot. It’s almost as if nature had a part in planning this day as well. I was confident today was going to be a good one even though I had not yet mastered using the zoom recorder. In fact, I had never come across one zoom recorder in my entire life. This was a challenge. I spent the entire night last night watching youtube videos on how to use it and nervously waited for the next day when my knowledge would be put to the test. Anyway back to this perfect day, I arrived at the Sydney Conservatorium and made my way to Room 3078 to join my other group members. The room was practically small (not enough space to move around) and equipped with a piano, sitting bench and a music-score stand. The only thing we brought was the zoom recorder and a camera stand but the problem was we could not get the recorder in a standing position. I wasn’t sure what was missing from the camera stand but my other group member managed to find another position for the recorder that was suitable to use in our recording session. He laid the recorder flat on the stand and tied it with a string. Then, we experimented the recording quality from different angles. First, we placed the recorder just beside the piano and tested the built-in microphones on the recorder. We saw the sound waves moving up and down and getting bigger as we placed the recorder closer to the piano. We first tried out Spot A but the sound was not the good. Then we tried spot B and got good wave forms so we recorded a full take on the piece by Yiruma called “River flows in you”. For the second take, we tried spot C and recorded the full piece length and found that it was too loud and cannot be used. So we shifted it back to spot B and took the following takes from there. In take 5, there were sounds of footsteps captured by the recorder during recording so we had to ask the pianist to play this section of the piece again so we can cover it when editing. We got the material we needed by 2.10pm and by this time our we were very exhausted, including the pianist himself. It was a fun experience working with other students in this recording assignment as we got to understand each other’s personalities as well as being patient with every takes.
(29/04) Downloaded the software Audacity and looked through youtube videos on how to use it. The videos helped me a lot to know the basics and how to operate the software. I referred back and forth to these videos for guidance.
(10/05) I have just started working on my recording assignment as there were heaps of other assignments to do in my other course. But anyway, today I managed to study how to read the music sheet and follow along with the recording. It was important for my editing so I could refer to the edit points on my music sheet. I found several edit points that were off key, lots of clipping sounds, some thud sounds, some areas were a bit off beat and the end part I had to do some fading to it. I did manage to work on the thud and air nose from the background. I went to the noise reduction option in the effect bar and highlighted the area that I wanted out of my track. This took quite a long process at first but I had the hang of it later.
(16/05) I am again late for this assignment. My life is a mess right now and I am just trying to find a perfect excuse to my lecturer today on why I have not finished. I guess I will try my best to complete this as soon as possible so that I can just submit it and make my lecturer happy. Anyway, cross fingers that I get this done with.
(28/05) I am revisited my assignment today because I had just finished my other big one in my other course. Today, I completed most of the work on editing. I highlighted my music sheet so that I did not get confused with the bass notes and the higher notes. I was following the higher notes for editing and circled the areas that needed editing.
(30/05) Today I complete my recording assignment. I had 7 edit points which I did to the best of my ability. There were some areas that I did have to split and shift a bit in front because it came to late in the recording. If you refer to my music sheet two days ago these areas are on page 2 with 2 long strokes. The ones circled were the edit points on the recording. And here below is the screenshot of my work in Audacity.
Agnes' Blog 