Want to try your hand at decoding some NBTV videos?  NBTV is a very low resolution (36 lines), low framerate (12.5 fps) video format that it transmitted via an audio signal.  The audio sounds like an old modem or a fax machine.  You can use free open source software to decode it into video.  Here is a link where you can find the decoding software: http://users.tpg.com.au/users/gmillard/nbtv/nbtv.htm

GITAG - C2 - 03 - NBTV - East - 16bps

Want to try your hand at decoding some NBTV videos? NBTV is a very low resolution (36 lines), low framerate (12.5 fps) video format that it transmitted via an audio signal. The audio sounds like an old modem or a fax machine. You can use free open source software to decode it into video. Here is a link where you can find the decoding software: users.tpg.com.au/users/gmillard/nbtv/nbtv.htm

GITAG - C2 - 03 - NBTV - West - 16bps

This is a raw unprocessed clip of a contact mic recording of tower C... this is wind on the contact mic... I tried to remove it... but it's present throughout the entire spectrum... it is kind of rhythmic... i might just keep the wind... what do you think?
the other option is to cut these bits out... maybe it will be a case by case basis.

Ctower WindClip Unprocessed

here is that same clip now with high pass, and low pass, and then a second layer of eq enhancing select frequencies in the lows, mids, and highs... the wind is still there... but it has more character now.

Ctower WindClip EQprocessed

audio documentation of a performance at the Toronto Music Gallery, presented by NAISA (New Adventures in Sound Art) on November 10, 2016.  

Requiem for Radio: Pulse Decay, is the first in a suite of works mourning the loss of the RCI shortwave site that stood in Sackville, NB from 1944-2014. Audio triggered by a Theremin is sourced from contact microphone recordings that were made of each tower when they were still standing. The Theremin is used to play the ghosts of the radio towers.

Control voltage from the theremin is run into an arduino that converts the CV into binary before sending it to a program in supercollider that runs the audio and another program in processing that runs the video.

Audio samples are sourced from my contact microphone recordings of the radio towers and associated video projections are stylized still images built from documentation of the towers of themselves creating a blue-print style portrait of each tower that contains its historic and statistical information relating to that tower.

Requiem for Radio: Pulse Decay - NAISA performance, Toronto, 2016

audio excerpt  - one of 26 possible files that can be triggered by the public in this interactive installation.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation enabling the public to play the ghosts of radio towers with radio waves.

Architecture, technology, history, and the human body come together in this near-supernatural conjuring of the spirits of the Radio Canada International shortwave towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation about the disappearance of shortwave radio transmissions.  It is a requiem for the Radio Canada International shortwave site that was located near the border of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and transmitted shortwave radio around the world from 1944 – 2014. 

In radio terminology, a dead zone is an area where radio signals cannot be received due to propagation difficulties. With the RCI site gone, there are now a lot more dead zones in the world, not due to interference, but rather because the transmissions have ceased.

This interactive installation involves 13 towers with capacitance sensors positioned around the space to create a scale model of the recently demolished RCI site. Each tower has capacitance sensors dedicated to one of the radio towers that stood there. The towers are placed in relation to one another exactly according to the placements of the original radio towers, and the heights of their antennas are built to the scale of the height of the tower they represent.

From a distance one can see glowing red towers. From up close, the proximity of one’s body will trigger ghostly droning sounds, as electrons jump from the human body to the theremin, triggering the haunting audio recordings.

The public is invited to walk among the scale model of the site and to interact with the towers and to trigger the sounds of the RCI towers – using radio waves to play the ghosts of the radio towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones (drone from tower M)

contact microphone recording of tower M
triggered when touching tower M in the New Dead Zones instalation

audio excerpt - one of 26 possible files that can be triggered by the public in this interactive installation.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation enabling the public to play the ghosts of radio towers.

Architecture, technology, history, and the human body come together in this near-supernatural conjuring of the spirits of the Radio Canada International shortwave towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation about the disappearance of shortwave radio transmissions. It is a requiem for the Radio Canada International shortwave site that was located near the border of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and transmitted shortwave radio around the world from 1944 – 2014.

In radio terminology, a dead zone is an area where radio signals cannot be received due to propagation difficulties. With the RCI site gone, there are now a lot more dead zones in the world, not due to interference, but rather because the transmissions have ceased.

This interactive installation involves 13 towers with capacitance sensors positioned around the space to create a scale model of the recently demolished RCI site. Each tower has capacitance sensors dedicated to one of the radio towers that stood there. The towers are placed in relation to one another exactly according to the placements of the original radio towers, and the heights of the towers are built to the scale of the height of the radio tower they represent.

From a distance one can see glowing red towers. From up close, the capacitance of one’s body will trigger ghostly droning sounds when touching the towers, as electrons travel from the human body through the copper sensor and into the circuit, triggering the haunting audio recordings.

The public is invited to walk among the scale model of the site and to interact with the towers and to trigger the sounds of the RCI towers – using capacitance and human contact to play the ghosts of the radio towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones: (glitches from Tower M)

contact microphone recording of tower P
triggered when touching tower P in the New Dead Zones instalation

audio excerpt - one of 26 possible files that can be triggered by the public in this interactive installation.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation enabling the public to play the ghosts of radio towers.

Architecture, technology, history, and the human body come together in this near-supernatural conjuring of the spirits of the Radio Canada International shortwave towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones is an interactive installation about the disappearance of shortwave radio transmissions. It is a requiem for the Radio Canada International shortwave site that was located near the border of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and transmitted shortwave radio around the world from 1944 – 2014.

In radio terminology, a dead zone is an area where radio signals cannot be received due to propagation difficulties. With the RCI site gone, there are now a lot more dead zones in the world, not due to interference, but rather because the transmissions have ceased.

This interactive installation involves 13 towers with capacitance sensors positioned around the space to create a scale model of the recently demolished RCI site. Each tower has capacitance sensors dedicated to one of the radio towers that stood there. The towers are placed in relation to one another exactly according to the placements of the original radio towers, and the heights of the towers are built to the scale of the height of the radio tower they represent.

From a distance one can see glowing red towers. From up close, the capacitance of one’s body will trigger ghostly droning sounds when touching the towers, as electrons travel from the human body through the copper sensor and into the circuit, triggering the haunting audio recordings.

The public is invited to walk among the scale model of the site and to interact with the towers and to trigger the sounds of the RCI towers – using capacitance and human contact to play the ghosts of the radio towers.

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones (drone from tower P)

Requiem for Radio: New Dead Zones (glitches from tower P)

it's been a long time since i've made sounds... 
this is just a little place to share some recent play and experiments... 


amanda dawn christie

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