We get the opportunity to spend a tremendous amount of the weekend watching the Delaware River roll by.  The section of the river that we spend time on divides two small towns in New York and Pennsylvania respectively. If you want to cross state lines you have to cross this bridge:

It is this great old metal bridge that has a metal surface that sort of looks like a cheese grater.  It lets out a great low rumbling hum when cars pass over it.  Back in the winter I made some recordings with hydrophones in the water below, but I wanted to return and record it with my Schoeps MS pair above the water.

In this recording I positioned myself under one end of the bridge and let the traffic roll over me.  This is just a snippet of a place I could spend hours lost in thought.  Who knew cars could be so soothing?

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

He’s a trained diver and he was nice enough to let me come out for the day and put him through his paces.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t get started until late in the day because of this sound:

I consider it a happy accident.  Initially I was really frustrated because I couldn’t figure out where this low frequency sound was coming from and I needed to record scuba sounds!  I kept looking around and there definitely wasn’t a nuclear sub in the pool!  My brother-in-law and I quickly discovered that a neighbor down the block was having his driveway ripped up and repaved.  All of that low frequency information was traveling from down the street and under the pool.  So what do you do when you have a loud hum?  We went out for lunch and then I took my nephew and niece out for ice-cream.  By the time we returned to the pool we were free and clear of construction hums and we could make all of the bubbling sounds we wanted.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of 2 Aquarian H2a Hydrophones. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

The barn has old wooden beams, a metal roof, and a small bat population.  When it started raining, I ran over to start recording, thinking that the metal roof coupled with the acoustics of the interior would lead to some interesting results.

Unfortunately, the rain was a little too light and constant for the impacts on the metal roof to be that interesting, so I was not hopeful when I set up the recorder.  I didn’t think I would get anything worthwhile unless the pattern of the rain shifted.  However, when I got home and started sifting through the recording, I discovered the rain was not the coolest part.  It was the roof itself!  If you listen closely, the roof shifts in the wind and generates wobbly low frequency sounds. Can you say “Roof Drone?”  I had thought I would go home and trash the recording, but am glad I spent the time sifting through all of the content.

Now, I have to go back on a windy day to get just the sounds of the roof moving against the rest of the barn.  In addition, there are occasional bat vocalizations, a few birds, and a couple of planes that are all filtered through the roof and the barn.  It might not be the best result, but it turned out to be a worthy and interesting experiment.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

My first library, REA_001 ROCKETS features a number of rockets that I’ve posted previously on this blog, and, in honor of the launch, I’ve decided to put up two of my favorite rockets from the library.

This is an large scale amateur rocket recorded at a close perspective with a pair of Schoeps in an MS configuration.

This is slightly smaller Rocket recorded at a close perspective with a pair of DPA 4060s.

They were truly a blast to record.  Here is a little background from the Rabbit Ears Site:

I recorded these rockets on two separate occasions.  The first session was in Plaster City, California, where temperatures soared to over 100 degrees Fahrenheit before noon.  The second session occurred in Pine Island, New York on an onion farm.

One of the biggest challenges when recording rockets is battling the high SPL and developing strategies to overcome it.  Before I did any recordings, I went to a launch and spent half a day just listening.

After working around lots of hobbyists and their wonderful creations, I have a pretty explosive collection of sounds.  None of my microphones or their owner were harmed in the making of this library.

After we met the woman who ran the farm, I noticed a giant scar on her leg in the shape of an ostrich claw. They kick.  They kicked really hard.  We also quickly learned that the adults only make noise when they are mating (a low hooting noise), and unfortunately we were not that lucky.  We also learned which ones would not be living past the next week (the yearlings):

They barely made a sound, but they did like biting my zeppelin.  I didn’t mind because, I knew they would soon be snack food (“bite away poor fellows”). At that moment I was starting to feel a bit down on my luck since we hadn’t really heard much except the story of how the farm owner got kicked by a yearling.  That was until we discovered the babies!  Not only were they cute, but they made this unearthly chirping sound that I’ll never forget.

When I was working on Radiolab a colleague of mine, actually used them as the basis for the sounds of parasites hanging out inside a large intestine.  I’m good for baby ostriches and parasites.  One of my favorite things about that day was the massive amount of ostrich jerky we left with.  The woman who ran the farm refused to let us leave without 5 pounds of ostrich jerky.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

The acoustics in the place are just beautiful.  Surprisingly, the acoustics in the church were not the biggest attraction.  Just outside the church is another hand-built structure: the bell tower.

The bells were sounded for the arrival of the couple and at the conclusion of the service.  I was lucky enough to weasel my way into the bell tower to sneak in some recording time.

Even though there were still some people in the church driveway, I managed to get a fairly clean recording.  If you listen carefully you can hear the creaking of the ropes and pulleys that the bells rest on.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

I don’t know why it has taken me this long, but I finally decided to record the grinder in our special coffee maker.

The first section is the Grind and Brew dry fire, and it is followed up with a grinder full of beans.  It has a nice whirr to it, and it is truly a sound that I cannot get enough of.  If you could only smell the aroma!

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96

As you can see, these guys really don’t mess around.  The rocket on the left was one of the high powered rockets that required over 1000-foot clearance from all of the attendees.  Recording this rocket and many of the others required lots of guessing about where to set levels.  There was some serious SPL out there, kiddies.  Just look at the size of the people in that photo and look at the size of the rocket.  At least 3 rockets that day required FAA clearance because they flew over 5000 ft.

Lucky for me this was my second rocket trip, so I guessed wisely.  I ended up leaving that day with over 15 rockets recorded on 6 different channels.  I have my Schoeps MS pair, my brother’s MKH 60, my newly acquired Sanken CUB-01, and a pair of DPA 4060’s.  The CUB-01 is a boundary layer mic and it was my favorite of the day.

The CUB handles a high level of SPL, but I still had to deal with low frequency vibrations and wind since it would be sitting on the ground.  I found these foam discs that are used for waxing cars and the density was just perfect.  It gave a little, which is good for absorbing shock, but still was stable and firm on the ground.  I cut out a piece slightly larger than the capsule of the CUB and zip tied a high wind cover from rycote over the capsule.  I’m really pleased with the results and I can’t wait to finish this library.  After this past weekend, I think I decided that I need another CUB, but I might have to wait a little while.

Recording Geek Note:  Rig consists of Sanken CUB-01 It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96.

I set the recorder up right by the window facing the tree, and I had it kick in at 4:30 AM and go out of record at 8:00 AM.  Not only did the recording turn out wonderfully, but I managed to sleep soundly all morning because I didn’t have to wake up and punch record! I love the timer on the Sound Devices recorders.  There is one edit point in the recording which I tagged.  The file above starts at 4:30 AM and then I cut in around 7:00 AM, so you could hear how the sound changed as the morning wore on.  There are also a couple of nice wing flaps in there.

I’d be grateful for any species identifications.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96.

I set my rig up about 200 feet from the river because I didn’t want to get too much of the river rolling by and wanted to focus more on the peepers.  In retrospect, I might have set the rig up a bit closer to the water and maybe the little buggers would have sounded denser, as this has a “medium, distant” sound.  I might give this another go tomorrow night, if the campsites across the river don’t fill up with noisy campers.  In the meantime, enjoy the chirping.

Recording Geek Note: Rig consists of Schoeps CMC5’s setup for MS, with the MK4 as the mid. It was all tracked to a Sound Devices 744T at 24/96.