Assignment 1

Brief

Make an audiocumentary (audio documentary) of a typical day in your life that gives insight into your everyday soundscape.

Not the extraordinary — the ordinary. The coffee machine, the tram, the rain on glass, the supermarket, the squeak of the door, the sound of your own footsteps.

Requirements

• Maximum length: 5 minutes
• Any recorder — phone, handy recorder

Process

Recording

Get close to sources. Avoid wind — unless wind is what you are documenting. Record more than you think you need. You will cut later. Capture at least one minute of ambient sound per location.

Editing

Import your clips into Audacity (free, Mac and Windows), GarageBand (free, Mac, pre-installed), or any other editor you are familiar with. Cut what doesn’t serve the piece. Use fades at the start and end of each clip to avoid hard cuts.

Deliverable

Export as MP3 and upload to Canvas. In Week 2 you will listen to each other’s work in pairs and build a shared sound vocabulary.