Critical
When I was first told about making a soundscape I was a little dubious. Mostly I was unsure of where to start and if it would actually be good but 11 weeks of hard work, learning new techniques and delvolping new ideas I feel that I have been a part of a group that has created a high quality piece of audio.
When as a group we developed the idea for our piece that of being a meditative of tone relaxing soundscape focusing around the concept of a swan song, I personally got excited for I started to realize the potential. This is when I first experimented with different sound sources (mostly swans) and seeing what could be done to enhance them to make them fit our brief. It was during this stage that I really started to grasp how to use different techniques like E.Q and time stretching effectively. Also it was during this stage that I became enamored with the idea of changing the nature of a sound to alter its meaning. I believe this is something that I portrayed in our finished soundscape in where our swan noises are made to sound relaxing and I think that this contrast adds to the dynamic of our soundscape in how it blends the two notions of meditation and nature/swan seamlessly. Another feature in our soundscape which I was extremely proud of was the presence of the Bass Guitar notes. I feel that the use of the instrument here is vital for firstly I think that the way in which it accents the bells is extremely important in creating an environment of mediation and I also find that the low frequency of the bass helped add a certain amount of depth. Another reason I am personally proud of the Bass here is that I created the custom E.Q which took a lot of patience and learning but ultimately I feel I created a warm sounding bass tone to fit within the structure of our piece.
Another factor I felt helped the making of our soundscape was due to our production group who I felt for the most part acted professional throughout whilst also maintaining an environment for creativity. In my group I feel that Timmie throughout was constantly working towards goals while at the same time coming up with new ideas for the teams to work,Vashti helped in my understanding of the concepts of meditation and swan song through her extensive research and she also was extremely good in a group setting in debating about ideas. What can be said about both Timmie and Vashti is that I felt they were passionate about what we were doing and learnt from the process. However I feel that Josh may have taken a back seat and was a little unprofessional, therefore I would probably not consider working with him again. I would like to think that I contributed good value ideas and also that I was able to provide technical support i.e microphone and techniques to the group. If I were to do this again I would defiantly invest more time in researching and also I feel I would try to be more experimental so I could further improve my knowledge in the subject.
Over the course of making this soundscape I have garnered a new appreciation for the art of soundscaping whilst also gaining a new understanding in many different recording and editing processes.
