Randomatones

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2022

20212020
Flooding in South Woodford
And sure enough, there was sudden flooding in the subway at South Woodford tube and I wasn't ready. In fact this drained away quickly. When I arrived I could see the water marks where it had been half a metre higher, still not enough to cover the shopping trolley. And the water was a mud soup, with all kinds of rubbish in it. Not that rubbish in the water has stopped me before.
The Old Birlec Factory, Birmingham
A couple of years ago my wife, my son and I had a week-long canal holiday on the Warwickshire Ring. Most of this was countryside, but part of it went through the eastern edge of Birmingham. The environment was a bit on the gritty side, and the waterways were a shockingly polluted soup of all kinds of household waste. But in general I found the canal architecture hugely appealing, especially this fine example just south of the Tyburn Road (A38) in Erdington, where the canal passes under a derelict factory that once made electric furnaces.

As we drifted slowly underneath, I felt had to come back to this place for some artistic reason or other. I was so enthralled with it, I crashed the boat into the bridge at the other end.

Two years later, on my way back from a band rehearsal in Stoke-on-Trent with two floating Randomatones in the car, I returned to this place to record them moving about in the water at random, and playing their randomised glow-in-the-dark concert of varispeed arpeggios to the empty resonant space of this covered section of canal.
New floating pink unit
Putting together the third floating unit. A simpler construction than the other two, this one uses the other grey horn speaker and has a single motor for rotation. Note the new detachable battery unit, with a serial plug for easy connection now that it has the battery terminals, the motor connection and an underwater light, which you can see minus a covering.
Regents Canal Limehouse Commercial Road Lock
First showing of the floating Randomatones after months of development, taking my exploration of the acoustics of enclosed waterways to another level - the water level. Conditions for this shoot were pretty good, the water was glassy smooth, and there seemed to be very little breeze. Then I got the units in the water, and after first nearly disappearing down the overflow, they blew off upstream under the bridge, where I wanted them, but then kept going. I had not had a chance to properly get used to the remote controls for the propellor onboard the blue unit, nor did it seem powerful enough to counter the upstream wind. I thought I was going to lose them on their first outing.

I really like the way they looked and sounded though. The sound featured the new arpeggiation I had been working on (trivial compared with having to fit remote-controllable propellors) and was fantastic under the bridge. Visually the units were striking in their vibrant colours, and the searchlight glare of the LED spot lights on each unit played beautifully over the clean brickwork. When pointing at the camera they were a bit intense, but for now my plan is to improve and increase the rotation of the units, so that the glare is only ever fleeting.

In all, a decent first trip out and very promising.
The Itchen River, Southampton
Another exploration of the acoustics of enclosed waterways, though not so enclosed as the canal tunnel in the previous outing. This one made for a slightly better video as there was more light, and the silky smoothness of the water is clearly apparent here. This is the smaller of the two Itchens north of Southampton as it flows under the roaring M27.

Feeling that the small units were being dwarfed by these large spaces, I brought a new larger orange unit with a more powerful horn speaker that sounded very smooth at home. I had another large pink one in the works but it was not ready in time for this trip. I stopped working on it completely after making this video, as I knew all I wanted to do next in locations like this was to get units floating in the water.

Testing two new floating units
Not actually floating yet (they will sit on inflatable swimming rings in the water), but lined up and getting ready to go for the first floating shoot happening soon.
Location scouting in St Pancras
This massive railway bridge crosses the Regents Canal just north of St Pancras station in London. The canal is quite wide here, and there is plenty of noise from trains passing overhead, but the acoustic is good. This could work with the spinning units, but would be another good incentive to get floating units working.
Location scouting in Worcestershire
Up in Kidderminster for a gig, with some time to the soundcheck I went to check out this location where the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal passes under the A456. The concrete enclosure gives this a place a great acoustic. But in order to come here I need floating units.
Shell for new floating orange unit
Another empty orange shell, this time for a second floating unit. I hope to take both of them out next month. Trying out a slightly different design to the blue one, with a panel of large holes that will accommodate four upcyled 3" speakers.
A new build
Another blue unit that will eventually float (buoyancy device not shown). This uses one of two kinds of 30W horn speakers I've been trying, again with the back casing and the 100V line transformer removed. Still quite a bit of development to go on this, as it will have a steerable propellor, which needs a remote control mechanism.
The Curzon Tunnel, Birmingham
Made on a rainy Sunday morning before I was due at a midday rehearsal near Tardebigge. I took a canal trip a couple of summers ago, part of which was a day on a section of the Birmingham network. I didn't pass through this stretch of waterway, but the trip definitely left an impression, though not entirely a good one at the time.

The combination of water, enclosed spaces with rich acoustics, and simple ambient music is a serene one for me, and one I intend to explore much more deeply. I live in London, which has a canal network, but nothing like Birmingham, whose centuries-old waterway architecture seems largely untouched despite modern redevelopments all around it. And unlike London, it has tunnels you can walk through.

Also I very much prefer ducks and geese to pigeons.
Floating unit design
Soon I will start building one of these. The two most recent video shoots (editing in progress) have been waterside, and much as I enjoy these locations, I remember the very first Randomtones video in the flooded subway near my house, and want very much to do something similar with floating units rather than only being able to suspend them from exactly the right kind of railings.
Music For Commuters And Pigeons
I had been hoping for music with neither. In the event, the pigeons provided an interesting few seconds of rotating filth, as I placed a camera on the underside of the blue unit to capture a whirling view of the unit and the ground below, in which their droppings produced a kind of blurry rotating starscape (watch from 0:57 for 10 seconds to see what I mean).

Passers-by came and went in step with train arrivals, and many turned their heads.

In general this was a fine location, a handsome Victorian arch providing a pedestrian walkway next to Pudding Mill Lane station, with the recent modern concrete Crossrail addition for contrast. Relatively quiet, but perhaps too vast for the small units. The larger horns would have made more of a sonic impact.
New larger spinning unit
The finished version of what was an empty painted shell a couple of days ago. This one has the new white horn speaker, meaning I can play it louder in larger spaces without distorting. Also it has a camera, which I may or may not use, as video tends not to be all that usable when the camera is spinning. The main issue with this unit is that it doesn't fit in the rucksack.
Elementary ancient electronics
With a back-of-an-envelope sketch of how to set up a Darlington pair transistor arrangement, plus a couple of resistors for LEDs, I take a few minutes carelessly soldering up a motor driver board, and then get the wiring wrong.

Only single-direction capability here. A reversible polarity setup would require an H-bridge arrangement. For a while I had no plans to implement this, as the varying speeds of the motors was enough to suggest rotational chaos. This was empahsised for me when one day I made the red unit rotate in the opposite direction (for a shoot last month). I found with the units rotating counter to each other, the variations in their speed were unnoticeable.
Painted shell
Several coats of paint later, via a white base, then pink, red and orange fluorescent acrylics.

Brush strokes are clearly visible but I think this will do, I am ready to build it now. Seen here with the 12V 5Ah battery in place. I was assumed it would need some kind of restrainer, but the battery is such a tight fit, I don't know if I'll ever get it out again. Pity, that was the idea. The current two read and blue rotating units would need to be taken to bits to get their batteries out.
Could I be the only person in the world who finds this location appealing?
An almost perfect spot for railings-based or floating Randomatones.

Admittedly this location is not in a perfect state. The floodwater is muddy, which I don't like. And although I would have no problem wading in here, as it's probably only 15-20cm deep, I would create waves which would spoil the stillness if I were to use floating units. Having incorrect shoes at the time of visiting, I didn't go in to see how quiet it was, but outside, the M25 above was incredibly noisy. Nothing to stop me making a decent video with just the direct sound from the units, but it would be nice to hear how they sound in that acoustic, which given this is a concrete casing, should be very good. Also it's lit, which is a bonus. Sadly no graffiti though.
East Ham train depot bridges
This is a location I considered some time ago, and though I knew it could not possibly compete with the Woolwich Foot Tunnel, I set up here anyway purely to tick it off the list. It turned out to be a great setting.

The acoustic was flattering and the colours were surprising, with the ochre brickwork almost aglow. Most appealing when I look back at the video was the reflective concrete ceiling. Just as people preoccupied with videoing a situation scarcely notice what's around them, I barely noticed it at the time.

I had been working on the sounds and by this point had introduced occasional octave sweeps. I did wonder whether these might be a little extreme and disturbing to the many depot workers entering and exiting their site, perhaps worrying them that one of their buildings might be on fire. In the end some last minute scaling down of the effect was worthwhile. The sound on the shoot was excellent, though it comes across less well and was generally too quiet in the recording, compared to the roaring of trains passing overhead, and the depot workers unloading a massive digger off a low-loader nearby.

If you're wondering how that activity did not appear in my usual walk-towards and walk-away shots, it's because I did those on the previous day. I did all the setup, switched on, and found that the units did not turn. I had broken something while fiddling with the octave sweeps.
Shells for new units
Two new carcasses under construction. These are little more than battery cases with supports for large speakers at either end. The battery will sit on its side, now that I have had the courage to do this with lead-acid gel batteries (you wouldn't do this with a traditional top-up-able car battery). This potentially saves height, although each will feature one of the large new horns, which outsize any savings made in the vertical dimension.
Spinning sirens of the Woolwich Foot tunnel
On the theme of gem locations, they don't get much better than this.

Besides the sound being a bit muddy (it was much clearer listening to it in the tunnel), and the autofocus on my phone not handling spinning objects in low light conditions, this latest video is a terrific demo of how these units sound in a reverberant acoustic. It also demonstrates how chronic noise pollution can be ameliorated, here forming an integral part of an ambient music piece.

I was very anxious about this shoot. CCTV camera pods every 50 paces, drunks yelling from one end to the other, generally being in the way of people and fast cyclists. Least of all was that the alarm, which I had recorded and set the Randomatones to play in their key, would have stopped or changed to something in the wrong key. My worst fear was one of the supports coming off and the unit falling on someone's head. That’s assuming I got the supports the right length. Too short and I would not be able to hook onto the pipes, too long and people would be hitting their heads on them.

Nothing of the kind went wrong. The supports were perfect. The units sounded stunning and fitted perfectly with the alarm that was still sounding 10 days after I last heard it. For six blissful minutes I wondered around videoing from various angles thinking "this is beautiful."

Not everything went smoothly. I had tried and tested small suction cups to stick on the tiled walls for mounting my camera (phone) and my Zoom audio recorder. On the day, the cups immediately fell off, and that was without anything attached to them, luckily. Most of the still shots I did with my phone on a gooseneck stand clamped to my cycling helmet.
Location discovery
Sometimes location scouting turns up a real gem of a candidate, such as this, the Spital Brook tunnel under the A10 near Hoddesdon.

The A10 is a dual carriageway at this point, but the banks are very wide, making this tunnel both long and surprisingly quiet. All surfaces are concrete, including the footpath, meaning the acoustic in the middle is excellent. The railings are perfect for hanging Randomatones from, and the water right now looks only a couple of inches deep, allowing paddling around with a tripod if desired. Even the walls have graffiti, though it's hard to see as there is no lighting inside. I will need to adorn each of the rotating units with another 10W or so of LED lighting.

I may not use this one, as it is a car journey from where I live (South Woodford) and I believe there is a similar specimen nearer to home that I aim to check out soon.
Larger horn speaker
One of two new larger horns I will be trying, next to the current blue unit for scale. The small horns on the current units are only 15W, which is too small for the 20W amp, causing them to distort. The larger white one is 30W, and as you can see, somewhat enormous. That will be the end of pacing over to shoots with just a rucksack

I thought I had made a mistake here, as when the new horns arrived they were clearly 100V line devices, which would have been no use. Luckily, take the back off and all you find inside is a transformer to convert the ordinary low impedance magnet/coil driver to 100V line. Simply remove this transformer and the speaker is good to go. It's also at least 0.5Kg lighter.
Under Roding Roads
Another video prompting me to reflect on what sort of setting works for the Randomatones and what I want them to do.

I'm still a sucker for graffiti and enclosed outdoor spaces with some kind of acoustic. This location, on the river Roding just north of the Redbridge roundabout in East London, is all of that, and had exactly the look I wanted. But it was far too noisy to make a meaningful video demonstrating the sonic delights of the Randomatones. Of course it would be noisy, I should have known that. The time I first considered it as a location was summer 2020, when possibly fewer people were rushing up and down the North Circular and it was quieter. I don't remember.

Anyway I'm reasonably pleased with the look of this video, if the sound does have to come direct from the units, and not from microphones that just picked up traffic noise. I think I need bigger units. Once again these looked tiny in their vast concrete arena. But they are still fun to capture close-up, and I risk boring even myself if I follow through with plans for several more videos like this.
Supporting roles
Some very important props. I never throw old bits of wood away, nor paints that are still vaguely liquid. Forthcoming videos involving the new rotating devices each need their own pair of supports to fit the location. The black ones bottom-left were the railing fixings for the Roding video, to be released in a day or two. The two white ones on the left have just done their work on a video shot this afternoon.

The grey and purple ones are for the next couple of planned shoots, though I may build some bigger units before then. The purple ones are almost certainly the wrong colour, but I'll see.
Visionary, programmer and amateur carpenter:
Andrew Booker
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