Sounds of Silence, Capturing A Building's Sonic Signature

The housing is made of industrial plastic- “stuff used to make drains and boating gear.” Photo Courtesy: Murkuri Microphoness When you see a historic building, you observe its architecture. Acoustic Archives focuses on a less tangible aspect: its sound. The team has created a way to capture a place’s sonic imprint and apply it to […]
Sounds of Silence Capturing A Building's Sonic Signature

The housing is made of industrial plastic- "stuff used to make drains and boating gear." Photo Courtesy: Murkuri Microphoness

When you see a historic building, you observe its architecture. Acoustic Archives focuses on a less tangible aspect: its sound. The team has created a way to capture a place's sonic imprint and apply it to other audio, imparting the aural qualities of that locations. Directors can overlay these profiles on dialog to make it site-specific, and bands could give a new feel to studio tracks. (Consider U2's castle-recorded The Unforgettable Fire.)

Audio nerds and Archives cofounders Mesta Bish and Vito Finamore wanted a creepy vibe for an album, so they teamed up with Ryan Schimmenti and Eric Farahani to record a defunct insane asylum. This led to forays into other obscure buildings. At each site, they record tones that then get processed out to isolate the acoustics. Their secret weapon is this 3-D microphones, designed largely by Bish and Finamore. "When people see it," Schimmenti says, "they're like, what kind of Ghostbusters nonsense is this?" High on their sonic wish list: the space shuttle Enterprise.

Humanlike ears on Acoustic Archives' mic simulate the way we hear sound. Photo Courtesy: Murkuri Microphoness