Circuit Bending: A start

We got shown a video in the morning that really shows the potential for the contact mics to record some interesting sounds. I think it also showed some great aesthetics as well with the bottle caps but that's not the point.

I think this morning's little lecture was more useful for next week's instrument-making though. Despite that, it did show us an example of how to creatively use the contact mics. I'm thinking about getting the liquid electric tape. I'd like to try out listening to water turning to ice, and ice melting into water.

Later we did body contact on the circuits by wetting our fingers and moving them across the circuit to find any interesting areas that alter the sounds. For my circuit it was really good. There were 3 main areas and all of them respond. The key thing though, is that for Group 2 and Group 3 to work area 1 has to be touched first before they respond.

Group 1: Changes pitch across a huge range
Group 2: Wobbles the pitch (oscillation?)
Group 3: Gives a few different clear notes that are within range of the pitch

Tonight I'm going to add a potentiometer to it to change the pitch for me. Because when you do body contact your body acts as a giant resistor, so I think that should work fine. Before I do that I want to make sure that I know what parts of the circuit do what first by probing it, and to find any more interesting parts of the circuit that I missed. I want to add some switches too, because for my circuit it can't turn on or off unless I add/remove the battery. I'm going to put together the cricket circuit from JayCar as well. I think it would be cool to have it working with my siren circuit because the cricket circuit doesn't make a sound until another sound sets it off first. So the sound of the siren can activate the cricket, which would make it a great two-part circuit that's really one instrument.

I want to be able to connect both of the circuits with this type of switch. But can't figure out how to connect it properly. So when I get home today I'll try figure that out.


Ok, I added a potentiometer to the circuit and fiddled around with it. There are 5pairs of points, and one particular pair is really good for changing the pitch. So I'll solder that on once I've worked out the second circuits good points too.

Stefan from Pumice came along and did a little performance for us as an example today as well. I liked it, but I thought it was far too loud. At several points I had to cover my ears so that they wouldn't get hurt. My favourite was when he had the tuning forks and the telephone receiver.

Overall, from today I think circuit bending can be really good for making sounds for movies. From my one, at one point I got bagpipes, sounds of very shrill birds, child screaming, and many more. It can also be a new advancement in music, maybe a new movement or a new genre.