captations

2010-04-26T11:01:00.000-07:00

Here is a test for my pal Dave's website. ChexSystems is a nreporting service that banks use to blacklist people from getting a checking account. Dave writes about it on his blog at MiCash.

On the SonOBee front, I have decided yet again to change tack and will be implementing the whole thing using microcontrollers instead of a jungle of analog parts and discrete logic. Diagram and detailed discussion to follow (certainly by the end of the year).

2009-10-29T06:32:00.000-07:00

SonoBee v. 2 is still on the drawing board and in pieces on my work table. This son of SonO will offer better dynamic range, that is it will put out a little juice when the input signal is small and a lot of juice when the input is large. The current hardware, version 1, pretty much ignored any differences in input level and just put out maximum voltage as soon as it detected any input audio signal.

Of course, getting this additional flexibility comes at a high cost: the number of parts in v.2 will probably double (or more). Whereas v. had just a single op amp per channel, v. 2 will have at least three, plus a multiplexer and microcontroller.

I should post a drawing, but the basic schema is as follows:

audio input (+/- 1V) -> buffer amp (gain = 2.5, +/- 2.5 V) => multiplexer => level shifter amp (offset+2.5V) => (0-5 V) => uController => (PWM, 0-5V) => gate driver amp (0-13V) => FET gate => power out (0-13V)

To simply generate PWM I could easily get away with not using a uController, but I like that option because it opens up the possibility later of supporting multiple types of output on different channels on the same board: single-ended resistive loads, half- and full-bridge DC motors, stepper motors, etc.

Eventually I could also support MIDI in and/or interface the uController output to external MIDI devices. Exciting stuff!

In the meantime, I am looking for a job as a software architect, expertise in Java. Here is my profile on linkedin. Or for button lovers:

2009-04-06T21:11:00.000-07:00

Introducing the SonOBee™

Insane, insane, insane, this time thing. None of it when I need it, yet it eats me up.

Whoosh. Zoom ahead a year or three and here I am with a new project to write about. These posts always seem to appear at the end, when everything is settled and accounted for. Maybe next time I will actually BLOG and show intermediate results. No matter. This week's prize is an 8-channel audio amplifier that sounds positively cacaesque but which may be used to effectively heat up wires, turn on motors, flash lights or similarly enervate any simple electrical thing needing 13 volts or less. Just don't plug it into a speaker (unless you're one of those noize types who likes cacacacacacaphony.) Oh, and don't forget one or two 15-volt power supplies to provide the juice.

This is the SonOBee.

I have spent almost 8 months designing, simulating, breadboarding, testing and finally drawing this thing in Eagle schematic software. Tonight I sent off the design files to a PCB prototyping house, BatchPCB. The actual boards should arrive in a few weeks. Then the soldering starts. Lead and tin smoke will fill my basement, shortening my lifespan but...what fun!

Here's a color rendering of the amplifier board as it will never appear in real life. But you like color, don't you?

Reason for the widget? My pal Max (who now has his own Wikipedia entry) is building a musical instrument that uses MuscleWire instead of regular guitar strings. The key feature of MuscleWire is that it contracts when heated. Max's instrument has eight strings, each plucked by its own motorized "finger", and each heated by a separate electric circuit driven by a car stereo amplifier. As the wires heat , they contract and change pitch, giving rise to the eery sounds you can hear for yourself on YouTube...

I call my amplifier the SonOBee because it doesn't sing, it buzzes. Right. There may also be a pun there. If it works as advertised, the SonOBee will replace two car stereo amps for all your non-musical car stereo needs. It will be smaller, lighter and more efficient. Comes in a black and aluminum case that someone with art talent really needs to help me decorate.

And if it doesn't work, it'll make a helluva bangle on the rear-view mirror.

If you want one for Christmas or whatever, they cost about $100 bucks. Write me.

2008-09-16T10:39:00.000-07:00

Whew! Long time since that last post. I'll try to do better in the future.

The wedding went off without a hitch. No wait, that's not what I meant. There was a hitch, nicely tied between Steve and Karen. But the best part of the wedding was meeting Steve's old friend, S...., with whom I hit it off big time. A year later, many flights to San Francisco later, she's on the short list of new immigrants to Canada to join me here. Brave girl! But we're in love.

And in a not entirely unrelated but less serious note, I am pleased to announce the creation of the Association of Ex-Boyfriends of Ex-Girlfriends of Voivod. This is an exclusive club for men whose former wives or girlfriends are themselves former girlfriends of the rock band Voivod. Maxime Rioux and I are the founding members, but I'm sure there are millions more of you out there. Let us know!

2007-03-01T19:03:00.000-08:00

Some cool news. I am going to officiate at my brother's wedding in May. Not wanting to scramble around at the last minute trying to get into divinity school, I applied (just minutes ago..) for ordination by the Universal Life Church, Modestor, CA. You can, too!

I can't wait. I'm still not convinced the District of Columbia will let me say "I pronounce you..." but I promise to try as least as hard as Rowan Atkinson in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

2007-02-17T08:38:00.000-08:00

Today I called Fido, my cell service provider, to complain about the Bible spam that is piling up in my phone. In fact, I called yesterday, but hung up in anger after the unhelpful customer support person said there was nothing she could do.

Today, the guy at the other end said essentially the same thing -- there was nothing he could do except to block all SMS messages on my account. Not a very helpful solution because, after all, I am paying for that service.

When I insisted that there must be a way for Fido to block these messages, he suggested calling back on Monday and speaking to someone in their network support group. And so I will do that.

While I was talking to the Fido guy, I snooped through the myriad menu options in my cell phone (a Motorola Razr) and discovered a message filter feature. This appeared to offer the ability to block messages from a given number! All I had to do was enter the number I wanted to block.

So I started typing in "247478", the number from which all the Bible messages are sent. Now, my phone (like most) uses semi-intelligent software to try to guess what I mean when I type in a number on the keypad. Do I mean A, B, C or the number 2? The more numbers you type, the more narrow the choice of words becomes.

And so I blindly typed in 247478. The only word that emerged was:

CHRIST

I just about fell off my chair.

Late breaking news: I tried resending an unsubscribe message, "lifestop", to 247478, just as the first devotional message had instructed. This time, instead of stopping my life or signing me up for more spam, the Big Guy responded with a message saying I would not receive any more devotional messages!

Maybe my problem is solved, but I'll believe it when I don't see it.

2007-02-15T03:47:00.000-08:00

On Monday it was cryptic messages on the TV, now I have started receiving Bible verses on my cell phone.

Yesterday I received a message from Matthew; today it was Ecclesiastes.

These "daily devotions" are being spammed into my phone by some jerkoff company whom I suspect to be http://www.mfaith.com.

A warning to whoever signed me up for this thing: if I meet you in a dark alley you'd better have a big f**in Bible to protect you...

2007-02-13T06:45:00.000-08:00

A strange kind of captation last night: My television sent me a cryptic message!

Around 6:15 p.m. last evening, my kids were watching "The Simpsons" on cable TV, channel 34 on the Videotron service. Suddenly, a message in white letters appeared on the bottom on the screen that said (in French), "Do not watch "Enjeux"' this week." ("Ne regardez pas "Enjeux" cette semaine.") The message stayed on screen for about two seconds, then disappeared.

At first I couldn't believe it. The lettering did not look like that of The Simpsons. The only explanation I can think of is that a Videotron employee somehow injected the text into the signal stream.

Now, "Enjeux" is a weekly news magazine on Radio-Canada, the French network. It also happens to be where my kids' mother works. Weird.

What's next? Black helicopters?

2007-02-12T04:46:00.000-08:00

Earthwaves finally got their first public appearance Thursday night at the Chambre Blanche gallery in Quebec City. Maxime and I performed his 40-minute composition, with me on lights, to about 20 people who braved the cold. The show went very well, as far as we could tell, although we were a little disappointed by the low attendance.

Maxime composed his piece specifically to accompany a painting that he chose from the catalog of the Musée des Beaux Arts du Québec. The painting, by artist Pierre Bruneau, comprises 10 portraits, each painted with phosphorescent oil paint, on its own canvas. The work is part of a collection of paintings that the museum typically lends to businesses or other institutions to hang on their walls for several months. Funny thing is, no one wanted to borrow this particular painting because...the phosphorescent paint is only visible in the dark!

I can imagine a company telling its employees, "Ok, folks, it's time for the daily appreciation of our wall art. The lights will be off for two minutes."

The time phosphorescent paint remains visible depends on how long and with what intensity it is first charged with light. We decided to incorporate that property into our show. I wanted the painting to appear progressively as each different movement of Maxime's piece was performed by the "automates". We therefore asked the gallery to cover the painting all day Thursday as we were setting up.

People starting drifting in about 8 p.m. I paced around the gallery nervously, trying to memorize my notes for the lighting choreography. Maxime stayed upstairs drinking beer. We finally dimmed the lights and got started around 8:45.

Maxime's piece ran about 40 minutes. It started in the dark with buzzing sounds emanating from the bass drum. The glow-in-the-dark tips of the four drum mallets began to rotate, then slowly pound out a rhythm. I began to light the painting using a handheld halogen light equipped with a dimmer. The music evolved into a duet of bouzouki and tabla (small drum), with Maxime playing trumpet. I used the lamp to light up three of the 10 portraits, dimming the light regularly so the audience to see the phosphorescent glow. The music continued with sound effects, voices and a kudu horn solo by Maxime. About halfway into the show, the bouzouki began playing a gentle solo made up of recorded Earthwaves. Who would ever have gussed that Montreal's industrial background noise could sound so good?

With nearly all the painting now illuminated and glowing, the music suddenly switched over to the recorded voice of Serge Gainsbourg reading a Beat-like poem called "Pas Long Feu". The final portrait to be illuminated was that of Serge Gainsbourg, an image copied from the 1980s (?) album containing the Pas Long Feu song. The bass drum beat out a final two minutes of fairly complex rhythms, accompanied by the bouzouki and tabla. Then it was lights up and the Pas Long Feu reggae song kicked in, played through the same woofers that drive the automates.

Polite applause, a few bows. Thankfully, Maxime's family was there to cheer us on.

It took us most of the day Thursday to set up. One of the problems with moving the "automates" is their sensitivity to setup. They have to be retuned every time a screw is turned. Maxime spent at least an hour tuning the bouzouki.

Closer to show time, a friend of Maxime's arrived (with several other crew members) to set up video cameras to film the performance. We still haven't seen the raw footage but it is apparently quite good. We have been promised a full-length video later this year...

Very Badly Painted Serge Gainsbourg

2007-02-04T11:04:00.001-08:00

Very Badly Painted Serge Gainsbourg
Originally uploaded by TuringTest37.

We won't have access to the actual painting (by Pierre Bruneau) until Thursday, so in the meantime Maxime and I are practicing the visual portion of the Chambre Blanche show using this hastily sketched outline of Gainsbourg. For the show the painting will initially be invisible (in the dark), then progressively illuminated by small, handheld lamps. That's my job. By the end it should glow in the dark on its own.

2007-02-02T10:01:00.000-08:00

Maxime and I are preparing for next week's performance at the Chambre Blanche in Quebec City. It will feature three instruments: a bass drum, a tabla, and a bouzouki, all played using Max's Ki system. The performace will include recordings of music, voice, sound effects and....Earthwaves!

Maxime has decided (generously) to include a segment of waves I recorded this week. The original plan was to play to back on a drum, but the 7-10 Hz frequencies in the earthwaves is too high to drive a drum using the current setup.

Instead Maxime and I hooked the output of the wave recording to a bouzouki. Here is what it sounds like (a Net premiere!):

To catch the whole performace, rendez-vous Thursday night, Feb. 8, at the Chambre Blanche.

Back in the mad scientist's lab, I have been capturing a lot of late-night ELF spectra with my antenna and amplifier setup. Last night, in particular, yielded a wealth of strange and unexplained phenomena. First, I am intrigued by the return of the 1-2 Hz bursts (that I described in an an earlier post). These strong signals always appear in the middle of the night, when they appear, and are always accompanied by other moving frequency lines.

But the most perplexing event of last night occurred just before 4 a.m. when, suddenly, most of the background noise that usually fills the airwaves suddenly disappeared. In its place were just a few strong signals (namely my 60 Hz power main) and some other light, wispy stuff (Schumann ??) around 8-10 Hz.

The cease-fire lasted only a few minutes, as you can see here, then it was back to the incredibly noisy radiation spewed out by Montreal's industry.

To try to track why the noise suddenly disappeared at 4, I called Hydro-Quebec (our electric power utility). They confirmed that power did NOT go off at my house last night (you can still see a line at 60 Hz, even during the ceasefire), but the lady in the call center could not tell me whether any of the factories (e.g. bakery, industrial laundry) around my house lost power.

If anything, this confirms that most of the noise that I am capturing comes from OUT THERE, and not from my washer/dryer or electric furnace.

Now that I know I am capturing it, I need to find out what it is...

2007-01-24T05:02:00.000-08:00

The other night Maxime, Jack and I feted Max's friend Mark who was turning...uh...40ish. Among other things, Mark does some amazing graphics that can be seen here. He also turned me on to a bit of musical history that must have slipped by, way back when: the NY band Suicide. Thanks Mark, and happy birthday, dude!

In other captations, Max is preparing for a concert to be given Feb. 8 at the gallery La Chambre Blanche in Quebec City. The music will be based around a single bass drum with multiple mallets, inspired by a painting by artist Pierre Bruneau. Dig this: the painting is phosphorescent. Look for some surprising visual effects at the show...

And finally, on a sadnote, it would seem that Montreal's best Indian restaurant, the Golden House of Curry on Saint-Laurent, will no longer be serving Double Diamond, the best beer for Indian food. My friend Tracy and I discovered this the other night when we ordered two DDs and the waiter came back with only one. "This is the end of the keg," he said, "and we won't be getting any more." Not only has Sleeman stopped importing Double Diamond (from England), it would appear that DD is no longer being brewed! Details and pictures of our last pint of Double Diamond can be found on Tracy's blog. Salut, salut....

2007-01-16T15:03:00.000-08:00

A couple different captations tonight. First, a nice screenshot of some funky signals that I captured last night with a new and improved version of my antenna and amplifier setup. Turns out I have been using the wrong kind of amplifier chip to go with the circuit. It was creating way too much random electrical noise, squashing all the natural Earth signals that really interest me. I didn't feel like ordering a new chip, so I did some more Googling and found a different circuit that uses mine in a different, better way.

I left the thing running all last night. This morning I used Spectrum Lab to break down the recorded signal into its constituant frequencies. Here's the screenshot: time goes left to right (starting at around 11 p.m.); frequency goes bottom to top. Stronger signals are lighter in color.

Note those strange, upside down "U" signals at the bottom, between 1 and 2 Hz. What are those? They are obviously periodic, but not exactly regular. Are they natural or man-made? They seem to be related to another set of strong signals in the 5-10 Hz range that occur simultaneously. Coincidence? I think not...

On a less frivolous note, I've staying up late to read Les Bienveillantes, the book that won last year's Prix Goncourt, France's highest literary honor. It is one man's story of the Holocaust, told through the eyes of a fictional, mid-rank SS officer.

Written by Jonathan Littel, an American who grew up in Paris, Les Bienveillantes draws the reader gently but firmly into moral quicksand. The book's protagonist doesn't participate himself in the killing. He pushes paper, attends meetings, writes reports. He claims only to be doing his duty. He acknowledges disgust but invokes inevitableness.

Obersturmführer Aue sees gray where anyone else would see black. From the gray he extracts just enough white to convince himself to stay on, write another report: number of victims, killing methods, morale of the soldiers doing the shooting, suggestions for improvement in future Aktions.

Littell has made his wretched character just likable enough to keep the reader from rejecting him outright. Aue admits his own foibles, ingratiates himself, appealing to the reader to just follow him one more tiny step down this way...then suddenly you're at the edge of the abyss, forced to peek through fingers at the horror below, before Littel pulls you back. And Obersturmführer Aue turns away, too, just long enough to gather his thoughts and find another excuse.

I'm not sure when or if Les Bienveillantes will be translated into English (the title means something like "those who keep watch", but if it is, buy it and read it.

2007-01-03T20:01:00.000-08:00

Tonight Maxime and I hooked up his drum prototype to my MacBook and played back an early recording of Earthwaves that I had made a couple of weeks ago. The 7-minute recording had a bunch of low frequencies in it, including ones around the 7.8 Hz Schumann resonance. The MacBook was hooked into Maxime's amplifiers and from there into the woofer he has modified to beat a large bass drum.

The WAV recording did a good job of driving the drum, but it turns out that it was probably the lower 3-4 Hz signals that were responsible for the drumming, not the 8 Hz Schumann resonance that we want.

So...we'll either have to modify the drum mechanism a little to become more sensitive to the 8 Hz signals, or else just cheat and use whatever works.

Hey, whatever works.

2006-12-31T05:04:00.000-08:00

The other day, you may recall, I managed to extract the first ultra-low frequency signals from my antenna and amplifier circuit. I was very happy, danced around the dusty basement, etc, etc...but something (as always) was bothering me. Even though I had recorded traces of signals in the same 7 to 8 Hz range that corresponded to the Schumann Resonances, I had no way of knowing for sure that my setup was truly capable of actually picking up those faint natural signals, the true Earth waves.

The uncertainty arises because of how I designed the filter circuit. I made the filter so selective that it was almost certain to give me back what I wanted, as opposed to what was actually there. I'll try to explain...

Think of radio frequencies as a mixture of sand and rocks. If you want to keep only the sand, you might use a sieve. Electronic filters are like a sieve whose grating size can be adjusted. Crank it up to let through more rocks, down to let through less. Several types of electronic filters exist, but the one I use is called a low-pass filter because it lets only low frequencies pass. In this type of electronic filter, the grating size corresponds to the lowest frequency that can pass unaltered, i.e. the smallest rock size. It is adjusted by choosing resistors and capacitors that have appropriate strengths - values - for this "cutoff" frequency. I use a table in a book and a set of formulae to choose the resistor values. No need for the gory details here.

In my case I designed the filter to cut out all signals with a frequency greater than 8 Hz. I chose that value because scientists have measured the first Schumann resonance at 7.8 Hz and I was only interested in isolating that one frequency. Why only that one ? Because I intend to use it to drive a musical instrument (probably a drum).

Now, the Schumann resonances appear at several frequencies. 7.8 Hz is the lowest of them. Others are at 14, 20, 26, 33, 39 and 45 Hz, but these higher frequencies will be cut out (or severely weakened) by my 8 Hz filter.

So. The question that haunts me is this: when I measure a signal at around 8 Hz, is it a Schumann signal or not? The Schumann resonances are very weak. Experiments by other researchers have shown that it requires the right antenna, the right atmospheric conditions, the right electronics to capture such extremely low frequencies. It is quite possible that I am not seeing Schumann resonances at all, but merely man-made signals (spikes on the power lines, weird electric discharges from my cell phone recharger, etc..) that happen to fall in the 8 Hz range and are being dutifully boosted and isolated by circuitry.

How to know?

To help clear the air, I did two things yesterday. I changed the antenna from a 100-ft length of telephone cable to a 500-ft length. It now wraps five times around my basement. I also slightly modified the filter to accept frequencies up to about 11 Hz.

Today I am going to record several hours worth of signals with the new antenna and filter and analyze them for traces of a spike at 7.8 Hz. To do that plug the output of my filter circuit into the microphone jack on my MacBook and record the input as a WAV file. Then I transfer the (BIG) file over to a PC that runs Spectrum Laboratory, an excellent free tool for analyzing real-time and recorded signals.

Later, I plan to widen even further the range of frequencies that the filter will let pass. That way I can check for presence of some of the higher order Schumann resonances such as 14 or 20 Hz. If I see those, then I know my setup is OK.

Argh, I'm starving. Gotta find food now...

2006-12-26T05:24:00.000-08:00

Earth waves live! It seems almost a miracle to me, but my contraption to capture ultralow frequency radiation seems to work. On Wednesday I added the last two filter stages to the circuit and connected the output to my MacBook's line in (microphone jack). I used AudiocorderOSX to grab the first sound waves (later Audacity). This is what I saw:

I recorded about 5 minutes worth of "audio" and saved the output to a file. From there I opened Audacity, and used the frequency spectrum analysis tool to plot the captured frequencies and their relative strength. I was hoping to see a very strong signal around 7 to 8 Hz, and much lower strength everywhere else. This would indicate that the filter worked properly, as the 60-Hz power "hum" should be the strongest signal (by far) coming directly off the antenna. This is what Audacity showed:

Notice the little spike at 60 Hz to the right, what remains of the power hum after flowing through an 8th-order Chebyshev low-pass filter. The book was right! (uh, that would be The Art of Electronics, not The Book, which is strangely silent on operational amplifiers...)

I was initially afraid (still am, somewhat) that the signals around 3-8 Hz were due primarily to the filter "ringing" in response to noise pulses. Such noise can arise on power lines when electric motors start up, or from poor quality windings in motors. The result is a nearly instantaneously spike in voltage that overwhelms the amplifiers and causes the filter to oscillate - "ring" - for a few seconds. Here is what that looks like from a recording I made with Audacity:

The spikes are pretty obvious. The ringing is visible as the fading sine wave immediately following the spikes.

I'm not sure that anything can be done to prevent the spikes and the ringing. In fact, the antenna is so sensitive that moving it or simply touching it will cause a spike. The ringing fades after a second or two, which shouldn't be a problem considering all the other random events in a Ki Orchestra performance.

So Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all. I'll be back in the New Year to connect the Earth waves to some musical instruments...

2006-12-19T03:28:00.000-08:00

Finally some success to report on in my efforts to capture the Schumann Resonances. I managed to measure, at least qualitatively, that my pre-amplifier and filter circuit is actually pre-amplifying and filtering something. Maybe it's just noise, but that would be OK. You might argue, after all, that the Schumann signals are merely terrestrial wheezing.

To get these first signs of vitality I set up my Mac Book as a signal generator. I thought it would be easy to find a free, GUI-driven utility to generate arbitrary wave forms but...not so! The only things close I could find were Max/MSP and Pd, both amazing but both presenting a steep learning curve. I love the idea of connecting widgets graphically, but when all you want to do is generate four or five frequencies simultaneously it just seemed like too much.

I found my answer in SuperCollider. SC is a fantastically rich programming language and runtime environment that runs on Mac OS and Linux. Using SuperCollider you write code that generates audio signals. The syntax is similar to Smalltalk and Ruby. It took just a few minutes of setting up and poking around through the help files to generate my first simple tones. For example, the code snippet

{ arg f=200;
var x;
x= SinOsc.ar(f);
x *0.1
}.play

will generate a steady sine wave tone at 200Hz whose amplitude is reduced to 10% of its default value. The audio output goes straight to the headphone jack.

I realize that the programming approach isn't for everyone but in my case it made it easy to simulate the power line noise (and harmonics) that I was trying to filter out. I wrote a simple script that generated four tones: 8Hz, 20 Hz, 60 Hz and 180 Hz, and ran the audio output into my filter circuit.

Low and behold, the oscilloscope showed me (almost) exactly what I was looking for: a strong 60 Hz signal with distorting harmonics on input (i.e. what the Mac produced), and a fairly clean signal of 16 Hz on output (my circuit), with very little of the higher frequencies present. Why 16 instead of 8? Good question and I'm still stuck on this one. Either the digital to audio converter on the Mac is being driven to twice what it is supposed to, or I am reading the oscillopscope wrong. In any case I feel like I'm on the right track.

So last night I started soldering. Until now I have worked exclusively on breadboards, which have to be an experimenter's best and worst friend. Best because they let you poke wires anywhere, like a switchboard operator. Worst because wires come loose, the board introduces noise, and ultimately you can't know who to blame for your failed project: the wobbly breadboard or your own genius mind that invented perpetual electron flow. So I say banish the wobbly breadboard.

Next step: finish my Christamas shopping and add the last two Chebyshev filter stages to test for stability.

2006-12-17T06:17:00.000-08:00

Spent most of Saturday playing Santa Clause for a group of about 100 underprivileged kids at the Eglise St-Clément in Montreal's Hochelaga-Maisonneuve neighborhood. The Santa suit was hot and stuffy, and the beard was driving me crazy, but the excited smiles of those little kids meeting Santa made it all worthwhile. Those kids deserve to feel loved and enjoy Christmas just as much as all the rest of us with our Wiis and PS3s.

2006-12-15T16:54:00.000-08:00

I added the second of four low-pass filter blocks to my 8-pole Chebyshev filter last night. It's hard to say whether it is effective. Like the first block I put in last week, this one seems to produce a fuzz of signals, only about 50 mV P-P. I don't have either a signal generator yet or the means to analyze the output, so I' m just eyeballing it. The input comes from the instrumentation amp which I'm pretty sure is working.

Next step: get a signal generator and test each block individually.

On another note I signed up for an account on emusic.com and was delighted to find the Stereolab tune "Super-Electric" off their album of singles available for download (which it is not from iTunes). Regardless of the debate about DRM, it seems clear to me (and everyone I know who legally downloads music) that the price point has to fall below the 99 cents iTunes charges. With the imminent demise of allofmp3.com it seems reasonable that shops like emusic.com should be able to convince more majors to sign on. Some money is always better than no money.

2006-12-14T11:15:00.000-08:00

Maxime is looking for a large marching bass drum to include in his next version of the Orchestra Ki. If you know where we might find one in the Montreal area, please drop in a comment.

2006-12-13T18:48:00.000-08:00

This blog is ostensibly about my attempts to capture ultralow-frequency radiation from the Earth and turn it into sound. Sometimes it may turn into a personal diary. On the physical level I am trying to build an antenna and the requisite electronic doodads; on a personal level I am trying to build new friendships and to get over TR.

Captation in French means to assert control over someone's legal will in order to gain personally from it, but in Quebec it can also mean a sound recording for radio or television. In English it means an attempt to win applause or recognition. I'll take either of these last two.

The first captations are of the Schumann Resonances, 7.8 Hz on average. Lightening strikes around the Earth send gusts of electromagnetic waves into the electrical "cavity" formed by the ionosphere and the ground. The waves vibrate like guitar strings, 7.8 beats per second for the lowest of them. They may be captured by a large loop antenna made of, say, telephone wires.

The radiation idea is mine; the bit about sound comes from Maxime de la Rochefoucauld and his Système Ki. Maxime, who has made an artistic career from his "orchestra" of semi-random musical contraptions, is always adding new instruments and sounds to Ki. After seeing one of his performances in Montreal this past summer I approached him about plugging his Ki system into the Schumann Resonances. As luck would have it he was working on a project to adapt Ki to Native American instruments and thought the Earth resonance idea fit pretty well.

Before talking to Maxime I had discussed this idea with my friend TR when we were dating a few months ago. Now that we're no longer together I should have more time to devote to it (silver lining).

So now I am in way over my head in analog electronics, trying to understand op amps, active filters, Sallen-Key topologies, Q factors, and how to keep poles and zeroes on their respective sides of the imaginary fence. Right now I am trying to build an 8th order Chebyshev filter centered on the 7.8 Hz first Schumann resonance. As of tonight I have breadboarded a pre-amp and the first op-amp of the four I need to build the filter. Oscilloscope readings are dodgy. Too many balls to juggle at once. What am I seeing, measuring? These are the captations...

2006-10-27T05:55:00.000-07:00

I need another place for my brain to go when I am tired of it. I thought here might work. Sometimes information pours too fast and it needs to be caught and held somewhere safe. These are the captations: more proof that man and machines are becoming symbiotic, just as man and dogs became best friends. Soon we will be happier with our machines than alone. The machine will understand "hi buddy!" and "good boy", just like Buddy and Rover do, and it will bring scotch, too. Soon we will no longer memorize telephone numbers (if "telephone" still means something); our shirt buttons will dial for us. Soon, maybe, we will send machines to keep old people company and help them die with dignity, not alone, but with a robot and a scotch. Maybe, too, we will simply cease to think like rational, caring human beings. Our robots will post to the blogs for us. Our imagination and decency will abandon us like beaten dogs.

Maybe they already have.

These are the captations. (I promise the next entry will be funnier.)