City Frequencies

Here is a test circuit for powering the lcd screen and logic board. The idea with this component as with all the RAEM gear we take onboard elevators is that it all has to be powered only by the batteries we take with us and the performance time is limited to how much power we can take with us and how quickly it gets used. In the 2006 Fringe Festival our total time per battery charge cycle was about 3 hours and for this year we hope to increase that to around 5 hours.

This is the Intel Atom motherboard that will provide one half of the audio generating capabilities of RAEM and be carried aboard elevators in whats being called the Suitcase. Its low powered duo core and has been tested at 12 volts with about 1.5 amp drain. This represents a whole new design for us with the inclusion of the atom board as well as a redesign of the amplifier speaker system so that we can provide a richer sound within elevators. The previous version while being of suitable volume didnt provide the quality of audio that we would prefer. The upgraded gear will be taken on tour so it will need to be mains powered, have a line out for audio into a PA as well as being completely self contained and self powered for playing in elevators or other unusual locations.

Heres a picture of a generic lcd screen purchased via ebay, its a vga 240 volt ac model. Pictured on the left is the step down transformer and inverter board while on the right is the logic board. After some research via google its been determined that this model takes 12 dc as main supply with a 3v on switch. Theres a dimmer circuit that goes from 0 to 5 volts but as we be on battery power the lcd will have to run at lowest setting, ie 0 volts for the dimmer. Presently this lcd is using 2 cold cathode fluorescent lamps to provide back lighting, this may be reduced to one.

So, we’ve been compiling a few statistics on the numbers of people that happened upon the elevators we played in during the Fringe Festival. For one of the better elevators documented (elevator 33) we found that over the 40 minutes playing time we had 96 people crammed into our elevator, not all at once obviously.

Given that we had 16 elevators where we played our full set of 40 minutes and didn’t feel the need to abandon due to low audience numbers, we can use some “interesting” mathematics to reach the conclusion that we played to over 1536 people, not including those that we reached before evictions, etc.

The audience can be be considered a captured one in that the “auditoriums” were only several cubic metres in size and more often than not we had people watching us and not the floor numbers counting up or down as we journeyed. As such we also experienced more interaction with our audience when they inevitably asked us who we are, what are we doing and why are we doing it. Comments about the music styles and the change to the elevator environment our presence made regularly followed that exchange of formal pleasantries.

We also discovered the existence of what we called the “jobsworth”, whom became apparent when an eviction by a security guard or building management representative took place with aforementioned jobsworth, or snitch, grass, snout, dobber, etc, standing next to said guard and pointing to us before skulking away to its lair… I mean office. Others weren’t so keen to point us out and merely rang the building supervisors to inform them of our “intrusion” and that they should do something about it. This we found out by the guard telling us that they had received a phone call and had to do something about it, usually with a “what the…” bemused look on their face. A few guards, however, were a bit more over zealous with their enthusiasm for eviction possibly due to the relative boredom of the average work day and the moral ambiguity that each would struggle with when faced with our performance.

Several of the audience members had heard of us prior to our performances through advertising in print and radio arranged by the Fringe Festival and us. This website also served to allow people to follow our progress across this great city of ours because each step was documented by a photo and a few sentences that were uploaded here “live from the field”, as we say in journalism, using a mobile phone that could send email and a php parser script.

Here is the table of our overall responses from each elevator measured in Full Set, Half Set and Evicted, where Full Set means playing the full 40+ minutes set, Half Set means we abandoned the elevator through low audience numbers (ie few audience for 20 minutes and the elevator going to “park”) and Evicted which means we got asked by someone (in authority or not) to leave, usually after playing for at least ten minutes.

Day || No. || Response
1 || 1 || Evicted
1 || 2 || Full Set
1 || 3 || Full Set
1 || 4 || Evicted
———————
2 || 5 || Full Set
2 || 6 || Full Set
2 || 7 || Full Set
———————
3 || 8 || Half Set
3 || 9 || Half Set
3 || 10 || Full Set
———————
4 || 11 || Evicted
4 || 12 || Full Set
4 || 13 || Evicted
4 || 14 || Evicted
———————
5 || 15 || Evicted
5 || 16 || Full Set
=============
6 || 17 || Full Set
6 || 18 || Full Set
6 || 19 || Full Set
———————
7 || 20 || Evicted
7 || 21 || Evicted
7 || 22 || Evicted
———————
8 || 23 || Half Set
8 || 24 || Full Set
8 || 25 || Evicted
———————
9 || 26 || Evicted
9 || 27 || Evicted
9 || 28 || Evicted
9 || 29 || Full Set
9 || 30 || Full Set
———————-
10 || 31 || Evicted
10 || 32 || Full Set
10 || 33 || Full Set
10 || 34 || Half Set
10 || 35 || Evicted
==============
==============

Totals :
Full Set : 16
Half Set : 4
Evicted : 15

Well it’s the start of the sort through of our experiences during the 10 days of Fringe Festival performances. Below is a list of the recipients of the Elevator of the Day award in date order. You might notice that there isn’t a recipient from the very first day of performance, so we might add one in later.

Day 10 – Elevator 31
Day 9 – Elevator 30
Day 8 – Elevator 24
Day 7 – Elevator 22
Day 6 – Elevator 19
Day 5 – Elevator 15
Day 4 – Elevator 12
Day 3 – Elevator 9
Day 2 – Elevator 5
Day 1 – _ _ _ _ _

Today we are in the studio recording the tracks we played in the elevators to create an album length release. All the tracks are being recorded live to maintain that in-elevator vibe, though we do have a bit more room here.

And i forgot to add the last days winner. A close call but it ended up being elevator 31 in the orica bldg, mainly cos we got to play nearly a full set till the bldg super and the jobsworth (check the evict video) ended it. Good reactions from the punters including a group that were also doing a fringe show in the evenings. There will soon be a decision on the Elevator of the Year! Updates to the video section are trickling in too.

This here is a pic of the tripod and the wee little microphone velcroed to it that was used to get recordings of the elevator interiors as we journeyed up and down, so the sound has lots of low hums and rumbles generated by the machinery. The music we performed is at a low level due to the placement of the mic below the briefcase housing the speakers and because the point of recording was to capture peoples reactions and comments. Currently upped are 5 moments of eviction videos, an entire journey by us (4 parts) in elevator 33 which was busy and had a “fridee arvo” vibe and finally a video from elevator 22 where you can see us in the mirrored doors. For some reason i didnt record the audio in there so i added the music recorded from elevator 17 and broke it up into 3 parts, the last one being more interesting as it has the eviction. Well thats a whole day spent rendering but theres still more to come including a Highlights of Elevator Wit and some reports of our experiences.

The pic is of the Black Box specially constructed to sit inside the briefcase lid. It houses the mixer, speakers and amplifier. After the first week of performances it got upgraded with a webcam (the hole for the lens is visible on the mid left) and an audio bus to record either the music from the mixer or the microphone attached underneath the briefcase. The vids will take some days to edit and sync up but they will eventually end up in the new Video section of the site. The first video upped is from elevator 26 where, if you cast your minds back, the elevator got auto’d to the ground floor by the guard after only several minutes of us setting up. Its largely of the dark, cos it was dark, but the lobbies were bright and the mic picked up all the strange sounds made in that eerie elevator. See if you can spot the snitch. Now, though, tis nearing the time for the Fringe closing party.