Its been another busy week at the Pervasive Media Studio, we've been working on several different aspects of the project. The most exciting, visible and audible part has been the first prototype 'tapping machine'.

Its not just a machine that taps though, it is controlled by GPS data coming from a mobile phone.

I went out to test the mobile phone app, by walking, running and stopping around the harbourside area near the watershed. In the studio (which is quite quiet at the moment) the tapping machine responded to my movement, tapping away at a wine glass, a piece of metal and a cardboard box. 

Seeing this video I imagine not wine glasses but a room full of maybe 20 different objects, each connected to a different person or vehicle moving about the city. Some of the objects might be big, a sheet of steel, a park railing or a paving slab. Others would be smaller, a teacup, a box, a treasured souvenir.

One of the difficulties of working with so many different elements; sound, machines, gps and interaction is that although we can hear one machine tapping, or a sound on its own, its impossible to know what it will be like to interact with it by walking until its working technically.  When it is live the experience of the work will be to walk around the city and hear sound as you go, being composed by your proximity to the gallery and the speed of walking, or to be in the gallery hearing the live composition of an orchestra of objects that are related to movement going on in the city.

I've also been out doing field recordings, trying to capture the sounds of different ways of moving through the city; a ferry in the harbour, a car, the motion of walking. These sounds will contribute to what someone walking with the mobile phone app will be able to hear. Some of the ways I'm doing this - like dragging microphones around in metal trays - looks a little bit odd. If you see me come and say hello!