Surround sound is often mistaken as a relatively new phenomenon in cinemas, one that emerged in the 1970s with the arrival of Dolby. Making Stereo Fit reveals that, in fact, filmmakers have been creating stereo and surround-sound effects for nearly a century, since the advent of talking pictures, and argues that their endurance owes primarily to the longstanding battles between stereo and mono technologies. Throughout the book, Eric Dienstfrey analyzes newly discovered archival materials and myriad stereo releases, from Hell’s Angels (1930) to Get Out (2017), to show how Hollywood’s financial dependence on mono prevented filmmakers from seeing surround sound’s full aesthetic potential. Though studios initially explored stereo’s unique capabilities, Dienstfrey details how filmmakers eventually codified a conservative set of surround-sound techniques that prevail today, despite the arrival of more immersive formats.
"The introduction lays out the basic theoretical framework for acoustic profiling, a method for listening to films by way of acoustic ecology (and vice-versa). This method is based on a double critical movement. On the one hand, a sound ecology of the cinema entails the application of acoustic ecology's prescribed listening practices to film sound studies. On the other hand, a new way of thinking about acoustic ecology is born of film studies, a way to consider acoustic ecology's practice through film studies' long history of dealing with problems of fidelity and realism through recording technologies. This intersection of fields offers a necessary critical discourse for handling the challenges inherent in navigating acoustic ecology's media practices. The four dimensions of acoustic ecology are described as documentation, analysis, prescription, and composition, and it is explained how these dimensions can intersect with a variety of standard concepts in film sound theory. In turn, this introduction explains how the set of films to be analyzed across the book will demonstrate, enact, and challenge these dimensions through their mediality, defined here as a mode of reflexivity that emphasizes the role of media technologies in engaging with, rather than acting as barrier to, real-world space. The films expose the myth of vanishing mediation and invite audiences to reflect upon their approaches to the audiovisual construction of space so that we may carry this reflection out to the world beyond the frame of the screen and its surrounding walls. The intersection of acoustic ecology and film sound studies can make films work as both extensions of acoustic ecology and means for critically re-thinking the field"--
HackSpace magazine is filled with the best projects, tutorials, and articles for makers and hackers. Each year, that amounts to over 1500 pages! The Book of Making, Volume 2 distills the second year of HackSpace magazine down to our favourite maker projects. We don't discriminate between different styles of making: in this book we look at how to make vinegar, how we built our first rocket, a clock we made, and when we learned to weld. Step into the wonderful world of making with this book from the Makers of HackSpace magazine. Be inspired by the amazing community projects you'll find in these pages and make your own creations with step-by-step guides. This book is full of the perfect projects for an hour, afternoon, or weekend. Here's a small sampling of what you'll find in this book. You'll learn how to: Take to the skies with your own rocket. Create music on a homemade synthesizer. Make electronic circuits with Play-Doh. Play video games with a customised controller. Hackspaces and makerspaces have exploded in popularity the world over, as more and more people want to make things and learn. Written by makers for makers, this book features a diverse range of projects to build. Grab some duct tape, fire up a microcontroller, ready a 3D printer, and hack the world around you!
Making Music With Samples is packed with creative, hands-on tips - aimed at getting the reader actively enjoying the art of sampling as quickly and easily as possible - interspersed with snippets of essential theoretical stuff: whether it's the science of sound, or copyright legalities. Starting with the absolute basics of what sampling is, author Dan Duffell progresses from simpler, widely-used tools like small loop-based samplers, through the various platforms available to the sample user - the different methods and equipment required to create and manipulate samples, including: hardware samplers, sampling/keyboard workstations, computer setups, software samplers, drum samplers, etc. He then describes the setting up procedures needed to get you started - connections and installation, signal levels and so on - at the same time providing some relevant background information on how a sampler actually works. Next: choosing source material - whether created you, or from sample CDs like the one attached, or from other people's recordings - which inevitably also raises the thorny subject of copyright and licensing: sampling and the law.Then there's a section depicting the basic layout and operation of some well-known software and hardware samplers, and a look at Sampling & Synthesis and Modular Systems...
Theorists of the soundtrack have helped us understand how the voice and music in the cinema impact a spectator's experience. James Buhler and Hannah Lewis edit in-depth essays from many of film music's most influential scholars in order to explore fascinating issues around vococentrism, the voice in cinema, and music’s role in the integrated soundtrack. The collection is divided into four sections. The first explores historical approaches to technology in the silent film, French cinema during the transition era, the films of the so-called New Hollywood, and the post-production sound business. The second investigates the practice of the singing voice in diverse repertories such as Bergman's films, Eighties teen films, and girls' voices in Brave and Frozen. The third considers the auteuristic voice of the soundtrack in works by Kurosawa, Weir, and others. A last section on narrative and vococentrism moves from The Martian and horror film to the importance of background music and the state of the soundtrack at the end of vococentrism. Contributors: Julie Brown, James Buhler, Marcia Citron, Eric Dienstfrey, Erik Heine, Julie Hubbert, Hannah Lewis, Brooke McCorkle, Cari McDonnell, David Neumeyer, Nathan Platte, Katie Quanz, Jeff Smith, Janet Staiger, and Robynn Stilwell
DO-IT-YOURSELF Here's the fun and easy way to start building circuits for your projects Have you ever wanted to build your own electronic device? Put together a thermostat or an in-line fuse, or repair a microphone cable? This is the book for you! Inside you'll find the tools and techniques you need to build circuits, with illustrated, step-by-step directions to help accomplish tasks and complete projects. As you accomplish the tasks throughout the book, you'll construct many projects while learning the key circuitbuilding principles and techniques. Find out about measuring and testing, maintenance and troubleshooting, cables, connectors, how to test your stuff, and more. Stuff You Need to Know * The tools you need and how to use them * How to make sense of schematics and printed circuit boards * Basic techniques for creating any circuit * How to make and repair cables and connectors * Testing and maintenance procedures
How is it that Americans are more obsessed with exercise than ever, and yet also unhealthier? Fit Nation explains how we got here and imagines how we might create a more inclusive, stronger future. If a shared American creed still exists, it’s a belief that exercise is integral to a life well lived. A century ago, working out was the activity of a strange subculture, but today, it’s almost impossible to avoid exhortations to exercise: Walk 5K to cure cancer! Awaken your inner sex kitten at pole-dancing class! Sweat like (or even with) a celebrity in spin class! Exercise is everywhere. Yet the United States is hardly a “fit nation.” Only 20 percent of Americans work out consistently, over half of gym members don’t even use the facilities they pay for, and fewer than 30 percent of high school students get an hour of exercise a day. So how did fitness become both inescapable and inaccessible? Spanning more than a century of American history, Fit Nation answers these questions and more through original interviews, archival research, and a rich cultural narrative. As a leading political and intellectual historian and a certified fitness instructor, Natalia Mehlman Petrzela is uniquely qualified to confront the complex and far-reaching implications of how our contemporary exercise culture took shape. She explores the work of working out not just as consumers have experienced it, but as it was created by performers, physical educators, trainers, instructors, and many others. For Petrzela, fitness is a social justice issue. She argues that the fight for a more equitable exercise culture will be won only by revolutionizing fitness culture at its core, making it truly inclusive for all bodies in a way it has never been. Examining venues from the stage of the World’s Fair and Muscle Beach to fat farms, feminist health clinics, radical and evangelical college campuses, yoga retreats, gleaming health clubs, school gymnasiums, and many more, Fit Nation is a revealing history that shows fitness to be not just a matter of physical health but of what it means to be an American.
The first comprehensive treatment of stereotypes and stereotyping, this text synthesizes a vast body of social and cognitive research that has emerged over the past-quarter century. Provided is an unusually broad analysis of stereotypes as products both of individual cognitive activities and of social and cultural forces. While devoting careful attention to harmful aspects of stereotypes, their connections to prejudice and discrimination, and effective strategies for countering them, the volume also examines the positive functions of generalizations in helping people navigate a complex world. Unique features include four chapters addressing the content of stereotypes, which consider such topics as why certain traits are the focus of stereotyping and how they become attributed to particular groups. An outstanding text for advanced undergraduate- and graduate-level courses, the volume is highly readable and features many useful examples.
An in-depth look at how employers today perceive and evaluate job applicants with nonstandard or precarious employment histories Millions of workers today labor in nontraditional situations involving part-time work, temporary agency employment, and skills underutilization or face the precariousness of long-term unemployment. To date, research has largely focused on how these experiences shape workers’ well-being, rather than how hiring agents perceive and treat job applicants who have moved through these positions. Shifting the focus from workers to hiring agents, Making the Cut explores how key gatekeepers—HR managers, recruiters, and talent acquisition specialists—evaluate workers with nonstandard, mismatched, or precarious employment experience. Factoring in the social groups to which workers belong—such as their race and gender—David Pedulla shows how workers get jobs, how the hiring process unfolds, who makes the cut, and who does not. Drawing on a field experiment examining hiring decisions in four occupational groups and in-depth interviews with hiring agents in the United States, Pedulla documents and unpacks three important discoveries. Hiring professionals extract distinct meanings from different types of employment experiences; the effects of nonstandard, mismatched, and precarious employment histories for workers’ job outcomes are not all the same; and the race and gender of workers intersect with their employment histories to shape which workers get called back for jobs. Indeed, hiring professionals use group-based stereotypes to weave divergent narratives or “stratified stories” about workers with similar employment experiences. The result is a complex set of inequalities in the labor market. Looking at bias and discrimination, social exclusion in the workplace, and the changing nature of work, Making the Cut probes the hiring process and offers a clearer picture of the underpinnings of getting a job in the new economy.
