Hi list!
This is to tell you about some experiences I made while asking for
permissions to record in different places.
Let me start with the most ambicious one.
I wanted to record an organ concert in the famous Cologne Cathedral. So
I asked for permission at the department of the Cologne Cathedral's
management.
First they were quite interested, but then they suddenly changed their mind.
They were wondering about, if the organ player might agree in a
recording at all; then they wondered about security and the dignity of
the "high house" (high not in the sense of altitude) and finally they
said, NO! We don't like the Cologne Cathedral to appear as an
advertisment. Well, that was not the intention, but just putting some
snipets on a publicly accessable web-site ... it's their oppinion and
they make the rules.
Then I asked an open-air-museum here in Germany for the permission to
record some of their attractions to present them also on their
Internet-site as a sample. If you see something it makes you curious,
but if you hear and feel the sound, you are persuaded. They are very
keen to learn more about it and we are talking about more and more details.
My current project is to record "The sounds of Golden Gate Bridge"
(GGB). I already was granted a general permission to record on the
publicly accessable sidewalks. (YES!)
From my personal experience I can tell, you have to ask for permission
upfront. About 35 years back I was standing in the middle of GGB to take
a picture of Alcatraz and San Francisco's skyline, as a police car
stopped behind me. The officers asked me very friendly if I am fine and
feeling good and what I am doing there. I told them, I am taking THE
picture of SF I dreamed of for many, many years and I am about to take
it, if they won't mind. They were not really convinced and waited until
I was done and was walking back to the SF side. Later I found out, that
about the very same place someone committed suicide a week ago.
So here is my friendly advice, fill out the form of the GGD authority.
It just take two minutes and tell them exactly what you plan to do and
respect that a rule is a rule is a rule.
The only restrictions are not to use any tripod stand and DO NOT mount
anything to the railings of GGB.
Well, that's easy to do. I will just use a small boom and put it onto my
foot.
As mounting in their understanding includes not bringing the soft rubber
side of a contact microphone in contact with the railings, this track
will stay empty.
A rule is a rule is a rule.
The biggest disaster until now, was asking for permission to record
inside of a central-train-station in Germany. My most favourite train
station is the central station in Munich, just because of some private
reasons.
Their more than specious reason was: My Ambisonic microphone system
would endanger travelers. - This is just a bad joke.
I have a quite visible scar on the right side of my forehead from a pair
of skis that a person maneuvered back and forth so clumsily while
boarding a train that this person violently smashed those skis into my
forehead. It bled very badly and the emergency doctor had me taken
directly to a hospital.
And that both skis and snowboards lie unsecured in the aisle of a
high-capacity wagon of a high-speed train is also not a safety risk, you
know?!
As long as the train does not have to brake from 250 km/h (~ 150 mph)
to 0 km/h in an emergency. If these sports devices fly through the wagon
following the inertia of the mass, there will be at least seriously
injured people.
But a tight and secure held ambisonic microphone system on a boom is a
security risk. Got it? - Me not!
But if it were easy, anyone could do it.
The promissed transforming of the recordings of the IBM quantum computer
are making progress, but I have to work long hours currently. A
colleague of mine has got seriously ill and I try my very best to
subsitute him; but it is not easy. So, please have some more pation and
bear with me. I'll will publish the results as soon as I am done. Let me
just spoil something: It sounds awesome!
That's it for today. Have a good day, night or morning, where ever you
are on this planet.
Take care and stay healthy
Cheers
Thorsten
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