"Our Ambient World" Postmortem
- MikeQuell
- Site Admin
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- Joined: June 6th, 2013, 4:15 pm
- Location: Los Angeles, CA
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"Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Hi everyone!
Hope you're enjoying the "Our Ambient World" library. For a first attempt, I definitely think it exceeded my expectations.
I would like to start a thread to go over anything we thought could have been better or what we would like to see for future projects. I personally would like to find a streamlined way to create a contact list of people that have signed up. It was a pain in the ass to copy and paste everyone's username on the forum and put it into a single private message for communication.
It seems like Google Drive worked fairly well after the initial week of its release. One of the main reasons I ended up using that is there is no daily bandwidth download restrictions and I had 80GB of free storage. Most other starting options on other sites are around 5GB.
Another thing we could probably change is the way files are packaged. Probably make a bulk package of .zip files instead of individual files.
So here's a bullet point list from me to get us started:
- Streamline the signup process
- Package files in bulk .zip files instead of individual .wav files
Also, some of you were probably wondering why I didn't include people's names with the deliveries. This was more out of privacy concerns. That's something that could be changed going forward, it just wasn't something that was made apparent during the sign up phase.
Hope you're enjoying the "Our Ambient World" library. For a first attempt, I definitely think it exceeded my expectations.
I would like to start a thread to go over anything we thought could have been better or what we would like to see for future projects. I personally would like to find a streamlined way to create a contact list of people that have signed up. It was a pain in the ass to copy and paste everyone's username on the forum and put it into a single private message for communication.
It seems like Google Drive worked fairly well after the initial week of its release. One of the main reasons I ended up using that is there is no daily bandwidth download restrictions and I had 80GB of free storage. Most other starting options on other sites are around 5GB.
Another thing we could probably change is the way files are packaged. Probably make a bulk package of .zip files instead of individual files.
So here's a bullet point list from me to get us started:
- Streamline the signup process
- Package files in bulk .zip files instead of individual .wav files
Also, some of you were probably wondering why I didn't include people's names with the deliveries. This was more out of privacy concerns. That's something that could be changed going forward, it just wasn't something that was made apparent during the sign up phase.
Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
A couple of thoughts...just like you created the 'contributor' thread you could create another password protected thread...the 'submitter's thread and add people only as they've completed their submission. That might reduce part of the work and take away the need to contact each individually?
As far as packaging, I'd recommend you use an application that can create a set of zip or rar files from a folder in user definable file sizes. IE take this 35gb folder containing 250 files and create 70 500mb rar (or zip) files. This is a format which has been used for years on the internet. It becomes easy to know if your downloads are finished (all the files are the same size) and the checksum which is usually built in confirms whether there is file corruption. It's much easier to check for file corruption since it's built in, rather than have to play all 250 files to confirm they are all good.
Regarding details for the files, I'd suggest having the submitters also submit a text file which includes the data they'd like to share. This file would likely contain the following recording details:
Location
Date
Content
microphones used
recordist & email address (optional...allows the submitter to control their own privacy)
I also like the idea of a location photo if available.
Thanks again Mike for organizing this, this set contains some awesome material.
As far as packaging, I'd recommend you use an application that can create a set of zip or rar files from a folder in user definable file sizes. IE take this 35gb folder containing 250 files and create 70 500mb rar (or zip) files. This is a format which has been used for years on the internet. It becomes easy to know if your downloads are finished (all the files are the same size) and the checksum which is usually built in confirms whether there is file corruption. It's much easier to check for file corruption since it's built in, rather than have to play all 250 files to confirm they are all good.
Regarding details for the files, I'd suggest having the submitters also submit a text file which includes the data they'd like to share. This file would likely contain the following recording details:
Location
Date
Content
microphones used
recordist & email address (optional...allows the submitter to control their own privacy)
I also like the idea of a location photo if available.
Thanks again Mike for organizing this, this set contains some awesome material.
- joe_griffin
- Audio Specialist
- Posts: 78
- Joined: June 7th, 2013, 4:23 pm
- Location: Chicago
- Occupation: Recording engineer
- Location: Chicago
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Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
I thought all the information that would be in that text file you mention was supposed to be embedded as metadata in the sound files. It was, in a lot of cases.
Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
I didn't know things like mics used etc would be included in the metadata. I had trouble figuring out how to add the metadata, normally i add descriptions into the name of my file and do title searches. I don't use Soundminer i generally use Snapper. So in the case of my submitted files that detail is not includedjoe_griffin wrote:I thought all the information that would be in that text file you mention was supposed to be embedded as metadata in the sound files. It was, in a lot of cases.
- joe_griffin
- Audio Specialist
- Posts: 78
- Joined: June 7th, 2013, 4:23 pm
- Location: Chicago
- Occupation: Recording engineer
- Location: Chicago
- Contact:
Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Makes sense. I know the metadata isn't consistent across all the entries. Some have more info than others.
- MikeQuell
- Site Admin
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- Joined: June 6th, 2013, 4:15 pm
- Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Here was a wiki page I was referencing for some of the file sharing providers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... g_services
- GrahamDonnelly
- Critical Listener
- Posts: 21
- Joined: June 11th, 2013, 11:16 am
- Location: Bournemouth/London
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Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Hi Mike,
I did not receive an email about the library being up - and I got caught up with life etc. Was wondering if you could PM or email me the password to gain access to the library? I am really looking forward to hearing this library.
Cheers
Graham
I did not receive an email about the library being up - and I got caught up with life etc. Was wondering if you could PM or email me the password to gain access to the library? I am really looking forward to hearing this library.
Cheers
Graham
- MikeQuell
- Site Admin
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- Joined: June 6th, 2013, 4:15 pm
- Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Sorry about that, Graham. Google Drive should have sent you an email just now. Let me know if you didn't get it.GrahamDonnelly wrote:Hi Mike,
I did not receive an email about the library being up - and I got caught up with life etc. Was wondering if you could PM or email me the password to gain access to the library? I am really looking forward to hearing this library.
- Nick Output
- Critical Listener
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- Joined: January 30th, 2014, 4:03 am
- Location: London
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Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
Hi Mike,
I was late finding out about this project, only joining the forum recently. Therefore missed my chance to be involved. I would like to be involved in the future as I'm sure others would. How can i go about this?
PM me or leave a response. Looking forward to hearing about the next project.
PS - Google drive is awesome… but also painfully slow. Box and dropbox are of a similar speed but lack the storage space. I think you made the right choice there.
I was late finding out about this project, only joining the forum recently. Therefore missed my chance to be involved. I would like to be involved in the future as I'm sure others would. How can i go about this?
PM me or leave a response. Looking forward to hearing about the next project.
PS - Google drive is awesome… but also painfully slow. Box and dropbox are of a similar speed but lack the storage space. I think you made the right choice there.
- MikeQuell
- Site Admin
- Posts: 412
- Joined: June 6th, 2013, 4:15 pm
- Location: Los Angeles, CA
- Occupation: Sound Designer
- Contact:
Re: "Our Ambient World" Postmortem
You could start your own here or wait for us to begin another. I usually broadcast it pretty far and wide. Designing Sound was pretty nice at helping to spread the word when we did the first one so I'm sure you'll hear about it one way or another. Sorry you missed it!Nick Output wrote:I was late finding out about this project, only joining the forum recently. Therefore missed my chance to be involved. I would like to be involved in the future as I'm sure others would. How can i go about this?