Students' project taps into a river of sound (From Oxford Mail)

Students' project taps into a river of sound

9:40am Saturday 20th October 2012 in News

THE banks of the river around Osney Lock were filled with weird and wonderful oddities this week.

Giant pinhole cameras and machines made from guitars were among the devices, installations and events designed by second and third year architecture students from Oxford Brookes University.

They tested and reviewed their equipment and ideas on the banks of the river on Thursday.

Design tutor Toby Smith said: “This is a group of students called Unit G ‘The Artful Bodgers’ and this was the first stage in a project in the area.

“They were cataloguing and responding to the occupation and activities that take place there. So we had people looking at the movement of the river, the movement of the ducks, sounds under the railway bridge, bird nests and other things.

“The idea is to look at those observations and propose how they could be adjusted, tapping into the productivity of the city.”

Tom Yudin, 20, pictured, used a guitar and steel strings to map the flow of the river.

He said: “I wanted to hear the river so I made this so the water would resonate in the guitar. It was weird to be able to hear it like that.”

Student Oliver Cleveley-Jones added: “My aim was to generate public interest through an experience – in my case climbing inside a pinhole camera – and then to encourage members of the public to partake in collective cataloguing of the site through the placement of miniature pinhole cameras.”