Freesound Forums
Dare 26 - unusual sound creation techniques
Started March 8th, 2014 · 135 replies · Latest reply by minagarmehei 9 years, 7 months ago
@AlienXXX Samplitude 15, had it for years and still feel like I've only scratched the surface! lately have been digging deeper, and utilising other freeware getting out of the comfort zone, it's great! I try and do a tutorial on something every weekend. mapping to keys sounds great, more like 'playing live'
@copycat, yes I love audacity now, I was using a free full video converter to convert audio files!
@headphaze maybe crazy but it sounds cool !
Another good resource for plugin hunters is http://www.kvraudio.com/
It has a great search tool: http://www.kvraudio.com/q.php
And the database includes any kind of audio related software, not just VST/VSTi.
AlienXXX wrote:Do you mean like converting a skiline into a waveform and then playing it (looping)?
Please note that static waveforms loop-played always produce a static tone - at best you can expect an organ-like sound.
You need to get that waveform evolving over time for an intersting sound (use filters with envelopes, or LFOs. Use chorus / flanger / phaser ...)Programs like Mathematica and Mathcad have the functionality to do that - convert any list of values to a wav.
Yes a city sky-line would be ideal, but I mean taking any continuous geometrical shape and calculating the values on a predefined scale according to an SPL meter. Say I was gazing in a park, I could plot the values of the landscape into my scale and then modify the values slightly to get a good end result.
To get something interesting out of it, I will need to create an algorithm that changes the sequence of values slightly to make a waveform that isn't just white noise. Also, the resolution of the values will have an effect, so a lower incrementation would produce a less noisy sound probably.
Thanks for your recommendations, i knew about mathematica, but not Mathcad so I will be investigating the functionality of this. maybe It will give more control over the end result.
I wouldn't want to add extreme effects like flanging or phasing, that would change the timbre too drastically. Subtle filtering is a good idea though. That will have to be done carefully, because I would like to get something that sounds natural at the end of it.
Cheers dude! 
I am the thing that goes bump in the night...
Freesound Housekeeper
Somewhat related: I saw on facebook today a link to blog featuring this video (amidst diversionary advertisements), so I'll just jump straight to the vimeo link here. Seems not all that interesting, to be honest, but the details of how it is done may or may not prove interesting. I just don't know where to find that information.
YEARS
from Bartholomäus Traubeck (two years ago)
zimbot wrote:
Somewhat related: I saw on facebook today a link to blog featuring this video (amidst diversionary advertisements), so I'll just jump straight to the vimeo link here. Seems not all that interesting, to be honest, but the details of how it is done may or may not prove interesting. I just don't know where to find that information.
Just looked at the video. It wwould seem to be that a strong light and phtosensor (or, more likely, a camera) are used to pickup colour variations in the wood. Some piece of softare then converts those colour variations to midi notes and sends them to an instrument (hardware or virtual)
I would say that, as the disk spins and the camera takes individual snapshots, the position determines the note and the darkness the intensity (velocity) of the note.
On the next frame, if the same position still shows a dark area, the note is sustained, if it is light the note is stopped.
A little track I made, inspired by this Dare!
http://soundcloud.com/luckylittleraven/ghost-ship-in-the-machine
It features these sounds
http://www.freesound.org/people/kb7clx/sounds/231861/
http://www.freesound.org/people/copyc4t/sounds/231320/
http://freesound.org/people/Trebblofang/sounds/234312/
Thank you so much everybody for the discussion, sharing of sounds and inspiration 
luckylittleraven wrote:
A little track I made, inspired by this Dare!
It's awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Honoured that one of my sounds was useful
I wanted to tell you guys about a new pack, and this seemed to be a good place to do it. In memory of this old dare, I finally got around to recording a bunch of stuff with my light probe.
Ever wonder what light sounds like? Ever wanted to demodulate light as if it was a radio signal? Well I can do that, sort of, if you don't mind the modulation riding on a tone, this is all FM, not AM. The most shocking discoveries I've made are the complex modulation patterns of an LED run on AC power. No wonder some people say they can cause headaches.
The Colorino Talking Color Identifier and Light Probe produces a tone when you hold down the light probe button. It's a pocket sized 2-in-1 unit, which is a Color Identifier/Light Detector for the blind and colorblind. The stronger the light source, the higher the pitch. The more light it receives, the higher the pitch. So you can vary the pitch by moving and turning it. But the light source can also carry modulation that varies the pitch, or something like a fan blade or a shifting column of water between the detector and the light can give the incoming light some modulation.
Most files were recorded from line-in on my desktop using Goldwave. Low-pass filter was applied to lock out the 16khz sampling frequency. Here's the pack: Colorino Talking Color Identifier and Light Probe by kb7clx
http://freesound.org/people/kb7clx/packs/19455/
@kb7clx
There are some fantastic sounds on that pack.
Not only they are interesting due to the concept, some of them will actually be very useable.
I suspect most of the white LED lights available today have the LEDS quickly cycling through red-green-blue colours, which our brain then perceives as whitet light.
I can see flickering on fluorescent lamps sometimes. These are full of ionized gas and flicker with the change of direction of the mains power (50 times a second in Europe, 60 times a second in USA).
I wonder if the probe can also pickup a slight modulation from those.
We don't have one of those lights, but I suspect the modulation would be even stronger than what you hear on the incandescent bulbs. Interesting about the LED's, their full cycle can be measured in rather large fractions of a second.
AlienXXX wrote:
@kb7clxThere are some fantastic sounds on that pack.
Not only they are interesting due to the concept, some of them will actually be very useable.I suspect most of the white LED lights available today have the LEDS quickly cycling through red-green-blue colours, which our brain then perceives as whitet light.
I can see flickering on fluorescent lamps sometimes. These are full of ionized gas and flicker with the change of direction of the mains power (50 times a second in Europe, 60 times a second in USA).
I wonder if the probe can also pickup a slight modulation from those.
Related to LED's modulation, you might find imaging of the modulations interesting... here is site about such things (a friend of mine wrote this book and set up the web site to go with it):
http://timevaryinglights.com/
Ah cool. I tweeted him a link to my pack, sounds like he'd find it interesting. I see he has some tracks on Soundcloud as well.
zimbot wrote:
Related to LED's modulation, you might find imaging of the modulations interesting... here is site about such things (a friend of mine wrote this book and set up the web site to go with it):
http://timevaryinglights.com/