Making Ackerley’s Theme

January 22, 2021 by admin Leave a comment

For the audio portion of my final, I decided to come up with my own idea by creating a song myself that went along with my story. As my character Ackerley is a bard and plays the flute I decided to use musescore to create a simple flute tune that goes along with the idea of adventuring.

The way I made this song was by first opening a new score in the musescore software under file>new…

Then I had to select my presets. The first one was to name the piece and put in the name of the composer.

Then I selected choose instrument rather than the clef I wanted so it would auto pick it. I then Picked flute and clicked add to score to choose the instrument.

Then I had to pick my key.

As for the time and tempo I kept the presets but to choose another time these are adjustable.

Then it was time to add in the actual notes. To do this I selected the note length I wanted to play in the top bar and used the letters on the key board to add them into the score.

I did this to write my whole song, then I had to export it. I went to File>Export… then in the export popup selected MP3 audio as my output before doing the final export.

Finally I uploaded it to SoundCloud.

Falling Asleep at an Orchestra Concert

January 16, 2021 by admin Leave a comment

This media assignment has two parts. First, edit a song to sound like it is playing from another room. The audio should sound muffled and the bass should be prominent. Here is an example of this effect and here is a tutorial on how to do this. The second part of this assignment is to write a weirdly specific description of your song. Here is an example of a description.

(Audio Assignment Played from Another Room)

It’s a Tuesday night and you can’t believe you agreed to be here. You are beginning to drift off as the orchestra plays in the other room. You can hear it but it is not as impactful as you wait in the ticket booth for any last minute attendees. Soon it all begins to fade out in the distance.

I inspired this piece from the music which I fall asleep to which is often an instrumental song with the description “Soft strings played from another room with fireplace crackles” or something similar. I tried to create the same effect, minus the extra sounds of fire or rain. I always find the descriptors on these pieces kind of funny as many could just be “Muted strings with rain” if they weren’t trying to sound elaborate.

Tutorial:

To make this I took the instrumental piece in audacity and enhanced the bass while reducing the treble a touch. Effects>bass and treble.

Then I found the low-pass filter and increased the frequency and roll off.

After that I just exported the sound as an MP3.

That’s not a cat

January 16, 2021 by admin Leave a comment

Make Noise!! The title is pretty self explanatory. Take a recognizable song or sound, and then turn it into a completely unrecognizable sound. For example, take a dog barking and make it sound like tv static. This can be accomplished using any DAW (digital audio workspace, for those unaware) or some online audio editor.

(Audio Assignment Make Noise from a Normal Sample)

“What was that? Was that my cat? It didn’t sound like her… Here kitty…” I quietly shake the bag of treats calling to her. I se a shadow, there she is! But why is she changing, getting…taller? “Is my cat… An alien?”

I wanted to pick a pretty distinct sound that everyone could recognize. I chose a meow because it was already higher in pitch. I thought of what it would be like if the cat transformed and was a disguised alien the whole time. While that’s obviously not going to happen, It was a fun idea to think about.

Tutorial:

I took the sample of a cat meowing and brought it into audacity. Then I began to mess with the low-pass filter under the effects tab.

I edited the frequency and dB until I liked the sound. Then I used the whawha effect to get the wobble of the sound.

Then I reduced the bass using the bass and treble feature.

Then I imported in the original sound again and arranged them so they played in order.

Do you hear what I hear?

January 15, 2021 by admin 1 Comment

Auditory Illusions is when you hear the lyrics where there are none because there is only piano. Create your own auditory illusion by downloading a song with heavy vocals and convert it to a MIDI file. Then put the MIDI file into MIDI Trails and adjust some of the settings. Use a screencasting software to record your video and audio. Upload your final product to YouTube. Here is an example.

(Audio Assignment Auditory Illusion)

Throughout my life I have always enjoyed illusions from magic, to optical, to even auditory illusions. Since I have always loved it so much, having a chance to make one myself seemed like a no brainer. I chose Lay All Your Love on Me from Mamma Mia because I listened to the soundtrack for a week straight over Christmas while working overnights. While that may have been a questionable choice, I knew it would be a cool song to use because of how much overlap the voices have with the chorus.

In the end I could make out quite a few of the lyrics, but sometimes I had to decide if I really could hear the illusion or if I just knew the song too well.

Tutorial:

To do this assignment I took my MP3 file of the song and found an online mp3 to MIDI converter. I uploaded the file, then pressed start conversion. I had to wait a few minutes, but then I was able to download it.

After that I was able to open the file in MIDITrail and click play under the playback tab.

Once I knew it worked I screen recorded the video using the xbox game bar screen capture built into my computer. Then I uploaded it to youtube!

A Fantasy Tale

January 15, 2021 by admin Leave a comment

Tell ds106 a fantastic tale! Add sound effects, epic music, and colorful and creative descriptions to bring your story to life. It should roughly be a 2-5 minute story. Make sure you make it nice and entertaining!

(Audio Assignment Story Time Fun) When making this sound I was inspired by the Dungeons and Dragons podcasts I listen to, as well as my own games. I decided to use a tidbit of a campaign I was writing for my friends and turn it into a real intro. I tried to add music I thought suited the scene, as well as adding in subtle footsteps and background noise in the tavern they were at. My goal was to not cover the story with other sounds but enhance it just enough.

My characters in it are my elf Ackerley, My friends druid human Fey, and another friends halfling character. I am not much of a verbal story teller but I want to work on it to improve my campaigns. I rely heavily on visual story telling and writing so this was a challenge for me.

Tutorial:

To make this track I first recorded my story in audacity using the basic record and stop buttons to separate the sections.