If there’s one assignment I’m excited for, it’s this one. I JUST WANNA WORK WITH OTHERS!! I wanna see where their brains are, and how we can connect them!
An idea I had was to use Sol as a radio host. We know Sol as a painter of the skies, a painter of stories, but what if we also saw that they told stories through audio? What if they had a podcast where they reflected people’s stories, or discussed the latest story they painted in the sky?
I think it would be interesting to see other people’s characters as the ones who have told their stories on Sol’s radio. Maybe they come on air, and maybe Sol helps them relive the stories? Or maybe they just talk about it and discuss! Perhaps Sol is working with a character that is more into audio or engineering to help tell the stories, maybe a cohost!
These are rough ideas, and I have no idea if anyone else would be down, but I’m interested to see other people’s thoughts! (I’m now going to look at all the brainstorming posts to see if maybe someone has a better idea that I can piggy back off of)
You wake up in chains in a room you’ve never seen, the last memory you have being of AI taking over. There is a soft Catholic church song being played in the back, so close that it sounds real, yet so distant in the echoes. The radio in the corner of the room is playing something, a message, but it never quite gets through. The bell tells you your time is running out.
I got a little bit eager with this one and skewed the rules a bit (not really, just went above what the directions were!) but here is my Audio Assignment, and here is the prompt,
“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.“
No one said I didn’t have to add more sounds . . . but I had so much fun with the other Audio Assignments and adding sound to add eerie vibes that I had to again! And this one I put a lot in, so here’s my walkthrough using Freesound, as always..
I used this Catholic church folk song that I found, because it already sounded a little faded and I thought I could make it eerie. I put this in Audacity, and instead of using the tutorial that the assignment had, I went in search of my own, because this one wasn’t on Audacity. I found this tutorial on YouTube, which just had me mess with the Low-Pass Filter. After that, I also played with the bass a little bit and then lowered the volume on it.
In the background, I also added a very soft wind sound. It’s barely noticeable, and mostly just adds white noise, but I think it’s nice and makes it feel heavier. I also put this in the Low-Pass Filter to make it sound distant.
Now, starting from the beginning, the first sound we hear outside of the song and wind is some synthy morse that is probably gibberish (but if it actually says something, pretend it doesn’t . . . or that it does, I guess!) I liked the different radio-like sounds this had, and I imagine in the room, there is a radio somewhere that is playing this.
The next sound is the slight rustle of chains. I imagine this is the protagonist realizing that they’re chained up!
Following this is just another muffled message from the radio. It’s incoherent, and over before you even realized it started.
Next is some knocking, that I added just to make it a little more creepy. This sound also got put through the Low-Pass Filter to make it muffled and distant, as I imagined it in a different room, like the protagonist is hearing it through the walls.
Directly after the knocking is some more morse code, yet this one actually has a message. It says “peace and love” which feels so eerie in this environment. I imagine this message is coming from AI, almost in a snarky, sarcastic way . . . reminds me of a certain AI I know . . .
And again, more knocking. This one is louder, more intense, more threatening. It’s beginning to get a little bit scarier, and you feel a lot more uneasy than before.
Following the knocking is the sound of chains rustling against something or dragging against something, and this sound was also put through the Low-Pass Filter. I wanted to set in the idea that there were more, that this wasn’t the only person, but also, this sound has a creepy feel, like it’s coming from the people (AI?) that put the protagonist here.
As soon as the chains are quiet again, there is a very soft sound of a clock ticking. It’s here to symbolize that your time is running out, that this is the end. It builds tension with each soft tick, despite the sound not changing in any way . . . until . . .
The clock is chiming. It’s time. Time’s up, that’s it. And as the clock chimes, as you realize you ran out of time, there is a synthy noise that starts getting louder and louder and more and more intense. The wind starts getting louder and heavier, still muffled slightly from the distance. All the while, you can still hear the clock ticking, and you can still hear the sound of the song, but it’s getting drained out by the synth and the wind, until there’s nothing else.
I think it’s pretty cool, if you ask me. THIS IS FUN!!! Sorry for everything I said about audio engineering, I take it all back, all I needed was a good night’s sleep and some motivation and BAM here we are.
I’d like to say that this is slightly inspired by a teaser for a song by the KPOP group ATEEZ (thank you ateez i love you ateez). They did this teaser live and out of nowhere with no context at all, and it was just creepy and weird and all the sounds were random and then there was suddenly morse code. While this teaser also pairs visuals to paint the scene, when you look at the unchanging scene for 30 minutes, you start focusing more on the audio. I tried to take a similar approach that just made this seem so weird and creepy. There’s also a bell that plays in the teaser, and I wanted to find a bell to fit for mine too, but none of the audios clicked well for me. The clock was the next best option!
But yeah! I hope this was cool! I also hope I helped some people with the assignment with the link to an Audacity tutorial!
I used stable diffusion to create my secret entrance. The text I wrote was “a secret entrance to a maze-like vortex with a hole in the center”. I wanted it to look confusing to enter.
The use of audio in this storytelling experience was captivating and immersive. Starting with the audio allowed for immediate engagement with the story, and the introduction of a narrator after the crash added depth. The background sounds, like the beeping of the spaceship and the buzzing noise of space, enhanced the sense of being in the moment. The meticulous attention to these audio elements highlighted the thoughtfulness behind the storytelling process. Even without prior knowledge of the technical details, the audio effectively conveyed the narrative. This experience underscores the potential of audio storytelling to engage listeners, even those who typically rely on visuals. It prompts consideration for incorporating similar techniques in audio books to enhance their appeal and appreciation. This, also, enhances the feeling of immersion. A major example of this in a modern setting is podcasting. More people are becoming intrigued by storytelling without visuals.
“Within this assigment, you must find some spooky sounds and create a scary audio clip. Select more than four sounds and overlap them on a program like Audacity. You can use Freesound to select your sounds. Make them as spooky as possible. Good luck!“
So, obviously, I did just that.
I wanted to keep it kind of anonymous, let your brain fill in the story. I got all of my sounds from Freesound, as always (what a good source of sounds).
I wanted a white noise sound in the background that would stay the entire time, something eerie and creepy . . . weird, even. It’s there to build ambience, to set the mood rather than setting the scene. To set the scene, I added wind noises to create an environment. I also added footsteps to create texture, making sure the audio I found was on concrete or at least something hard, because I imagined it as such. Maybe it’s an alleyway, but I think it’s just an abandoned road, because the wind isn’t bouncing off of anything and the ground is hard.
One little thing to paint the story with the footsteps is that I paired them with the eerie environment. I stopped them, paused them and cut out the audio there abruptly, as our main character pauses after hearing the baby laugh. Another little thing, I kept the main character breathing shakily throughout it, but upon hearing the laugh, she not only stops walking, but she stops breathing, holding her breath.
She keeps going after the laugh stops, catching her breath again, and it’s just her breathing with the white noise, wind, and her footsteps, until there is the distant, barely there sound of a child singing. Only this time, she does not stop, and she doesn’t run ahead, because just after the child sings, there are two sounds that play out that create tension, one like a catherdral, and one almost like a jumpscare. But you keep hearing her footsteps and you keep hearing her breathe: she’s still going.
And then it ends.
What happens next? I don’t know, maybe she starts running as the child laugh gets closer. I was originally going to end it with a “boo!” from a child, like it jumpscares her and that’s the end, but I couldn’t find a good enough audio for that, so the end is ambiguous.
This was so much fun . . . I don’t like creepy things, but I play horror games and if there’s one thing that is so important about horror, it’s sound. It’s the ambience. It’s the scene that you make through audio to fuel visuals in your brain, to let your brain freak you out more and more over the littlest of sounds. It’s so so cool.
Also, I believe this was a student from a few years back, but I listened to this as inspiration (I was going through the assignments) and I just think they did a really good job and that was really cool, so I just wanted to promo it!
I’d be interested to see if anyone from this semester does this assignment . . . I wanna see all the creepy scenes we can build through audio!
The entrance to the hidden catacombs awaits anyone who is commerced to pass through the eerie trenches that date back to 1915, to a time when warfare first experienced the effects of poisonous gas.
There was an opening with lots of background noise of beeping and crackling. More sounds and talking were in the introduction and then the narrator introduced himself. The Truth Podcast was interesting because it shared new information for me about an historical event. The dialogue between Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin painted a word picture of what they saw and what they did on the moon.
The astronauts included dimensions in descriptions of craters and also action words such as, I have stepped off the ladder. The surface was dust like and created ripples when kicked. The aircraft tore the surface up a bit, upon landing. They planted an American flag and did a memorable ceremony for other astronauts.
They wanted to leave a legacy with words on the moon, similar to writing in concrete with a stick. They talked amongst themselves asking questions such as, “what are we doing up here? and what does it all mean?”
It amazed me to hear the recording of President Richard Nixon’s voice in a pre-recorded statement, in case the astronaut’s perished in their attempt to go to the moon. What they accomplished is unbelievable! They went to the moon and returned to earth to live for decades. Armstrong died at age 82 in 2012 and Aldrin is still alive, he landed on the moon when he was 39. What an amazing life that we get to live here! Most of us will not attempt to do what they did, but what “moon” adventure will be the big obstacle that you face, and take the next step?
“Create a breaking news story. This should be fake news. You should create a dialogue and have an AI read it using text to speech. There are several free programs. One possibility is Colossyan.com. Mix in a news jingle to make your story sound legit. You can find some jingles on freesound.org. Be sure to give credit if necessary.
Be creative, funny, or serious. The choice is yours. Just make it sound realistic.”
There wasn’t a lot of work put into this. I used this news jingle from Freesound, which I thought fit perfectly. I did have to edit the sound a little bit to give it that repeating bit while the voice is speaking over, because it wasn’t long enough before. That was easy though, I just copied that segment in Audacity and pasted it over and over until it fit the length of the voice audio.
The voice audio is from Colossyan, which was actually really cool! There are a ton of free voices to use of different cultures and languages with different accents and dialects, and I actually got a little distracted by playing with it for a bit. The script is just something I came up with on the spot, though, now that I’m thinking about it, maybe I should’ve run it by Dr. Oblivion and asked for his advice! Next time I come up with a script, I’ll hear his thoughts!
One thing to note about Colossyan if you use it is that it told me it would take 6 minutes to generate the audio to download . . . and then it took like 20 minutes . . . which isn’t really a big deal but it annoyed me a smidge. Maybe that was my problem on my end, though. Otherwise, really cool! Recommend it!
I didn’t edit the voice at all in Audacity, although I did lower the pitch slightly in Colossyan. I wish it were more dramatic, but I guess you can only do so much with AI.
One thing that I think I should’ve added was dogs barking and cats meowing faintly in the back. I think it would’ve been funny and set the scene more, but I didn’t want it to be distracting, if that makes sense. But maybe distracting would be necessary, because this was unexpected breaking news? Interesting . . .
Anyways, this was fun!! I’m getting it . . . the first audio assignment was a doozy but I’m started to feel good about my work now, so that’s a lot of fun!
Here is my sound effect story, where I tried to tell the story of someone painting something in a serene environment, then having to leave, that someone being Sol!
I used rain as background noise to set the scene, along with a quiet piano and the sound of people talking quietly. I layered each of these all ontop of each other in order to make the environment. The environment can be imagined to be a cafe or a restaurant or any sort of quiet place with quiet talking, not alone, but not noticeable. Everyone is doing their own thing, no one is paying attention to anyone.
It’s peaceful.
I wanted to start it off with the opening of the paint and putting it on the paper, then actually painting. I thought this added to it, put in movement and story. They had not started by painting, but they are now, and you can hear that.
I added two different painting audios (this one and this one). There really isn’t a lot to say about this, but this is someone (Sol) painting.
The bell in the rain audio was unintential, but I think it worked out great. I imagined it as a timer for Sol, telling them that that was the end of that painting, and that it would be time to go onto the next. I showed this through the sound of someone packing up a bag after the bell rang.
I like the rushedness of this. They only have time to paint a little before time is up, before the bell is ringing and telling Sol it’s time to go to the next story. As a painter of stories, painting the sky to tell people’s stories, perhaps this story was short, that’s why Sol had to pack up so fast (definitely not because of my time limit). It’s really interesting to think about!!
I was really happy about this! I took my time and I think I did a good job! All of my sounds come from Freesound and I linked each one in the Soundcloud post as well as attached to the words in here, if anyone wants to go listen to them.
To create my Radio Bumper, I used Premiere Pro. From http://freesound.org, I found two soundtracks that I liked and downloaded them. One is classical music, and the other is of dogs barking for contrast. I imported those into Premiere on separate layers, then used the microphone for voice over on a third layer. By clipping out parts and shortening the time sequence, I was able to achieve an end result that I deemed respectable.
Tune into ds106 radio for short stories and unique happenings.
I did my radio announcing several times for the best reading, yes, I wrote it out, and I increased the gain in the audio to +2 and set the music to -5, to be heard over it.
