The Sounds of Nature

Sacred Synthesis

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #20 on: October 23, 2018, 07:27:08 AM »
Ah, the wonders of nature.  She's full of surprises, and so many musical ones.

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #21 on: October 23, 2018, 02:24:25 PM »
Ah, the wonders of nature.  She's full of surprises, and so many musical ones.

This really is a lovely thread. I'm staying on a farm at the moment, and while I'm literally surrounded by synths, it's so easy here to re-tune to the sounds of nature, even as I sit staring at the laptop. So many bird calls (we had three hawks trying to get at the chickens a couple days ago), and the various leaves falling from various trees. We used the sound of falling apples on a track a while back (the song was called "The Apples Are Falling," but the apples were of course dropped)...

All that said, as I prep to fly back to Berlin tomorrow, one of my first and favorite memories of living in Berlin was the "sound" of the silence after the first heavy snowfall. As a California boy, hearing the sudden soft soundlessness of Sanderstrasse covered in 6 inches of snow was startling.

Tying things together in a DSI-friendly way, I'll be reunited with my Prophet 6 soon. I rarely use it to generate "organic" sounds, though. The Korg MS-20 lives the same wild life as the MS-10, with goat howls and snail whispers coming easily. The Micromoog is crickets and bees when it's not The Bass. Etc. The P6, for me, says "But I'm a synthesizer making synthesizer sounds!" I use it for gorgeous electronic musical tones primarily. I'm certain I could get a donkey cough or a wind-swept discotheque dungeon if I *needed* to, but I don't know I'd actually want to. Every creature has its place in the food chain or in the parking lot!

Sacred Synthesis

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #22 on: October 23, 2018, 07:36:38 PM »
Ant, you referred to a host of exotic sounds.  I most liked in your post the reference to silence from the dampening effects of snow.  Now tinkling lake ice has a companion - the sound of snowfall.  That's not hyperbole.  Snowfall does have a sound of its own, but - as with the lake ice - it can be heard only under certain circumstances, when all else is silent.  If you ever find yourself in the woods during a snowstorm, there is an extremely delicate sound made when a million flakes are coming to rest on limbs and leaves (American Beech leaves stay on through the winter).  It is the pinnacle of petite tones - a soft flutter and whoosh that disappears the instant you take a step.

Speaking of farms, I once worked on a dairy farm milking cows.  I heard a variety of sounds there that I don't care to recreate on a synthesizer. 
« Last Edit: October 23, 2018, 07:40:12 PM by Sacred Synthesis »

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #23 on: October 23, 2018, 08:42:14 PM »
My brother is a geophysicist, and has used geophones to listen to reflected waves from shotgun blasts into the earth (as well as regular seismometers to model subterranean structures). It's hard to find frequency-multiplied versions of it, but here is a specific electronic music project around it, with the second piece seeming to be raw samples:

http://sos.allshookup.org

"Cluster One" on The Division Bell used audio translations of the solar wind, and if I remember correctly Tomita used waveforms from the output of stars in some of his later music.

I've often been fascinated with audio transformations of data like that, but I've never had the ability to do anything with it.
Prophet 12, Modal 002, MFB Dominion 1, Behringer DeepMind 12D, Korg Polysix & EX-8000, Roland JX-8P, Ensoniq SQ-80, Kawai K3m and now an OB-6!

Razmo

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Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #24 on: October 24, 2018, 04:29:44 AM »
Earth really got me... what sounds depict "Earth"!? ... I ended up with trying to make a sound that resembles dirt and rocks falling down a slope... what about the sound of an Earth Quake!? is that the sound of the earth?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBfrLoBpsIQ

Sorry... even though it's the sound of a rock (or rather a combi of metal vs. rock), it gives me no feelings of "earth" :D ... I'd say this is just the sound of metal, and I also firmly believe that the metal is what is vibrating most here :D
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Razmo

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Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #25 on: October 24, 2018, 04:39:44 AM »
But the "funny thing" is, that even though some things DO have a sound, even if it's miniscule like with snow falling or the sound of ice, i don't think that most people would associate these sounds with what they actually are... exactly because so few hear them, and are also influenced by movies and history when it comes to sounds we associate with a particular thing... to make people associate, it's often needed to use abstract sounds that has nothing to do with the thing, or at least something else... the sound of snow falling? ... the sound of snow is easy, it's this crunchy sound that snow makes when you walk on it... this is something people can relate to... I'd say that the sound of snow falling is (to me at least) silence... absolute silence... why? ... because it's usually quiet when snow is falling because the layer of snow on the ground absorbs soundwaves so that we hear less reverberation.

My point; foley sounds somehow has to connect to stuff ordinary people associate with the situation... thus, simulating the sound of the earth by taking seismic soundwaves and multiply them into the hearing range serves nothing really because ordinary people have never heard such a sound and would not associate it with earth in any way... in many cases, people see the sound of the earth as something huge and low... preferably something "rumbling" because they probably associate huge low groaning rumbles with earthquakes and the like... or a landslide (thus my trying to create the sound of rolling dirt, boulders and pebbles).

The reason I'm trying to recreate something like this is because my sounds are based on fantasy roleplaying... I wanted to find sounds that would represent the four elements for some fantasy creatures like Earth, Fire, Water and Air Elementals... how would such creatures sound if they were to sound believable? ... a Fire Elemantal is simple... it's the roaring sound of fire... A Water Elemental is also simple... the sound of water splish and splashes... Air is also simple... the sound of a roaring wind... but Earth was harder... why would it rumble!? it's not quaking... I just thought that small pebbles and dirt rolling of the creature would be the best representation, maybe with a bit of low rumble to depict it's earthly heritage... this is where sound design is a bit of an art in itself... being able to find the sounds that makes the listener feel convinced :)
« Last Edit: October 24, 2018, 04:47:53 AM by Razmo »
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Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #26 on: October 24, 2018, 06:51:39 AM »
Cool problem. Borderlands 2 had a fantasy RPG parody DLC that included some animated rock creatures. They made various rocks-clunking-together noises, and then a neat collapsing sound when you defeated them. Your idea sounds pretty good. Maybe record some pebbles and dirt being poured into something, then slow it down a little? Maybe a shovel being thrust into soil for the footsteps, if it has feet?

Synthesizing it with the hardware I have would be...tough.
Prophet 12, Modal 002, MFB Dominion 1, Behringer DeepMind 12D, Korg Polysix & EX-8000, Roland JX-8P, Ensoniq SQ-80, Kawai K3m and now an OB-6!

Razmo

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Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #27 on: October 24, 2018, 09:55:06 AM »
Cool problem. Borderlands 2 had a fantasy RPG parody DLC that included some animated rock creatures. They made various rocks-clunking-together noises, and then a neat collapsing sound when you defeated them. Your idea sounds pretty good. Maybe record some pebbles and dirt being poured into something, then slow it down a little? Maybe a shovel being thrust into soil for the footsteps, if it has feet?

Synthesizing it with the hardware I have would be...tough.

But it is exactly synthesizing I'll have to use right now as the only synth I've got is the REV2... I actually have synthesized something already, but it's not perfect yet... When I get a Prophet X it'll be a lot easier... though not as fun as having synthesized it instead... there is a challenge in trying to synthesize these sounds for me... and it's a great learning experience to boot :)
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Sacred Synthesis

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #28 on: October 25, 2018, 04:53:07 PM »
« Last Edit: October 25, 2018, 04:57:37 PM by Sacred Synthesis »

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #29 on: October 26, 2018, 03:20:08 AM »
Aha!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwWmKx2kq-s

Nice.
I'm in the UK at the moment, with the natural sounds of "wind blowing cars down the motorway" keeping me awake!

Re: The Sounds of Nature
« Reply #30 on: November 06, 2018, 07:23:23 PM »
Earth really got me... what sounds depict "Earth"!? ... I ended up with trying to make a sound that resembles dirt and rocks falling down a slope... what about the sound of an Earth Quake!? is that the sound of the earth?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBfrLoBpsIQ

Chysn,   

OK,  I was a geology major in college.  I never witnessed this!   
Sequential/DSI Equipment: Poly Evolver Keyboard, Evolver desktop,   Pro-2, Pro-3, OB6, P-12,
 

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