This post will attempt to articulate the basics of the science of sound and hopefully it will inspire you to use it to your advantage. Having a basic understanding of how sound works makes sound design an easier skill to maser - without some kind of in-depth knowledge in this area, youre limited to using a time-consuming trial-and-error approach, or just tweaking presets. Making informed decisions when creating and refining sounds makes the process happen much more efficiently and gives you results that are more expressive. In order to take our first step on this journey, we need to ask a simple question with a complicated answer: just what is sound? Well, at its most basic level, sound is variations in pressure in a medium (usually air) that are detected by the ear. The speed (or frequency) of these variations (vibrations) is measured in Hertz (Hz) - a vibration of 20 cycles per second is referred to as 20Hz. That would be an extremely low sound - the human ear can typically dated frequencies between 20 and 20,000Hz (20kHz). Music touches us in just about every aspect of our lives. Some people feel very strong emotions when they hear a certain song. It can make them happy or sad. It can make them jump up and dance with laughter or bring them to the point of nostalgia. Some people see structure in music. There are those who actually see the workings of the brain in a song. They see the way in which our minds work as being similar to the flow of a song. Other people even think of songs as thought forms. Some people relate to music through music theory. They see notes on a scale, the intervals between notes, and chord structures. Most of us have a physical reaction, such as, tapping, head bobbing, dancing, etc. You can create musical and emotional dynamics by placing each instrument at different volume levels in a mix. Simply making a sound louder or softer affects how it is perceived. However, you crete a much more intense dynamic when all of the voume controls create a pattern based on their collective placement. For example, if all of the volumes are set evenly, so that there is a little variation between the loudest and softest sounds, the mix will be quite different from one with a wide variation in volume levels. When you change the volume levels during a mix, it creates a level of dynamic that is often so strong it draws the listeners attention. Almost all sounds are made up of more than one frequency, and with pitched sounds (where a distinct note can be discerned, as opposed to noise with no apparent pitch) our ears will detect the lowest frequency - known as the fundamental frequency - as the pitch. FOR EXAMPLE. a piano playing the A above middle C will have a fundamental frequency of 440Hz, as well as numerous harmonics, which are frequencies occurring at multiples of the fundamental. So in other words, 440Hz is our fundamental frequency, also known as the first harmonic, 880Hz is the second harmonic, 1320Hz is the third harmonic, and so on. The basic waveforms you will encounter on synthesizers are sine waves, square waves, sawtooth waves and triangle waves. A sine wave is the simplest, being just a fundamental frequency with no harmonics. A square wave is created by using just odd harmonics. A sawtooth wave uses both odd and even harmonics. A triangle wave consists of only odd harmonics. We can use filters and EQ to shape the timbre of a sound - for example, using a high-shelf EQ to bring down the level of the higher frequencies, making it duller, or using a band EQ to boost a specific frequency. The feel of a sound is determined by its volume level as well as its frequency content. We measure volume level in decibels (dB). When producing music on a DAW (digital audio workstation), 0dB represents the maximum possible level your average digital-to-analgue converter can handle before clipping occurs. However, volume is a complicated area, and Im sure most of you are getting bored reading this so Ill wrap it up. Volume and a sounds perceived loudness doesnt depend on the dB level; a sound will appear louder if it has a higher average volume level and fills up the frequency spectrum more fully. Keep psychoacoustics in mind when youre designing sounds and youll find it easier to get the results you want.
Posted on: Sat, 01 Feb 2014 18:10:09 +0000
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