The evenings are usually a little quieter as far as noise goes. It means that I also have less editing to do to get my sounds in good shape. Editing sounds is not as simple as it looks unless you approach it with an axe.
You have to make careful choices about what is noise and what is sound. The line between the two is often blurry. Filtering out low frequencies may denaturize the sound altogether. Unlike with photography, where the saying “If it’s not in the frame it does not exist” is applicable, it is not so for sound recording.
Field recordings often will contain background noise that should not be there at all, but is not always removable. If it’s a low hum from a nearby power station, it is easily filtered out by applying a high pass filter with a 125Hz cut-off. Anything above 125Hz will go through and what is below is dampened or silenced.
When walking back to my apartment one evening in the park, a pond was extremely noisy.
It sounded like this:
Up until today, I have no idea what animal makes this whistling sound. I did have to filter out the background noise from the Halifax Port. Luckily that was a low frequency that was easily removed. If I were to keep that noise, it would have sounded something like this:
It’s a good thing that audio editors exist. Even if I only use a freeware called Audacity, it already allows me to do the editing needed to create properly curated sounds. It may not be the best out there, but it has the merit to be free. I can use this until I have enough atmospheres and soundscapes to need something more powerful.
In nature, the most likely sounds one will be recording are birds. It’s true that bird songs will (usually) calm the nerves and allow you to sleep.
Since I was “Out in the evening”, here is something to allow you to sleep a little easier. A selection of birds like Warblers, Red-Winged Blackbirds and more, on a quiet evening at Patricia Beach.
The recording was not altered in any way, just transcoded into an mp3 to save some space on my server.
Enjoy your evening, keep listening around you!
Until next time…