How to achieve this eerie groan

Hello all,

I’m on Windows 10 and Audacity 3.0.2. I am very new to all of this and have been spending an inordinate amount of time trying to reproduce a certain sound effect. It is this https://download.prosoundeffects.com/#!details?id=16487178 I’m trying to reproduce the main groan heard at the beginning. There’s an added underwater effect which I’m not really interested in. What I’m trying to make is the eerie groan. I can tell it’s slowed but beyond that I’m unsure. Are they doing more to it to make it eerie and what would the original sound effect sound like to make such a noise? Is it even human?

low pass suggestion for underwater.png

Hi MamboWitch

You are correct it is slowed down. Sounds as if its someone going “aaaaaaaagh” and a lot of echo and reverb added.

You can replicate this particular sound effect by going “aaaaaaaaaaaagh” and recording it into Audacity.
Add reverb & echo. Try adding these two effects either before or after slowing the track down, and see which works better.

For extra effect use double tracking.

From the EDIT menu, select DUPLICATE from the TOOLS TOOLBAR select TIME SHIFT TOOL (see jpeg).
TOOLS-TOOLBAR TIMESHIF.jpg

Zoom in and use the TIME SHIFT TOOL BAR to advance one track a few milliseconds.
Pan Track 1 far LEFT and track 2 far RIGHT.

Try different permutations of reverb, echo and timeshift.

Try this - record bird song (if you have a hand held digital recorder) slow it down by 50% - 25% in Audacity then you have an ethereal soundscape.

If you record a birdsong very close (a few feet away) and again slow it down enough, you will have a something very similar to a whale.

Keep experimenting - That’s what Audacity is designed to do.

Thanks for the detailed explanation. I hadn’t thought to duplicate and offset the time signatures. It does create a slightly eerie feel. Slowing down the bird song has also got my imagination working. I’ve avoided reverb so far because this sound is going to come from a characters mouth who will be in rooms of varying sizes but it does add a haunting element with the echo.

As far as the “aaaaagh” sound I guess the base recording of the clip I linked must be very well done because it’s hard to find/create one as convincing as that is to me.

Hi MamboWitch

I found that slowing birdsong down, and then looking at the waveform, you can actually see the patterns used in the song.

Forgot to mention another tool built into Audacity which may be of use, if special effects is of interest to you, it’s the CHANGE SPEED tool.

Its purpose is aimed at vinyl records, but I doubt if the Audacity developers will object - probably the opposite and give a nod of approval.