Subliminal Messages

[patitapetit]

Hello!
I've got Audacity with Ubuntu 8,04. I want to know if I can make a mp3 file with Subliminal messages.
I mean I would like to listen new age music with "hidden" messages, like "I love myself" etc.

Can anybody help me? I mean

Could anybody explain me "Step by Step" how to record a subliminal message with Audacity?

Thanks a lot

Patricia

[kozikowski]

Nobody is piling on to answer this because it's a college level course in recording and production. Some parts of that don't even have wiki pages or tutorials.

Koz

[Spud]

Well isn't it just making a new track and recording your voice at the APPROPRIATE level that it is not to obvious or obtrusive (mixes well into the other track/music)?

Seems kind of obvious - or am I missing something?

Spud

[steve]

"subliminal message" is very open ended and can refer to many techniques. All it actually means is that the message is below the normal limits of the human mind's perception (below the sensory threshold). The idea is that the subconscious can still be affected even though the message is not consciously perceived.

The simplest ways of doing this are;
To simply play the recording very quietly, or mix it in with other sounds (or music) at a low level.
To play the message while the recipient is asleep.

Other techniques involve "back-masking" (playing it backwards - use the "Reverse" effect in Audacity), or dramatically changing the speed/pitch (use the "Speed Change", "Tempo Change" or "Pitch Change" effects). The message may be split into tiny fragments and spaced out within the music (for example, mixing each syllable with a percussive beat in some music), or the harmonic content could be split and spread across a much wider range than normal (using many very narrow band pass filters in the 800Hz to 1.2kHz range and spreading them out across a 20Hz to 20kHz range. The possibilities are endless.

There is very little scientific evidence to support the theory that any of this actually works. There is some evidence supporting subliminal effects from listening to messages or sounds while asleep.

[iwilliam]

Some great ideas, Steve, Thank you! I may have to experiment with some of those.

I use the time shift tool to align my "subliminals" tracks to where I want them in the background mp3 I've imported into the project.

I then use the enveloping tool to adjust the volume up and down in the subliminal track. (I do this so that, for example, parts where the background music is very loud, the subliminal track will be louder, and the parts where the background music becomes quiet, the subliminal track does so also.

It is a bit time consuming and tedious (I suppose audio editing generally can be) but it can produce some interesting results.