by busboy » March 19th, 2008, 5:15 am
I had been concerned that if the pitches were harminically compatable that there might be some form of "blending", so I had for the first experiment seperated the pitches by quite a bit . . . the Delta I ran at just under 400 and the Theta I believe was set at around 100. Since the Delta is running in the final file at a much lower volume, I made that one the high tone . . . I don't mind a louder low tone (usually comes through like a hum), but a louder high tone really gets annoying.
The Wiki link was something I hadn't considered. I was just setting tones based on what sounded compatable with the vocal track and any other effects I'm mixing in, using the highly scientific method of recording and mixing it in, listening, deciding it sucked, then moving the pitch setting up/down 50 until it seemed to fit in. Obviously, if I'm setting them to actual musical note frequencies, getting them to sound nice would be alot easier.
If using actual notes, I take from your post that setting an actual chord would effectively cancel out the effect? That makes sense to me, and was one of the reasons I tried to shy away from notes. Also, setting the tones at actual musical note settings may raise another complication that just occured to me . . .
I had been layering in subliminal tracks and barely audible tracks to create a background distraction so the pauses in the vocal track didn't cause me to start thinking too much -- my concious needs something to play with or it gets agitated and therefore not relaxed. Recently, I've come to question the effectiveness of subliminals alltogether, based on various studes I recently read (although I plan to do a series of experiments next week to verify for myself whether they are effective). If I'm stripping out the subvocals, that leaves only Mino's "subliminal" file to serve as a distractor (I run it at barely audible levels, so my mind can try and figure out what the voices are saying -- a nice distraction).
If I'm using the voices exclusively as a distractor, I had planned on editing them out and mixing in actual music instead, again at a nice soft volume so they dont interfere with the beats or vocal tracks. Some early experiments with this have been promising . . . especially with 12-15 minute files. I take a 3 minute music clip (something mellow and smooth, Like Ray Lynch), then repeat the clip for the length of the file dropping the pitch of the music a little each time (also overlap the music and fade in/out from each so there's no perceptible shift). It seems the "dropping music" might be oddly effective as a sort of audio suggestion to go deeper . . . . some more experimenting will hopefully reveal more.
Anyways, back to the concern. If I set the beat tones to actual notes, I'm wondering what risk there would be to the beat tone forming accidental chords with the musical file, and would that interrupt the formation of the beat. It probably won't be too much of an issue either way . . . At most, an accidental chord would occur for a moment or two, and an extremely temporary interruption in the binaural beat isn't going to destroy the overall effect.
Assuming I set the binaural carrier tone to a musical note, do you think it would be more beneficial to mix it in with the musical background or seperate them (via volume settings)? Mixed in allows it to become essentially hidden, but will the tone be "lost" in the croud of musical notes? Running it at a more pronounced volume seems like the better/effective approach, but I'm thinking about listeners who don't like binaurals. I actually like the hum, but many people I know find it annoying, so blending it into/under more pleasant musical notes would make the file more enjoyable for them . . . but would it be less effective?
As always, thank you for the knowledge and advice Friendly.
p.s. -- yes, I'm using Brainwave Generator. Audacity has a binaural beat generator (via a plug-in), and it actually seems to have a few advantages over BG -- you can set smooth transitions from the different levels, whereas in BG the shifting up/down seems more abrupt. Regardless, BG tones just sound nicer to me, so I've been using that eclusively for the binaurals.