Sounds Around Us - Monsoon Beauty Update - 18th August 2021

Sounds Around Us - Monsoon Beauty Update - 18th August 2021

Sounds are around us
Sounds surround us
Yet on iNaturalist India they don't abound

We don't have a Cow's Moo or a Cats Meow
Let alone a dog barking or barking deer

Time to change that

Add a horse's neigh or a donkey's bray
A beetles click
or songs that make birds tick

Monsoons Bountiful Beauty is around you
Sharing sounds would be welcome too

About Sounds

Of all the senses and phenomenon that we (humans) perceive digitally we are, so far, only able to share Static Pictures, Sounds and the phenomenon of Motion. The best we can do with taste, touch and smell is describe them which are a sad way to experience them.

Even with the senses we can share the overwhelming contributions (on Inaturalist) are static visuals. This is despite sounds being such an integral part of our daily life - in communications, in entertainment, work , the very ambiance of life is created by the soundscape around us.

As much by visual cues we also live life attuned to sounds around us.

Yet as of the time of writing this India has only 1174 sound observations or 0.16% of all observations out of total of 732,528 observations

Almost all of us have at our disposal incredibly great devices that reproduce sound, and these are also excellent tools to record & share audio.

Below is a short guide on how to record sound and edit using your mobile phones (and if available then PC's for sound editing)

Sharing, of course, is easy via the inaturalist App.To know a little bit more see this Inaturalist - How to Uploads Sounds

When uploading to iNaturalaist do consider the following

1. For recordings where the target sound is mixed up with other sounds or is faint do point out the time sections so that listeners know where to pay attention.
2. if required describe the sound
3. Sounds may accompany pictures or vice versa
4. If feasible and you are positing only a sound do consider posting a still image of a spectrogram.
   
5. Providing a reference sound - since documentation / links to other sounds is not so easy, nor does iNaturalist Computer Vision work for sounds, so it would make it easier for people to match sounds from an already established reference.

We look forward to your idea of natures sounds (within the limitations of inaturalist) and hope to hear wonderful naturescapes

Apps and Software for Recording Sounds

Since most of us would be recording using our Mobile Phones we would be covering some apps and good ways to use them. If you do have access to a higher quality recording device the techniques remain the same, while detailed guides are linked below.

There are many different paid and free apps and software available. We are providing some examples of free to use tools. If you know of better or alternative tools kindly so share in the comments or by direct messaging us.

Recommended Recording Apps

Inaturalist Mobile App

The iNaturalist app has an inbuilt sound recorder. Simple to use - one just open the app, selected new observation, chooses the Record sound option and get started. The great advantages are that the sounds are directly imported as an observation with location also registred.

The disadvantage is that there is no control on the sound being inputted.

RecForge II - Audio Recorder

This is the google play store link

For most purposes the free version is adequate. It provides all the basic and some advanced controls as well as a db meter which indicates how loud / not loud the recording is. Details on the recommended settings and how to use are shared below

Recommended Editing Apps or Computer Software

Lexis Audio Editor - Android App(Do not use for recording )

Google Play Store Link

This is an on phone audio editing software. Fairly simple to use and it exports to .wav format. Once again details on its effective use are shared below

PC Audio Editing Software (open source or free software)

1. OcenAudio (https://www.ocenaudio.com)
   a. Detailed tutorial on using OcenAudio for Bird sounds is shared here

2. Audacity
   a. Detailed tutorial on using Audacity for Bird sounds is shared here

3. The editing techniques provided for various software are most common for most nature sounds. The Ultrasonic Sounds of Bats, and sounds of underwater organisms is a chapter being left for another day.

Recording Sounds

Using Rec Forge II App

If you have chosen the settings above the most important feature is the preview option.

1. Once you open Rec Forge II you will be presented with a message about the version and some warnings. You can choose to discard / or ok the message.
2. After that you will be presented with a mic icon to the bottom right. Pressing that will open the preview mode.
3. On the right edge of the screen will be a Tall Sound Meter - the louder the sound the colour bars will move from blue to light blue to whice.
4. In the main screen will be the rolling image of the sound - complete with spikes and all
5. On the bottom is the db decibel meter - this can be moved to the right (highest is +20) or the the left (lowest is -20 db). Depending on how loud your target sound is (or is not) you may choose to increase or decrease the db meter. Caveat - recording on the higher db is not always effective as in many cases other sounds apart from the target sound also get extraordinarly large boosts , and the target sounds are often too jagged.
6. Once you are satisfied with the Preview you must press the white tick on the left bottom to start the recording. You will know the recording is happening based on the time meter.
7. To stop the recording use the square stop button on the right bottom
8. To pause the recording (not recommended) use the round pause button on the right.

Tips for Good sound recordings

1. The phone mic is usually at the bottom of the phone – point that in the direction of the sound you are recording
2. Keep the phone still and stay silent for the duration of the recording to avoid handling noises

a) Turn off your message and alarm tones so that those sounds don’t also get recorded. If need be turn the phone to airplane mode and start recording

b) Any comments or commentary of the object of the recording should, ideally, be shared at the end

1. Try and take longer recordings when possible (minimum 30 seconds is a good start). For example there are a fair number of birds which have long complex songs , while some toads / frogs also change their calls / song some time into the sequence
2. Focus on the target sound – sometimes by taking longer recordings you will get sections that are very clear and good quality. During this time do not try and do other things that may create distracting and detracting noises - like handling / walking/ using a noisy camera (DSLR) /. These other action sounds greatly affect the quality of the sounds being heard.
3. At the end of the recording do make comments (a short commentary) about what you recorded at the end. These could include

• Name of the Creature seen (or if unknown then describe it hear - size, colors, form, etc)
• Any notes on what you saw and heard, behavior observed or anything that was special about the recording.
• What it was doing d. or where it was (specific location - flying in the air, inside a bush, on a tree trunk, in your hand etc e. approximate location & altitude -(Audio recordings via rec forge II / or most audio apps are not GPS tagged so it is ok to mention it here for both notes and future relevance

1. Practice a few recordings - once you are familiar with the process it will be easier to snap take recordings

• Practice changing the db levels on the fly in Rec Forge II

Editing the Recordings

Nothing fancy – only suggestion is normalizing the sounds so that the recorded target sound and the commentary are approximately the same volume, and also to ensure that the target sound is at “good” audible volume for human hearing.

When editing the sound file do not cut and chop – leave the flow of the recording as it it – cutting and chopping changes the nature of the call and is not useful for either future research or comparisons.

Do not use filters - Once again in the long run the use of filters detract from the future value of the recording and also importantly cut out ambient sounds that provide context and enrich the sound.

Editing On OcenAudio or Audacity

In OcenAudio one has the option to view both Waveform and Spectral Form simultaneously. In this view one can see heat maps of where the sounds are and are good visual cues to “listen” out for when hearing the recording

Target Sound

Select the sound portion you want to normalize (The target / focus sound) Normalize to -3db or in case the original recording is too low normalize to -1 or -2db. If there are no “unnatural” sound spikes in this section then you will see a change in the soundscape. If there are sound spikes the normalization will not be very as effective.

Commentary

Select the commentary – normalize this to -8 or -10 db. The soundscape should show that the commentary is less volume than the target sound (if feasible)

Editing On Lexis Audio Editing App

1. Selecting a File for editing. - Use the open option to find a file you want to edit

a) Rec Forge Files are usually stored in /RecForge with the names are described in the settings

1. Selecting Sections of the Audio

a) Because the app is free it does not allow selecting the the whole audio section at the same time.

b) Move the start (left selector icon a bit in - a fraction will do) - do the same at the end (right side) - The proceed to the 3 vertical dot menu on the upper right → effects -->normalize

1. Do the normalization separately for the Target Sound Section and the Commentary Section **Remember the normalization is relative to your highest / tallest spike - which are usually not part of the target sounds - they could handling noises or message tones, vehicle horns etc.
2. If you want more control over how much you want to normalize you could use the ...--> Effects —> Equalizer Amplifier option and change the amplification there.
3. Export - Once you are done with the editing you can use the “Save” option - top centre to export the file. There is an option to choose the file type you are exporting to. You could choose to export to .wav (recommended) , or .mp3, or m4a (any file format that is acceptable to inaturalist)

Recommended Settings for Rec Forge II App

Audio Settings

Audio Record - wav, 48 kHz - Stereo (Mono x 2)
Use the .Wav format. (this is the non lossy file format that retains the best quality sound)

Source - Front Microphone (at the bottom of your phone usually)

Recording Name format - - Use the full date_24 hour time format (will look like this yyyymmdd_hhmmss,wav)

try and not rename the file - as the default name will provide you date and time of recording for later reference

will be 20200622_2031

YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS

YYYY = Year
MM = Month
DD -Day

_ underscore

HH = Hour
MM = Minute
SS = Seconds

Disable AGC - Keep this Selected

Meta Data - You may enter what details you want here – who is the recordist etc,

Other Settings

Prevent phone from sleeping - Yes (Tick this)

Conversion Settings

For now let this be (do not select or tick)

Interface Settings

Auto Switch to wave view - Tick (Yes)

Preview Mode - Tick (Yes)
(please read the notes of preview mode in the using Rec-Forge II Section)

Vibrate when Pressing Keys - Tick (optional )

Others Guidelines for Audio recording and editing

Ebird - Audio preparation and upload guidelines

Macaulay Library resources on Audio recording, editing, uploading and more.

Websites that Host Nature Audio or have interesting Audio Projects

The Dawn Chorus Project

Ebird as an excellent repository of [Birds Pictures, Songs and Calls]. The audio spectrograms are a very effective way to learn bird calls

The Macaulay Library one the world’s premier scientific archive of natural history audio, video, and photographs.

Xeno-canto is a website dedicated to sharing bird sounds from all over the world

Feedback and Comments

Do share your thoughts, any other links or anything else with us via direct messaging or through the comments section

Team India's Nature Monsoon Beauty

indiasnature.01@gmail.com

@ram_k @mountainjen @vijay_dixit

Publicado el agosto 18, 2021 04:45 MAÑANA por ram_k