Modd3d

It’s kind of a minor hobby of mine to try to figure out where samples in songs originally come from and what instruments the artists use to make certain sounds that I find interesting. The other night I was searching for the famous “James Brown is Dead” sound and I found a sweet article at synthmania.com that listed the origins of a bunch of famous synth sounds. It also listed several organs, loops and other fun things and provided sound samples for most. You should go check it out.

Several folks at the Pacific Northwest Synth Gathering asked me where I got my Syntar t-shirt. They’re available at CafePress along with some other random items.

This Venn Diagram showing the relationships between the various members of the non-jock class (nerds, geeks, dorks and dweebs) has been floating around the Intertubes lately.  I’m glad I found it because it’s already settled several arguments (“He’s a geek.  No, he’s more of a nerd.  No you’re a nerd!  Yeah well your face is a nerd!”)

So you put off backing up your data until it’s too late.  Now your computer won’t boot and instead you’re greeted with the dreaded “click of death”.  Don’t worry, all may not be lost.  Here are some tips and tricks that may just help you with your computer data recovery efforts.

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So now I guess girls who like to hang around geeks are “nerd hags”. I didn’t know there were enough of them out there to warrant their own classification. I dare you to get your girlfriend to wear this nerd hag shirt!

Updated for 2015!

Geekettes, are you trying to figure out what to be for Halloween this year?  Are you tired of the same old choices at the party stores (slutty maid, slutty pirate, slutty nurse, slutty witch, slutty candy corn, etc.)?   We here at Modd3d have some true geek girl costume ideas for you.

These items were compiled by our crack team of costume designers and lovers of all things geeky.  Their instructions were to come up with a list of nerd costumes for girls, but not the kind with thick glasses and pocket protectors.  This is what they came up with.  Some are clever and fresh, some are old and cliche, and some are just plain classic.  You should be able to find something that suits your geek sensibilities here.

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Seriously, is there anything bacon can’t do?

I like listening to movie soundtracks every once and a while. By that I mean the incidental music that was specifically written for the movie as opposed to whatever pop songs they’ve decided to throw in there. The problem with many soundtracks, however, is that there is a high-pitched whine in the background. Most of my friends either can’t hear it (they think I’m nuts) or aren’t bothered by it, but for me it’s very noticeable.

The other day I was listening to “The Pagemaster” and there it was again. I decided to prove that I wasn’t nuts and ran a track through the old spectrum analyzer.

Clicky for the track I analyzed (Uncompressed .wav so we don’t lose any frequencies. Don’t worry, it’s just a short clip. BTW if you’re the Pagemaster and you feel I shouldn’t be putting your music on the Intertubes let me know and I’ll remove it.)

Do you hear it? Here’s the frequency analysis:

Sure enough, there’s a spike just below 16kHz that comes in at the start of the track and just kind of lives there. Apparently most of my friends can’t hear 16kHz. I imagine many sound engineers can’t either or they wouldn’t be putting out CDs with that there. But why is it there? Why only movie soundtracks?

My theory is that the orchestra being recorded is playing along to visuals from the movie they are scoring and that what we are hearing is the flyback transformer in whatever CRT monitors they are using. The horizontal scanning frequency of NTSC monitors is about 15.734kHz, which would support this theory.

This is my plea to everyone who records a film soundtrack: please use LCD monitors! James Horner, John Williams, Hans Zimmer, Danny Elfman, that guy who records stuff in his basement; please don’t record near any CRTs. They are coming through on the recordings, and they are detracting from your excellent compositions.

Thanks!

-Scott

The only thing cooler than a giant robot is a giant robot that shoots fire out of its mouth.

When recording your own sound effects for things, your first instinct is probably to stick a microphone by the actual thing you are trying to create an effect of. Sometimes this works, but other times there is too much other noise or it’s dangerous or implausible and sometimes it just plain sounds wrong. You have to think of what people expect things to sound like and not necessarily what they really sound like. Most sound effects you hear in movies and TV are cartoonish caricatures of real sounds (that’s part of why shots sound so unpolished when you hear them with the actual field audio).

Here’s a list of some sound effects and how to make them.