Native Speed

image credit: Mando Gomez

Slow down a song by The Chipmunks just the right amount and you’ll hear the real voice actors singing. The geek inside me is a little insulted I didn’t think of this myself.

AUDIO [Christmas Don’t Be Late - Nightmare Edition] (via Panic) AUDIO [original]

I actually did think of this before, kind of. A year ago I recorded a cricket chirping outside my apartment in Raleigh at a high sample rate, roughly calculated the ratio of its body mass to my own, and slowed down the track to hear what it would sound like (this is a stretch) if I were its size – or I guess, if it were mine. With only a low quality laptop microphone the result was surprisingly good, though probably not very accurate.

Enter Avisoft Bioacoustics and their Ultrasound Recording System. The following recording, taken from their library of animal sounds, is of a Great Green Bush-cricket (Tettigonia viridissima) and is slowed down by a factor of 10. Not quite the body mass ratio I calculated (that’s not what they’re going for) but it was a shot in the dark anyway.

AUDIO [cricket call, slowed *10] AUDIO [cricket call at native speed] IMAGE [Great Green Bush-cricket]