VonBraunSoother

[Kolya]

So it's been a long night fighting hybrids, dodging turret-shots and gathering keycards like some mentally deranged janitor. And now you're lying in bed - wide awake - with recurring flashes of topless fembots haunting you behind your eyes. No, you can't die of insomnia, but it's no fun either. You know you're missing something to get you to sleep...but what is it?

Dr. Bob explains:
Well like anyone who lived on a starship for some time you're used to hearing the constant humming of the ship's engines up to the point were not hearing it anymore makes you instantly nervous and gets you tipping on your toes. That's not surprising since the working machines mean life to everyone on board and they're low rumble is likely to become that sort of sound that you after some time don't even hear anymore until it suddenly stops.
The phenomenon has been studied extensively on long time space travellers and is generally known as space-lag.

But here it comes to the rescue: the VonBraunSoother [Link deactivated. Please use the newest 15min version: The Von Braun Delta Inducer V8 (20.5MB)]. Developed by sound scientist Kolya von Gantenberg it uses the engine humming of the ship you have grown to love. There is also a thick layer of soothing brown noise as well as two low level sinus waves shifting around the frequency of 15Hz which is close to the frequency of the VonBraun humming adding some dynamical change over time. Also integrated have been two other samples recorded on board namely a very gentle version of the ship's security system's mumbling and a distant monitoring bleep sounding at regular intervals. This will help to keep you from focussing on the brown noise too much.

It is suggested to put the five minute long soother on repeat before you're going to bed either during the last minutes that you're working on your computer or you can burn it on an audio-cd and place it in a stereo in your bedroom on low volume.
The file comes in high quality MP3 format (256kbps) and is 6.86MB in size. It's fading out a little to the end and fading in at the start to avoid clicking noises when repeating on slow systems.

Sleep well,
Kolya

[ZylonBane]

Your "thick layer of soothing brown noise" just sounds like 8-bit hiss to me. Annoying, not soothing.

[Kolya]

I suggest you go visit a real doc (otorhinolaryngologist) right now. Or just wash your ears. They're full of brown noise.

Kolya

[furiousgeorge]

Just his ears?

[Kolya]

I guess it's a personal thing what you find to be soothing and what not. For me it's this, for ZB it might be the sound of ...um... a texture well done?

Kolya

[furiousgeorge]

LoL. Should I laugh, or groan?

[William Dojinn]

Actually lack of sleep can kill. Just a FYI and all...

[Magicman]

That thing would keep me awake more than it would put me to sleep.

... says the kid who goes to sleep with Blind Guardian on

[Bluegrime]

Great... Could you possibly do one similair to this, with the "we are" thing repeating over the rumbler sound? You know, the one that comes when it does the angry dance.

[Ultraviolet]

My computer is loud enough to serve in this capacity. Pass.

[D'Arcy]

The sound of the fans in my computer is louder than this

[Kolya]

You think it's too gentle? I've played it via MP3-Stick and Stereos and it seemed okay to me. You know it shouldn't be too loud. But then again your fans may be the culprit here?

Kolya

[D'Arcy]

I'm not blaming your work. I'm just saying that it wouldn't make much sense if I'd put the mp3 playing in loop while trying to fall asleep because all I'd hear would be the sound of the fans (although they're not that noisy)

[Kolya]

I see. Mmmh, my computer is rather loud too. But I'm sleeping in a different room. I tried putting it in the HiFi there put my bedmate was like: WTF! Turn this off! I wanna sleep!
I told her it was an experiment but she wasn't impressed so I tried sleeping with headphones on. That didn't work too well either. The phones kept falling out my ears...

Kolya

[Piter]

It sounds good to me. But I suppose it is a bit boring when You listen to this whole evening... But I'll try

[Bluegrime]

Huzzah! I fell asleep with that on a loop using my mega loud setting. And yes, i did wake up when my parents finally had enough and killed the power to my computer. But it was certainly easier to fall alseep with repetetive sound then with the normal backround noises of my house..

[Kolya]

Ha! Finally scientific prove!
Thanks Bluegrime.

I thought about an update but unfortunately I lost the original work in a crash....okay, I accidentally deleted it. Oh well.

Kolya

[metal dawn]

Your "thick layer of soothing brown noise" just sounds like 8-bit hiss to me. Annoying, not soothing.

What the hell is "brown noise?" Sounds nasty.

[ZylonBane]

It's what brownian motion sounds like. Bit of an odd concept.

Anyone who wants to reproduce this, just record the background noise from your audio card and normalize it up to 50% or so. Cut out the high frequencies. Voila.

[RocketMan]

I like the idea very much Kolya...its quite a change of pace. Don't worry if its not universally embraced at first....this kind of thing is highly mathematical and takes careful tuning to work correctly. I've always been amused by the idea that noise can resonate in your body at some point and help calm you down. Kinda like the vibration of ths subway puts me to sleep

[Kolya]

I have to admit that I didn't have much of a clue about the mathematical/acoustic background nor about the psychological awareness-levels that correspond to certain electrical brain frequencies. I just chose the sounds that seemed soothing to me, tested, added, leveled, tested and so on...
I've read a lot more about this by now and I'm working on another version. It will incorporate the concept of binaural frequencies to slowly get you down to delta-stage over the course of half an hour in a linear way. So no repeat until sleep this time.
What I'm trying to achieve is a real delta-inducer based on VonBraun sounds, the effect described very well in Gibson's Fragments of a Hologram Rose.

About "brown noise": The way I used the term it means the lower frequencies of "white noise". White noise is basically a combination of all of the different frequencies of sound (much like white light is a combination of the different wavelengths/colours of light). It can mask other sounds on all frequencies. Accordingly brown noise can only mask low level sounds.
In the VonBraunSoother I just used it to blur the the different samples into a general rumble.
The next update will start with almost white noise to mask any environmental sounds you might hear. It then will slowly limit down to the lower frequencies meanwhile getting more gentle until barely audible at the end so you don't wake up again when environmental sounds become audible suddenly.

Just so you know: This is just an experiment of mine. And while I hope it will have some effect nothing you will ever hear can simply put you to sleep if you're not sleepy at all or don't intend to relax or sleep. It's no magic.

Kolya

[ZylonBane]

In the VonBraunSoother I just used it to blur the the different samples into a general rumble.

But it's not even remotely periodic enough to be considered a rumble. I just hear loud hissing with some kind of rough warble in the background.

[DaBeast]

The best cure is to just not turn off your pc, provided it's in your room or record that noise.

Sailors would feel uncomfortable for a few days on shore leave. The sailors cure being copious amounts of alcohol, and maybe some hoes.

I can vouch for the first one.

[Kolya]

But it's not even remotely periodic enough to be considered a rumble. I just hear loud hissing with some kind of rough warble in the background.

Mmh, I didn't know that a rumble is periodic per definition. What I meant is that the brown noise was supposed to blur the differences between sound sources (samples and generated sounds).
But I take it that you generally missed lower frequencies since you heard only hiss and a warble. The next version will have more bass and I will consider reducing the "hiss".
I'm also thinking about adding some sort of repetitive beat. I'll see into that.

Sailors would feel uncomfortable for a few days on shore leave. The sailors cure being copious amounts of alcohol, and maybe some hoes.

That's interesting. I was never on a ship for more than a few hours (2xCalais-Dover and back). I do remember two things about it though. First thing was the weird feeling of being on a moving building when leaving the shore. Second was the trust I placed into this pile of rusty steel as long as I heard the engines hum. And they had a good Belgian beer on board: "Stella-Artois". I think it's available in the US too.

Kolya

[TheNightTerror]

I've spent a few days on a ferry before, I never got jumpy without the sound of the engine, it was not hearing any water that made me grumpy. That, and the fact I was on solid ground. I spent half the time I was on that boat hanging over the railing watching the water, or, if we hit particularly rough water, I'd run back and forth across the ferry to see how long I could go before I fell flat on my ass. It was great fun.