Sound Effects

[EustaceM]

My director asked me if I could add a voice/sound effect to an actors voice to make them sound like a ghost. How can I achieve that effect with the soundboard equipment? Would I need to have a computer to do so? How would I hook up the computer to do it.

 

[pugg71]

I'm not a sound pro, but I pretend to be one on the weekends, so I'm just brainstorming here.

First: I think the effect you're looking for is a thing called "reverse reverb." Check out the television scenes in the movie Poltergeist for an example of this. Creeeepy.

What's the make & model of your sound console? It may already have some effects built-in.

Hooking up a PC to your console should be easy. I keep a 1/8" to 1/4" adapter handy for just that purpose. At my venue, I often get folks who want to use their own music, but only have that music on an MP3 player or smart phone. Hook the adapter into the headphone jack, and the other end into one of the 1/4" inputs on the back of the console.

Finding software to generate the effect may not be as easy. Others here with more experience may be able to recommend good products.

If you don't have any other way to generate effects, you could try playing with the EQ for that channel. The drawbacks would be (a) it wouldn't be a great effect and (b) if that actor also does a "normal" voice you'd have to reset the EQ when the effect wasn't needed.

 

[MarshallPope]

Something that has worked well for me for a similar effect was to use a guitar effects pedal. I needed to make the voice of God, and, IIRC, I used a Phase pedal. Cheap and easy.

 

[chausman]

You can do it cheaply, or you can do it expensively. I might go the recorded route, because then you could add a lot of effects, and not worry about turning the effect "on" or "off" if the actor needed a "real" voice. You would need a computer, but any computer could handle it. I would record the actor saying the lines as the ghost while you record it, and then you can play with it in Audacity. Audacity can record your actor, add the effects, and play the recording back, but I would probably want to use something like iTunes or burn it to a CD and use that.

 

[TimmyP1955]

A chorus effect into a reverb. Heavy on the FX at first, then fade the FX out if the ghost is to have a serious conversation (Jacob Marley). (If you have Yamaha FX, I like Symphonic instead of chorus.)