What is a hobby you enjoy, but seems too quirky or obscure to bring up in most conversations? - eviltoast

Mine would be creating pen and paper ciphers for my made up secret communication needs.

  • Console_Modder@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    Absolutely!

    I have a bookmark saved on my computer at home to an old forum with the instructions I followed when I started doing this, and I can send that link later.

    There are two programs that I use, and both are free.

    GIMP - image editing software

    Audacity - audio editing software

    Here is the basic process from that bookmarked forum post that I can remember off the top of my head. If something is wrong (especially the Audacity import settings, since I don’t ever change them), I will fix it later.

    1. In GIMP (or other software of your choice) convert the image to a bitmap (.bmp). This step is very important!

    2. Use the option to import raw data as A-law with “little endian” (I have no idea what those setting do, but I assume it’s for keeping the header intact)

    3. Change the timeline in Audacity from time to samples and select everything after the 34th sample to edit and add effects (samples 1-34 are the information that tells your computer that this is a picture CHANGING ANYTHING IN THE HEADER WILL STOP YOU FROM OPENING THE IMAGE AFTER THE EDIT)

    4. Export the audio using the raw data option, selecting A-law again. This should re-save the “audio” as a bitmap image as it will not add an audio file header to the data.

    I believe the blue parking garage image uses reverb, or maybe a phasor… possible both to get that effect? But there are a lot of setting to mess with for each audio effect that can dramatically change the outcome. The trees picture was made by putting the original picture in the left audio channel, and putting a horizontally flipped copy of the image in the right audio channel. Delete the header from the flipped copy, and exporting the data smashes them together in this really strange mirror effect. Afterward, I would use GIMP for any color correcting, changing saturation/hue, simple stuff

    Edit: spelling and formatting