Why does your voice sound different on a recording? Greg Foot Answers Your Questions | Head Squeeze
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.ย. 2013
- Greg Foot tells us exactly why we hate the sound of our own voice on answering machines and such like in this Headsqueeze single question science video.
When we make a recording of our own voice then play it back, we are hearing it more or less as other people do. The sound waves travel as a series of vibrations through the air and meet our ear drum. The ear drum in turn sets three tiny bones vibrating - the incus, malleus and the stapes and they send vibrations into the cochlea. The cochlea translates the vibrations into nerve signals and those are sent to the brain. Why then does that sound so different to what we perceive as our own voice?
When you speak you hear your own voice in two different ways. The first is as above, vibrating sound waves hitting your ear drum. The second way is via vibrations inside your skull actually set off by your vocal chords. Those vibrations travel up through your bony skull and again set the ear drum vibrating. However as they travel through the bone they spread out and lower in pitch, giving you a false sense of bass. Then when you hear a recording of your voice, it sounds distinctly higher and the comparison can be quite surprising.
Greg Foot explains all in this marvellous Headsqueeze video. If you have any other sound related science questions, post them in the comments below and we'll try to cover them. Give us a thumbs up, share and subscribe for more science goodness from Greg and the team.
Have you ever inhaled helium? Greg Foot has the science behind it: • What happens when you ...
Whether your voice sounds different or not, have you wondered if your dog understands you: • Can my dog understand ...
/ headsqueezetv
th-cam.com/users/subscription_c...
Filmed at www.evolutions.tv
Greg Foot Answers Your Questions: An entirely interactive show, every week Science Daredevil Greg Foot answers the questions that our audience have sent in through TH-cam comments, Tweets, and facebook posts. Make sure you keep asking us questions in the comments! - บันเทิง
I always cringe at the sound of my voice on a recording. I hate hate hate it. But to know that that's actually my actual real life voice, kills me inside.
lol and awwww
Welcome to the club.......
Same here....shouldn't have watched this video...
its the same phenomena as when we hate pictures of ourselves and so on, because its different than what our brain perceives of us as ourselves. We always hear ourselves through our skull, and we always see ourselves in the mirror (flipped image) well, when you hear a recording, you hear a voice that you brain realizes is you but is confused because it's not used to that being what it perceives as you, so you cringe at the idea. When you see photos of yourself, you are seeing a true image of yourself, but you are used to the flipped image of yourself that your brain thinks of as you when you look into a mirror.
bottom line, you don't hate on peoples voices, so just because you think you sound awful, realize everyone else thinks you sound normal.
Why does it kill you inside?!?
In my head: AMAZING mimicing voices
Outside my head: ...............
Ashfur the blonde edgelord inside my head:amazing voice
Outside: death in a sound
same thing with me inside my head i sound amaaaaaaazing but then when i hear it recorded its acually very dissapointing
IM WORRIED IF WHAT I SOUND ON A RECORDING IS WHAT I ACTUALLY SOUND LIKE TO OTHER PEOPLE OTHER THAN MYSELF BECAUSE I THINK I SOUND BEAUTIFUL IN MY HEAD BUT SOFNANSJSLSBD
I've seen you before....
Yep...
I hate it everytime I hear my voice in recording video or audio. It's really far different from my original voice. It sounds like so childish like a voice of 12 years old the fact that I'm already 19.
Same for me, but my sounds kinda gothic like or a teenager accent. But my voice sounds smoother when I talk, but not when it's recorded. :(
Also when I yell in a recording, I sound like a child yelling.
I found my mic on my tablet, and I started talking to it, and I can hear my real voice :D (Not 100% of the time though... :/)
Jen White I’m 11 and I sound like a 6 year old in recording I hate that fact cuz I do not sound like a 6 year old in real life
jen white same here
Thought about doing TH-cam until I recorded my voice
Same. My voice is SO DEEP when I record
same that's why I don't talk xD
Mine is so squeaky
+Ak-47 Agar Yt LOL ME TOO
lol same
:( I hate my voice and wish I could change it. But now I might not talk as much in life as I usually do T^T...
I hate mine to
Jαмєѕ ? My voice sounds like a baby on recording I hate it
Crazy Gamer 320 my voice sounds like deeper on recording I’m pretty sure it’s cringe for everyone to see their voice on recording bc they don’t think that’s what they sound like
guys your lucky u have a voice because people dont have a voice at all which means u have 75% of having a voice so yeah be happy!
You can change your voice through extensive practice, but it takes a long time, or through surgery. It's far better for you to learn how to live with and accept who you are. While I'm not necessarily comparing it to obsessive behavior, it is close.
It's similar to those who are never satisfied with their physical appearance so they do surgery until they're unrecognizable. It may start with something minor and derail. People may think; 'well I've already done my nose, so I might as well do my ears'. Then on it goes. For examples, go to Google images and search for "surgery addiction".
Not a pretty picture...
This probably just crushed all of the aspiring singer's dreams lol
it really did 😞
Yep really did I stopped singin
I'm gonna sing to myself only from now on...
Man I remember when I heard the way I sound in recordings, I said to myself " Eww why do I have friends? "😔
Hundreds....hundreds of people say i sound amazing but recording.......😠😠😠😠😠😡😣
Guess I'm gonna shut up forever...
+Nora Elshazly lol
😂😂😂😂
Me to
5th Reply 5 Years Later Lol
if i hear my voice for a long time it makes me kills
I doubt anyone will be reading this, but I'll put it here just in case. I've been told I have a good singing voice, but also am bothered by my voice on recording. That goes to a psychological thing. It isn't that you have a bad voice, it's that suddenly, your brain hears you talking in something that's not your own, and naturally makes you reject what seems unnatural. Its like how you would freak out if you shut your eyes, and still saw everything. If you know that, and listen carefully, you might here that recorded voice sound occasionally, I know I did. Oddly enough, my voice on recording doesn't bother me as much after hearing similarities.
+Krayola D We sound like we sound on recordings, yes. The video is correct, just missing some extra info that worried a lot of people.
+Raquel Pernell Are you saying that other people like your voice in person, but not on recording? My guess is that that is a technical problem. It can mean two things (assuming people are being honest):
1. The camera (or whatever was used to record the singing) cannot pick up everything. Like how voice recordings on older phones sound like crap.
and/or
2. The speakers of what the recording is being played on are not high enough quality. That's why music sounds better on those $100 headphones than those $5 gas station earbuds. On the more expensive ones, it Is able to produce more of the notes. On the cheap ones, It is not playing all of the notes.
It isn't actually missing notes, but I can't think of the appropiate word. It is similar to how someone that is partially deaf can hear certain things perfectly, but can't hear other things at all. Tones might be a better word, but there is another word specifically for this that I can't think of right now.
Endrew Swiftwind But YOU said that you were told u have a good singing voice but on recording u sound like shit.....How are u able to fix that
+Raquel Pernell No, I said that it sounded terrible to me. It stopped sounding as bad when my voice cracked and it sounded similar to my recorded voice. So my mind accepted it a bit more.
Thanks for ur info,this video teared me down bcs i feel that my voices isnt good and indeed this video is lack of this important info
so my voice actually DOES sound like a 5 year old's? damn . . .
Don't worry, mine too... damn!
***** voice buddies! *high five*
My voice is so stupid I have to live forever alone now
Lkhagvasuren Davaatseren me to whyyyyy
Lkhagvasuren Davaatseren #storyofmylife
This is why I don't make TH-cam videos. I'll start editing them then I'll hear my terrible voice, close down the video editor and finally delete everything.
You get used to it after a while
Lol. 😂😂😂 me too 😂😂😂
J Garcia you and me both!! lol!!
yeah me also
+J Garcia Same.
oh so my recorded voice is my actual voice?
crap
I KNOW RIGHT
random person my voice sounds like my balls dropped when i was 2 and they never stopped falling
Dylan Reddekopp 100th loke
Dylan Reddekopp I suck it makes me want to kill myself
Im never going to sing. Ever again
Oh my Gwad my voice is so disgusting
I listened to a recording of me singing its summer from phineas and ferb back in like 2007, and I sound like a girl oh my god eeww eww, my self confidence has been destroyed.
Can i hear it (nothing creepy) just curious
hhahahaa so is mines
franson goodwill I sound like a mouse.
My voice sounds terrible just go to my channel
My friend told me I sounded different in a recording. Huh.
Hayden Rose Same
Why do I even have friends if my voice sounds like this. My voice is not high it’s deep and I’m a girl 😶
Yeah I had all my friends listen to a recording of my voice and they thought it was someone different and said it didn’t sound like me at all
Yep, when I talked for me it's not deep. But when I record my voice, my voice became deep😂😂😂
Me too
So you mean I sound like a goat in real life when I sing?
T_T
@James The smol bean my singing voice just completely shocked me when I closed my ears. like I sound worse on a recording but with your method I sound like an angel. are you pulling tricks on me because I dont even sound that good singing in my head
@@Corgiॐ
Nah, I've looked it up online. Covering the flappy part of your ear (behind your ear) whilst looking as if you were making Mickey Mouse ears will actually give you a pretty good approximation of how you sound.
I think it's an in-between of the recording and that. No-one likes the sound of their own voice, your not alone.
I always feel self conscious about talking too loud because I consider it rude, but hearing here that my voice is much more quiet than what I'm hearing is extremely helpful.
mine sounds like 5 years old when recorded, so awful...
Mine does too.
mine too
Same pinch😥😥
i love my voice in real life it sounds more mature but when i record my voice i feel like i would shut up forever
I'm sorry but this is COMPLETELY opposite with me (which is why i thought the video was confusing at first when reading an article on it and how it described the deeper vs higher) when I hear my voice on a recording, video, etc. it sounds much deeper than what I hear in my head. I feel like the voice I hear in my head is higher pitched and more tonal. however, when I hear a recording, my voice is far deeper and way more monotone. so, why is that? if it's supposed to be lower through my skull then why does it sound higher than recordings.
Same!
I was just going to make this reply =P Same here, i sound higher in my head but lower in videos
I am the same too, i thought i'm always slightly higher, but when i heard myself is damn low!
*****
Well, I cannot say that this is a problem to me, neither do I suffer. Women seem to enjoy my deep voice, especially after waking up. :) I just want to know why does it sound lower and deeper in a record, phones, and as it appears in others' heads, than in my own. Is it really a mystery? Or is just my mind converting it somehow, making it sounds higher pitched only to me?
The point is that the voice sounds different from how we perceive it ourselves. For some it might be with a lower frequency, for others higher, it doesn't really matter.
Here's a question to go off of that. Why do some people sound different recorded than in person (via video, phone, etc)?
It depends on the microphone. Lapel mics don't have a great bass response. Some of them sound really good but cheaper ones can make a voice sound tinny. Mics designed for podcasting take advantage of proximity effect(the closer you are to the mic, the more bass). As an example, the Shure SM7B used to be very popular with rapper because you can get up close and really beef out your voice. There's a lot of variables but those are two extremes.
Yeah so like the voice you hear in your recordings isn't your actual voice is depends of that
My voice when I hear it : oh yeaaaa
My voice in recordings : **high pitched** oH yEaAaAa
NOOOOOOOOOOO. thats what I sound like to everyone else?! Ugh. Oh well, I was probably better off not knowing this xD
me tooo ahhhhh
Depressing isn't it?
No, my friend told me that my original voice sounds different than the recorded one
@@vasilikik8609 me too, my parents told me dat too tho
Help meee
The thing that pisses me off is when I talk I sound like im talking normally but im actually talking in like low hard to hear talk because im litterly told to speak up when I talk and when I talk like what others say is normal I sound like im yelling a little bit in my head
tell me about it. recently I've been taking vocal lessons to kinda try and strengthen my vocal cords and I've had to kinda cop a little british accent on it cause my normal voice, oh dear, you would cringe.
Yeah... i had this problem
speaking like i feel is normal then someone cuts me mid sentance and asks me to say it lauder cuz they cant hear what im saying >.> its annoying...or like having to order twice because they didnt hear you the first time and it feels awkward to raise my voice like im yelling zzzz....
Does this mean my actual voice is low compared to what i hear or idk lol
Not the answer I was hoping for. :(
You missing some info look at the comment above u
I always thought i have a pretty deep voice, but when i hear a recording of it, it is a lot deeper and i can't even understand myself often.
I thought I had a deep voice until I recorded .I sound higher
Try and listen to my recorded voice. It aint good
@@IamINERT Same, which makes me have depression.
@@fleon1269 fr .being 17 and sounding like I'm 14 😯 when recording
@@IamINERT I've read some articles that says as you grow older, your voice changes , to sound more ''mature'', so I guess we still have hope, another way is to increase your testosterone level which will deepen your voice. Good luck to both of us. -.-
My voice sounds manlier in real life and when i record it it aounds like a freaking retarded sheep
BINDs same I sound like a little girl my voice is normal in real life
When I was younger I thought I could sing good.. every time I sang, people kept looking at me weirdly.... And now I know why I shouldn't sing, I love singing so I just sing in my room and hope no one hear me
Thanks Anna - that's a good question!!
The video is cut on Adobe Premier and the graphics are done on After Effects!
I wonder if there's a way to make a recording of a voice sound like what it does to the person whose voice it is.
la .alEksolas. Attach some sort of speaker/device, that will broadcast a recording or your voice, to their vocal cords? I think that would be the only way? Even then idk if it would work.
Its like hearing a song from inside a car and then stepping out of it, closing the door and wishing you could hear the music the same way outside of the car as you do inside it. You can turn it up as loud as you want but it is still going to sound muffled and different when you exit it and close the door because the sound isnt all around you but is away from you. Same with the voice thing, you sound isnt traveling through you from inside to out when you hear it on a device that is detached from you. perhaps not the best analogy but its what i thought of. Also I realize I may gotten some details wrong or my theory about the device on the vocal cords could be wrong but I have in no way claimed to be an expert in biology, anatomy, or any science for that matter 😅 anyone reading this, please cut me some slack.
not rn therese not
In my head I sound pretty cool but in, recording I sound really sarcastic.
I wonder what Morgan Freeman hears when he talks.
Taylor Foulkrod God
The walking dead
God
Jesus himself
When I hear my recorded voice, I literally wanted to die
I’m so freakin mad at my voice right now. I’m watching my friend’s stream with me and I sound like I have freakin soap in my mouth. Is their a voice changer potion or somethin?
I wonder what morgan free man sounds like in his head......
Probally sounds like what the rock thinks he sounds like
My whole life has been a lie 😱 I can't take the truth seriously I might jump of a bridge I can't handle the fact that everybody has to hear my voice like it does on camera I hate my voice on record I wish people could hear how I actually talk 😩😭😭😭
James The smol bean thx
Kasserole 22 all of my friends from school sound the same on video but no mine? Why?
Kasserole 22 so if I was my friend would I sound like a b***h?
Danger Things your voice is the same it’s just your mind playing tricks
He said in the video we actually sound way higher than we think but my friends say i sound higher on recording not in real life tho
Great video! I really love this. Great work :)
Yeah I hate hearing myself on a recorder. Its low but just doesnt sound like me.
that's weird, my recorded voice sounds high pitch, but my friends always tease me over having deep voice and that's what I always hear on my own. O_o
That's because you hear it even lower inside your head. You might think your real voice is high, but, as your friends are not able to hear your "inside voice", they still think it's deep. :)
Juan Carlos Prada yeah man i realized that before. Even that question was few months ago I appreciate your explanation :D
When I hear my voice: I think I sound pretty good.
When I hear the recording: who knew my voice sucks.
This is a cool video! Thank you.
Hiya - great question! So great that we already made a vid on it.
If you go to the James May Q&A strand you'll find "Why do mosquitoes prefer some people to others?"
:)
Well here's my question:
Me: Voice fairly deep
Friends: My voice is deep
Recording: YOU SOUND LIKE A CHIPMUNK BWAHAHAHAHA!
Why? Why is my voice higher on recording (not just slightly but incredibly to the point that I doubt it's my own voice)
I also know of 2 other people this happens to so I'm not alone here.
When that happens, u listen to ur real.voice
Same goes for me.
But other people think I have a deep voice. The contrast between my voice and what my friends think VS what audio sounds like is too extreme to be trusted.
Achtung_Spitfire Same thing here mate, A new college friend told me that she couldn't recognize my voice over the phone and thought i was her roommate (a girl) and was drunk......... but who cares that's not what i sound like in person :p
Achtung_Spitfire Hi there! Just a bit of info, if you're still interested in this. The reason why you have a deep voice but it sounds high pitched on a record is because of the quality of the sound recorder. Due to the quality of components in the mic of the recorder, it may or may not capture the low vibrations of a deep sound, recording the high toned part mostly. Also, when you do a recording, most apps and devices make it in a MP3 which has it's limitations altogether with the fact that it compresses sound information to save up on file size. There's a myriad of implications on that side that also further disrupts how your voice really sounds. I record myself in videos for my company (I'm the owner and have to do that quite frequently) with a DSLR but the sounds are recorded with two pro microfones (one in front of me, one behind me) and the two are mixed before releasing the video. Hope that elucidates a little bit!
Thank u sooo much for this video..
I am just now learning about this. I always hated how my voice sounded when recorded but learning that is how everyone hears my voice... 28 years of my life has been a lie. lol
Apparently all the dudes sound higher pitched in recordings & many ladies are saying they sound deeper. How do we explain this
+Trevor Estrada I'm male and my voice sounds quite deep in videos compared to how I perceive them when speaking.
I'm a dude and my voice also sound deeper in recordings
My voice sounds so bad, but for me it sounds normal
Trevor Estrada I'm a dude and my voice is SO MUCH deeper in recordings
I'm a male and I sound like a cringy goth girl on recordings
Then how does Cover's for songs in youTube sounds so nice :/ ?
RIGHT
They were autotuned i think , and their recording quality are pretty good.
Great explanation.
Great Video!
this is so devastating
I’m 13 and I sound like I’m 8 on recording
Well thanks for the little lesson because I always wonder why my voice sounded different from on a recording now I know
Wow this had me scared, sad, and mad all at once felt like my heart was sinking 😂😂😂 Thank God I can manipulate my voice a little closer to what think it sounds like in my head when I record because it does not sound good otherwise 😂😭😭
i think as a 17 year old my voice sounds deep ... but on recording i sound like an annoying 9 year old
same
means on call of duty you sound like that no offense
+StonedDj2321 none taken, not really... I'm not that big of a squeeqer
Damn, Morgan Freeman or Vin Diesel must go insane. If their voices sounds even cooler inside their heads XD
I've been asking different teachers and people this for years, but now I finally know the answer!
awesome video, i was always curious about this subject although i do prefer my natural voice over the one i hear when im talking
Really? But... Why's does my voice sounds so deep when recorded? Can anyone explain?
Lucky
+Matt Toaster What does it sound like in your head?
Well I'm gonna go lill myself now
+Krayola D Replace the 'k' with an 'l'. You can get the hang of it relatively easily. :]
Newton'sFlamingLaserSword No pun intended?
significant hit to my confidence.
Great vid.
This is what exactly happens to me. I have a perfectly nice voice when I sing and talk, but when I record myself talking, I go two octaves up (I'm overreacting, but you know what I mean). How can you fix your voice pitch so that it will sound mostly the same on a recording?
I sound dumb when recording, I can't even pronounce R or any smart words such as "terms", "different","difficult",
"Importantly" or immigration I hate my self.
Thanks for this very fun way of learning. I can relate more to what is said through the illustrations. :) artistic, creative, and I love the accent, too!
now i understand why so many (including myself) think we have amazing voices when we actually suck :p
now i am depressed X[
I wonder what Barry White would have heard?
My voice being recorded sounds like I'm 6 or something like that.
I hear my voice like I'm my age. *BISH WHAT*
Well that just blew my mind...
Thx a lot
My voice sounds like a little girl I hate it I hate it I'm gonna cry ToT
this is the real reason why i wont upload a video! in person or on the phone everyone says i have a nice deep cool smooth voice but my voice sounds TERRIABLE on recording! LMAOOOOOO
finally got it jesusssssssssss thanks m8.
That's cool!
Are you telling me.. When I hear myself talk.. That's not what I sound like? Awww. Dangit.
jesus... so basically when i think im shouting in my head i'm actually talking on a medium level that gets heard. and if im ultra shouting i'm just shouting?.
thank you greg foot
I love you for teaching me
And I thought my voice was good when i singed. I wonder how the Famous singers deals with this fact.
My voice sounds a LOT lower. Not higher. Why is that????!! Because if that's my voice then I sound EXACTLY like a man...
Well you are your fathers child
U need to check ur underwear
:D awesome video
WOW, guess I aint the only one, thx! Sing on people!
That's wierd my voice always sounds lower on a recording...
maybe it's because you actually have a naturally deep voice when you talk
I actually recorded my voice and played it back to 20 friends and family before i posted my 1st video and everyone said that i sound different compared to how they hear me. So i'm sure that this might be the case but i'm sure depending on the recording equipment and software your voice can sound different than how you actually sound.
Yeah it is different.
Bro i am afraid im so Denial that i actually believe that
Dang it.
My hopes for this video were as high as my voice, (now officially & apparently is), in real life.
I still give it a 👍though.
I loved this video. /sub
Thanks Greg.
There are a few issues with this explanation. Firstly, you've confused the terms "pitch" and "timbre" - We don't perceive the pitch (being the actual note) of our voice to be lower than it sounds to anybody else, if that were the case we wouldn't be able to sing in tune.
Our tissues absorb a lot of the bass frequencies generated by our vocal chords, which are then transmitted to our inner ear and we perceive our own voice to have more bass frequencies (deeper or "warmer" timbre) than somebody listening to what's transmitted through the air.
This is compounded by the fact that high frequency sounds don't travel as readily through body tissue.
For those claiming the opposite to what's in this video, this is probably due to proximity effect. Put simply: The closer a microphone is to the sound source, the more bass it will pick up. Being very close to a microphone will cause your voice to sound deeper than it actually is.
Telephone networks do away with a lot of high frequencies, which is another reason for a voice sounding deeper or more "bass-heavy" over the phone.
This is not really the answer that I'm looking for.
When I hear my voice through the recording, it doesn't sounds higher, but it sound lower. Really contradicting from what you told here. So this still remains a confusion to me.
yes my voice sounds LOWER on a recording like by an octave
Mine also!!!! It sounds way too deep
same principle, just forget he said higher and replace with deeper. Same same.
same comment i made, my voice sounds MUCH deeper on recordings.
...a lot of it depends on the frequency response captured by the mic and then the frequency response of the speaker you play it back on
Mine sounds really nice, i feel for u guys get ur voice better
Thanks for trying to give us some hope
my voice sounds like there's a bunch of spit in my mouth 😭😭😭
that’s gross but honestly same ;(
I talk to my friends with my headset and they all have ear phones and they all sound the same till it comes to me
Very cool
What is the frequency drop numerically? How much lower do you sound to yourself than in actuality? How would one measure this? Measure the frequency of the jaw vibrations by implanting a microphone into your skull?
Keep an eye on the channel because I'm pretty sure Greg will be giving us a 101 on why we grow facial hair in a few weeks!
:)
It's somthing wrong with sound recording. I recorded my friend talking and it was completly diffrent to what I heard standing next to him.
Thats called a shitty mic
+ᅟᅟᅟᅟᅟᅟ Bruh
most people dont use highquality microphones its actualy not verry dithrent to the voice you hear this video is pretty missleading
I've always thought I have that assertive tone on my voice, until someone told to me to change the pitch of my voice when I speak because it sounds 'soft'. I thought there was no problem with my voice until I recorded it. And here I am after searching the internet why.. :(
Thanks
shit i hate my voice on recording
Me too
In my head I sound like Mark Wahlberg and on recording I sound like a 12 year old (which is weird because I've usually been told my voice is a bit deep)
Very interesting
WHAT?
That's how I sound like????
NOOOOO