Processing Images Through Guitar Effects Pedals

Expounding upon a video from a few days ago where i utilize a technique called SSTV, or Slow Scan TV, which allowed me to convert an image into audio data and decode the data back into an image. Then i figured i should add some effects to see how that would affect the resulting image. Here i utilize outboard effects like guitar pedals to augment the audio data to achieve similar results.
Audio is broken up into five sections:
1. Audio recorded directly into Tascam Model 12
2. Audio processed by MXR Carbon Copy Analog Delay
3. Audio processed by Fairfield Circuitry Shallow Water
4. Audio processed by Empress Reverb
5. Audio processed onto cassette tape while slighty adjusting tape speed while recording.
My girlfriend got some film developed recently and the image used here is a nice shot she got of her farm cat, Todd, who has since passed away. I fade in the processed images to create a smoother effect against the original.
RIP Todd

[@S-CB-SL-Animations]

"Get off the phone, I'm trying to use the internet!"

[@paxson2000]

“The song i was downloading only had five minutes left!”

[@xmbiedirt]

That's a good comment.

[@Pagliacci_Rex]

"Goodbye" 😡

[@fclefjefff4041]

@@jamesmcn0000 How obnoxiously boomery of you

[@deltab9768]

My first thought with that sound. Dial-up!

[@zephyr6913]

I want to see this video being a no context lore tape in a horror game.

[@paxson2000]

That would be dope. If you make the game i’ll make the footage!

[@Pagliacci_Rex]

​@paxson2000 I could see this being in a Remedy Game, Sam Lake loves this kind of stuff.

[@ajcottrill4949]

Y’all need to get on this haha

[@The0Stroy]

Analog Horror vibes!

[@backwardsface3046]

Nobody like this comment it’s at 666

[@chandra_creator]

People are talking about agony & suffering, but yk what? Maybe that cat's just vibing.

[@paxson2000]

I think people sometimes forget that existence=suffering=existence Thanks for the positivity!

[@WolfWalrus]

Yeah cats just _do this_ sometimes

[@julius879]

That's just a tired little lad

[@paxson2000]

@@julius879 he’s a wee bit sleepy

[@kidfriendly6666]

LOL​@@WolfWalrus

[@randomcreature147]

its sad that so many musicians have to go through this... truly heartbreaking

[@paxson2000]

very devastating stuff people

[@Canyon_Lark]

you mean an analog VFX phase?

[@Scratchdhelp]

as a musician myself, i found it very difficult to use guitar pedals, this would happen to me, but i learnt to get used to it to achieve *tone*

[@paxson2000]

@@Scratchdhelp welcome to the chat Tone Ranger

[@your-mom-irl]

Now do big muff

[@BrickNewton]

Should not have clicked on this halfway through an acid trip

[@paxson2000]

Hope you learned a lot

[@wardrich]

Correct, you should have done it at the start 🤣

[@seph__]

Same boat, clicked on this in the middle of a shroom trip lol

[@seph__]

good stuff tho

[@joshuasbandit]

It was meant to happen

[@247snowflake]

I've heard of people doing this in Audacity by importing BMP files, applying effects, then re-exporting them as images, but to do it with analog is something else entirely. Mind-blowing.

[@thehockeynerd3479]

How do you do this? Is there a video I can watch on it?

[@aLtee]

Life been feeling like this for about 2 years

[@paxson2000]

@@aLtee sometimes that’s life. Hope it gets better

[@generalmarkmilleyisbenedic8895]

Same, but longer

[@MattRTGB]

Yeah fr

[@kiq4767]

more like since Rome fell

[@upstairsdownstairs]

All that’s left is to go full circle and teach a cat how to play the guitar

[@macario1885]

This is how it looks when you stare at the same spot of the room without blink for too long.

[@paxson2000]

@@macario1885 i used to do that when i was a kid. Would stare a spot in the room until the rest of my vision started to brown-out. For some reason always had to move my eyes before too long.

[@moom81]

did the same thing but with popcorn ceilings. peripheral vision darkens into static

[@NameFirst-fb6km]

Toki ?

[@unfortunatelebanese]

Ah yeah i do this so often, with bathroom tiles and stuff it's like getting high but without the drugs?

[@toi_techno]

Lol Whilst having a bad vibe on 2CI

[@theunease5541]

"Hey babe, look what came out of those photos I developed. Doesn't Todd look so cute yawning like that? I’m glad I have something so nice to remember him with." “Wow babe, that really is a great photo. I know EXACTLY what to do with it.” RIP Todd

[@Nenga117]

Hip-Hop producers: “I only sample vinyl for my beats” This guy:

[@paxson2000]

Lol

[@bbyponk]

this hasnt been true for like 20 years

[@AutumnalSunflower]

this new analogue horror channel is great

[@Denver_Risley]

VERY cool! Long live the circuit benders and senders of wrong signals through wrong things.

[@paxson2000]

we are the dreamers of dreams

[@mr.croasant2055]

@@paxson2000’we are the music makers’

[@zethnevarg2399]

this sounds like an unholy demon got trapped within a tv and took on the form of a cat, sentenced to eternal damnation

[@paxson2000]

more like eternal jam station my guy

[@shadowchasernql]

correction, cats are already demons

[@ShadowZero27]

yea it just sounds like a modem or fax machine

[@paxson2000]

@@ShadowZero27 and clouds just look like clouds

[@fezsquall9]

​@paxson2000 then what's that cloud i saw one time that looked like a slug jumping over a baguette?

[@TheSecretProvider]

Interesting results. I also found out you can run video composite signals through (for some reason only) digital multi-fx pedals and it'll affect the video too. Vibrato makes the image wiggle, downsampling broke the video down into squares, delay made horizontal copies. It was really neat. Then the Atari classic I was using for the video signal caught fire (accidentally gave it AC power)

[@paxson2000]

Dude that sounds immense. Would love to see footage

[@crunchuy]

You can hear the sounds of this cat screaming in agony, distorted and stuck in time, bound to be replayed over and over. One can only imagine the transgressions made to get him there...

[@paxson2000]

This video was his consecration. He has been able to finally transcend this mortal plane

[@sockthustra8749]

"I still have nightmares about that cat." "What cat?"

[@Halophile95]

​@@sockthustra8749 Thank you for the Half-Life reference.

[@onionring56]

if this was uploaded as a cryptic video from some mysterious channel it would become one of those one hour rabbit hole video essays

[@paxson2000]

@@onionring56 damn i missed my chance at obscure relativity and now will have to settle for being relatively obscure

[@VoidySan]

Bro, this rips. Fun effects and unholy screams upon the cat.

[@paxson2000]

that is utmost praise. thanks for watching traveller

[@johninfl]

As a ham radio operator and synth enthusiast, you have made my day.

[@darz_k.]

It's what Todd would have wanted.

[@danielodors]

turning images into sstv signals then processing them through guitar effect modules is GENIUS!!!

[@paxson2000]

@@danielodors i was having such an awesome time experimenting with it. Thanks for the nice comment! Will try and keep up making creative content

[@Will-li7ux]

reminds me of that growing little cricket sound that you hear or feel when you are "entering" on an aya trip. It's so fast it feels like a little motor spinning inside your head. The fastest you hear the craziest you see.

[@paxson2000]

@@Will-li7ux must be the ancient spirits trying to communicate through SSTV!!

[@MooImABunny]

Todd yawning into oblivion is an interesting thing to witness. rip Todd

[@SilverTao]

awesome concept for getting varying levels of distortion in digital artworks or maybe as a rendering shader for games. I love the reverb and shallow water results

[@paxson2000]

Yeah it is a cool concept and also really fun way to experiment with image processing. I appreciate you watching and the comment!

[@copperlemon1]

You can do something sort of similar by forcing Audacity to open images and applying effects. Obviously you don't get the immediate feedback, having to export and open the image to see the alteration, but it's easy and free.

[@donutholebandit6212]

This does a better job at being uncanny and uncomfortable than any horror webseries ive seen this year.

[@paxson2000]

@@donutholebandit6212 yo thank you. I was just having a fun experiment, but i’m glad it’s being appreciated by horror fans. Thanks for watching

[@TheGoombaslayer]

Well this is just cool as hell

[@paxson2000]

now we just gotta figure out how to combine it with feedback loops!

[@RiffZifnab]

Literally what I just said to myself (:

[@EdwinDekker71]

So ...not very cool at all..?

[@TheKrokomaster]

Skipping over it forwards made me think almost nothing is happening. Skipping over backwards gave the weridest effects so i played it normally and with headphones it sounded like i summoned ghosts to my room. 10/10 most haunted vid on youtube.

[@paxson2000]

@@TheKrokomaster thanks for getting haunted

[@zoesidener7724]

this goes so hard actually, its also a very good way of visualizing the effects

[@paxson2000]

I totally agree on the visualization aid. In fact i believe there is a lot of aliasing going on in the first clip because of my mixer/recorder’s sample rate and not using any kind of low pass filter. Makes me want to experiment with different sample rates

[@semicool103]

the cat gets more scary the more I look at it. awesome

[@paxson2000]

😸

[@japhyriddle]

Very cool. Around I decade ago, I played around with something kinda similar. I have a VisiTel. It's a little device that lets you send still pictures over a phone line. I used to record the signal to tape, and alter the tape speed and volume to mess with skewing and contrast. I think maybe I ran it through a delay pedal once. It was only black and white though, and very low resolution. I've always been fascinated with SSTV. I hope to play around with it at some point.

[@paxson2000]

That sounds like a beautiful technique. And it sounds like VisiTel works in a similar way to SSTV, did the pictures load from the top down?

[@paxson2000]

There are greats apps for experimenting with SSTV, i downloaded a $4 one called CQ SSTV and that’s what i used to create these images

[@chodnejabko3553]

People never cease to amaze me with their creativity. This is both very interesting & pretty.

[@paxson2000]

@@chodnejabko3553 hey thank you!

[@runforitman]

Wonderful tribute to Todd Thank you for sharing :)

[@Clairemewsic]

This has been one of the coolest things i seen being done with SSTV!

[@paxson2000]

thank you kindly

[@jpeg1991]

Her: What sort of music do you listen to? Me: Processing Images Through Guitar Effects Pedals

[@paxson2000]

@@jpeg1991 Now That’s What (italicized)I Call Music

[@freedustin]

If you like these kinds of sounds maybe get into shortwave radio, you'll hear lots more and who knows maybe you can crack the code? (its likely just some monitoring station for a city owned water pump tho)

[@BlakeeBlue]

I've been waiting for someone to do this for so long. Thanks

[@paxson2000]

the prophecy has been foretold!

[@BlakeeBlue]

🙏🙏🙏

[@prodbyhuff]

idk why i was recommended this but this is so sick

[@paxson2000]

glad the algorithm got you here. and thank you dude

[@trancadoemcasa]

5 second in I thought I accidentally clicked on a new analog horror series or something. Cool experiment. RIP Todd :(

[@paxson2000]

@@trancadoemcasa thank you!

[@EricTheCleric93]

Now through an Earthquaker Data Corrupter to make your TV explode.

[@paxson2000]

dude that would be dope. Based on reading the description for that pedal i believe it would make it possible to create stacks of the same image based on the octave shifting capabilities. now i just need to get the pedal! thanks for watching

[@iamsushi1056]

The data bender doesn’t always work with audio-visual things. SSTV is better than most formats; requires a bit of knob tweaking though

[@newenglisharchitecture1012]

Real analog horror vibes, love it

[@MotorGoblin]

Such an interesting idea. Excellent work.

[@paxson2000]

Thank you Engine Demon

[@TheOneRiv]

This is deeply unsettling, but also fascinating

[@paxson2000]

@@TheOneRiv happy to entice such a varied response from your emotional palette

[@nc8313]

8 seconds in I felt sick like I was possessed by the cat. Great video and experiments!!

[@sampeel1272]

RIP Todd

[@paxson2000]

@@sampeel1272 thank you

[@kamikan22]

People: AI Cant have dreams AI dreams:

[@offgridmatt]

🤘Todd rules.

[@paxson2000]

He’s a great dude

[@CreeewDeeeTaaay]

Gotta love a cat with a people name. My cat’s name is Tiffany. He’s also a great dude.

[@mfcx3438]

i already know ts gonna pop up in my feed in like 9 years

[@wisdomax2891]

i love that you picked the worst image of a cat you could find for this experiment

[@FishVirus]

how so? I think it’s a pretty good image

[@lucidmime]

well this is one way to pay respects to Todd

[@stopmikeandjim3196]

I have no idea why this was recommended to me, but I'm glad it was

[@paxson2000]

@@stopmikeandjim3196 glad to hear it, thanks for watching

[@DM01710]

Using hardware to distort images like this is awesome, feels so oldskool like a black sabbath video for example sooo coool

[@hellf.o]

Wow this is awesome in so many ways..! I tried data sonification in Audacity but your results are much better! I'd just love a tutorial so much..! Thanks for sharing this great experiment!

[@paxson2000]

Thanks for the high praise! And i will try and get a tutorial up soon.

[@aldo_pinheiro]

​@@paxson2000 Pretty please! A tutorial would be amazing! I subscribed to get notified whenever it comes out.

[@scottishcheese13]

Heeey that’s what I was going to say. I’ve made a lot of pics and a couple videos using Audacity, but this is like an even better analog version.

[@paxson2000]

@@aldo_pinheiro thanks for subscribing! excited to make a how to video. Will try and get that done on my next day off of work

[@paxson2000]

@@scottishcheese13 thanks for checking out the video! I’ve never messed around with data sonification in Audacity before

[@jackpijjin4088]

We're headed back to Scanimate! :D Looking forward to seeing more like this; always wanted to try it, ever since running and recording my Dreamcast through an old low-end reel-to-reel.

[@paxson2000]

Yoooo thanks, bout to fall down a Scanimate rabbit hole. And i’d love to watch someone play dreamcast on a reel-to-reel

[@skbproject5589]

Ghosts in the Melodies

[@ElFlaccoBlanco]

RIP Todd, indeed. I feel some part of him got beamed to another planet…

[@Multi-Waves_Sketchbook]

Oh your entire channel is an audio goldmine! Excited to examine these goodsss

[@paxson2000]

Yo. That means a lot. I really enjoy making videos but music is where i started. And i’m not afraid to put up some weird shit that’s very lofi. I hope you enjoy

[@WilliamFancyFace]

1:31 He got transmogged into a rubber chicken

[@dennisyoung4631]

Yes, via a “transmogrifying circuit.” (Apologies to the poet who wrote of a transmogrifying Bee…)

[@XohjaiSbarkeater]

Its like a sound based Rorschach test. Incredible.

[@breadmoneyarchival]

This gives 2007-era KZbin kind of vibes

[@paxson2000]

@@breadmoneyarchival good

[@yassokiiba]

This is just incredibly good! What an amazing concept - the results are pretty special too

[@paxson2000]

It was mind blowing to discover i could turn pictures into audio. And once i loaded into my DAW and threw some effects on it and saw the results i was stoked on the results. That made me want to run them through guitar pedals. If you have any eurorack modules that process sound in cool ways you should try it!!!

[@clef-is-futile]

@@paxson2000i’m super excited to try this with my eurorack setup, gonna try and do research on my own but the tutorial would be amazing if you get around to it!!

[@nuisanceguru]

​@@paxson2000did you not have any problems with the files header?

[@paxson2000]

@@clef-is-futile most definitely. Will try and get that done on my next day off work. Looking forward to whatever you cook up!

[@mrr5835]

Amazing the variation you got! Glad u put the specifics in the description.😊

[@paxson2000]

Thank you! Try it for yourself, would love to see your results

[@Wood_spoon366]

I like the noises it sounds like a futuristic robot thinking

[@TheChadPad]

You, sir, have done something great here. This is true creativity. This has so much potential in artistry for music videos and such. Bravo👏

[@paxson2000]

@@TheChadPad thanks ChadPad! That’s a humbling comment. Appreciate it

[@TheChadPad]

@@paxson2000 you’re welcome sir. Thank you for sharing it with the rest of us

[@tonywagner6584]

Wow. Slow scan tv is super cool glad to see it in action I would have never thought of hooking up fx pedals. Fun fact: slow scan tv is how the moon landing in the 60s was transmitted back to earth for broadcast. Keep up the good work.

[@paxson2000]

We landed on the moon?!! Thanks for watching and for the bit of trivia

[@SpheresVA]

Image feed? Because I don’t think there’s SSTV for video

[@tonywagner6584]

​@@SpheresVAbasically they took the images and converted them to broadcast standard. Oversimplified explanation like making a gif from stills. Huge drop in quality but works.

[@SpheresVA]

@@tonywagner6584 I bet that took a long time unless they used robot36 or something which would tank the quality

[@Phoen1x883]

​@@paxson2000 please tell me this is a joke

[@thepinktreeclub]

guys chill tf out

[@MirdjanHyle]

No.

[@lifesoldier]

oh man!!! can't wait until you're experimenting with spectrograms!!! hope to see more soon!!

[@daxtron2]

I'm kinda impressed at how well SSTV handles the distortion and still produces a relatively decent image.

[@primerocuarte3987]

This made me so uneasy. I was half-specting a screamer at the end and I got startled by that wobbly thing

[@paxson2000]

Dang i should do a jump scare video. Sorry leaving you hanging without a screamer at the end

[@primerocuarte3987]

@@paxson2000 No no, that's not what I meant. I don't like being jumpscared, it feels awful. It would be so mean if you actually did that.

[@nim4464]

@@paxson2000 you should

[@smileyfacism]

@@paxson2000if you do that I'm reporting your channel for promoting terrorism.

[@VicTerri6]

That’s so very cool! 😮

[@paxson2000]

Thanks! 😊

[@dziany_forsacze]

_This experiment was brought to you by LSD._ Great idea, jokes aside, this is phenomenal. Completely out of the box. Thanks for posting.

[@paxson2000]

@@dziany_forsacze thanks for watching! That’s very kind!!

[@jaycee30865]

Oh now this shit is dangerously trippy right here.

[@orbitaloutcast9878]

There's something weirdly beautiful about a silly picture of a cat yawning slowly decomposing into colorful noise and reforming again and again. It reminds me of when I run for a really long time or I exert myself physically a lot in the hot sun I go color blind for a while (I have to walk 2 miles to the beach to get sand for my cat's kitty litter)

[@paxson2000]

@@orbitaloutcast9878 beautifully phrased. also genius level cat parenting. now i want to move to the beach, save a little money on cat litter. Thanks for stopping by

[@orbitaloutcast9878]

@@paxson2000 A word of advice: Wood shavings/wood chips are better, and if you still want to use sand you can use baking soda, regularly remove the poo regularly. A bucket of sand should be enough to last 2 weeks to a month if you have 1 or 2 cats.

[@Onlyanaccount]

this combines both of my passions

[@paxson2000]

Dope! Thanks for watching

[@CableWrestler]

Cats and colour TVs?

[@lowellrindler9454]

slightly absolutely fascinating

[@tomddd]

We played this at my '90s modem's funeral.

[@Califlower-official]

It reminds me of datamoshing using audacity execpt your using analog digital equipment rather than a software to do all this! Its incredible to see, now the question is... What would happen if you recorded a video and put it through a guitar pedal? Still a really cool thing to see how this works!

[@paxson2000]

@adehanft actually has a video showing how to create animations with a similar process! So yeah, possible in a way!!

[@waddledee474]

"babe wake up, new analog horror just dropped"

[@djsylviavoid]

the cat in this image is screaming in agony because he's trapped in this tv damned to an eternity of being twisted and warped by guitar pedals.. I should know, I've done salvia

[@paxson2000]

@@djsylviavoid lol dude salvia sent me into the only dimensions possible to make this video

[@Greedygoblingames]

Fascinating. What's really interesting is how the guitar FX never seem to affect the image of the curtains 😂

[@paxson2000]

@@Greedygoblingames lol yeah that’s just a reflection on my CRT TV!

[@paxson2000]

@@Greedygoblingames good eye!

[@Putricalencephilametolus]

Ah, the portal radio recieving a transmission. That's where I've heard it before.

[@DruNature]

Truly terrifying, otherworldly and haunting... I love it!!

[@paxson2000]

@@DruNature thanks for watching and i’m glad you dig it!

[@0ssified]

Whoa, this is really dope!

[@rubydreamsuwu1095]

The reason why it sounds a bit like a dial-up handshake (the sound it makes while establishing a connection) is probably because they're both forms of audio data. I don't know much about the application of transmitting information through audio that's shown in the video, but I do know a bit about dial-up internet. The reason why dial-up sounds like that is that because at the time, there wasn't much dedicated internet infrastructure, so they used phone lines to establish a connection. This means that the data required to establish it needed to be audio data - essentially letting a computer talk over the phone to discuss things like protocol types. I'm not an expert, and I may be misremembering, but it's interesting nonetheless.

[@paxson2000]

@@rubydreamsuwu1095 that is interesting! Thanks for the awesome comment!

[@jerrykovis5417]

so happy the ALGOS got me here. as much as we might hate TECH, i would've never found out about you because i'm not that cool.

[@yeoldpepsi]

The sounds are the cat desperately trying to escape the pedals

[@VAL-TORR]

that cat really got that vibe

[@empresseffects]

I would like this to be playing on a permanent loop in my office

[@paxson2000]

@@empresseffects yo Empress, i would love to make a series for you all! Used y’all’s reverb pedal for one iteration of this experiment

[@nicokulmann8398]

Oh that's like the intro of stoop lights, very cool

[@paxson2000]

lol dude your profile picture genuinely freaks me to the furthest flung out

[@alexbaughman9404]

this is so cool! I love the colors it becomes

[@pi198273]

I know an SSTV the second I hear one! underrated technique IMO

[@paxson2000]

@@pi198273 i feel blessed having found out about SSTV! It’s been so fun to experiment with. Thank you for being here!

[@gossmanai]

This is so creative. Absolutely sick

[@martinmaidana2022]

Love the window reflection

[@WeightlessBallast]

No AI, no ChatGPT, no multicore GPU processors...just analog gear and innovative af.

[@paxson2000]

@@WeightlessBallast yo big thanks.

[@dorjedriftwood2731]

Absolutely incredible this is mind blowing!

[@mRahman92]

This looks like a tech demo as well as an 80s horror movie where someone or something transformers. Holy scanlines Batman!

[@Mr.Meowgical]

Coolest shit I've seen in a minute. I've done the digital version of this with Audacity and photos on my computer, but there's stuff here that I _really_ wanna get into now. Thank you for sharing, both the audio and the visual were 👌🔥 Also R.I.P. Todd, I'm sure you were an upstanding cat. Wishing you and your gf well.

[@paxson2000]

@@Mr.Meowgical thanks Mr. Meowgical! Appreciate the nice comment. And yes this technique is super fun to experiment with!

[@JulianA-tr6pt]

I was about to comment about that. I used to apply effects to photos in audacity probably 10 years ago. Cool results, but a bit tedious avoiding corruption until you get used to where the headers are.

[@Mr.Meowgical]

@@JulianA-tr6pt True, they're a little unclear at first. Did ya have any favorite effects to process images with? Any interesting combos or techniques? Filter curve was my personal favorite.

[@drtchock]

you sent me down a rabbit hole...

[@j.wilcox3547]

Really amazing. Glad I found this.

[@trialbyicecream]

Rip Todd

[@paxson2000]

@@trialbyicecream thanks Blaise

[@King.-Arthur]

Captain, we're picking up a strange transmission, attempting to boost the signal now...

[@flyingo]

Better stuff than any AI could generate.