Episode 95 Gavin Kearney & Helena Daffern (AudioLab, University of York)

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Episode 95 Gavin Kearney & Helena Daffern (AudioLab, University of York)

This episode is sponsored by HHB Communications, the UK’s leader in Pro Audio Technology. For years HHB has been delivering the latest and most innovative pro audio solutions to the world’s top recording studios, post facilities, and broadcasters. The team at HHB provide best-in-class consultation, installation, training, and technical support to customers who want to build or upgrade their studio environment for immersive audio workflow. To find out more or book a demo at their HQ facility visit www.hhb.co.uk

Summary

In this episode of the Immersive Audio Podcast, Oliver Kadel is joined by Professors Gavin Kearney and Helena Daffern from the AudioLab at the School of Physics Engineering and Technology at the University of York, UK.

Gavin Kearney is a Professor of Audio Engineering at the School of Physics Engineering and Technology at the University of York. He is an active researcher, technologist and sound designer for immersive technologies and has published over a hundred articles and patents relating to immersive audio. He graduated from Dublin Institute of Technology in 2002 with an honours degree in Electronic Engineering and has since obtained both MSc and PhD degrees in Audio Signal Processing from Trinity College Dublin. He joined the University of York as a Lecturer in Sound Design at the Department of Theatre, Film and Television in January 2011 and moved to the Department of Electronic Engineering in 2016. He leads a team of researchers at York Audiolab which focuses on different facets of immersive and interactive audio, including spatial audio and surround sound, real-time audio signal processing, Ambisonics and spherical acoustics, game audio/audio for virtual and augmented reality and recording and audio post-production technique development.

Helena Daffern is currently a Professor in Music Science and Technology at the School of Physics Engineering and Technology at the University of York. Her research utilises interdisciplinary approaches to investigate voice science and acoustics, particularly singing performance, vocal pedagogy, choral singing and singing for health and well-being. Recent projects explore the potential of virtual reality to improve access to group singing activities and as a tool for singing performance research. She received a BA (Hons.) degree in music, an M.A. degree in music, and a PhD in music technology, all from the University of York, UK, in 2004, 2005, and 2009. She went on to complete training as a classical singer at Trinity College of Music and worked in London as a singer and teacher before returning to York. Her research utilises interdisciplinary approaches to investigate voice science and acoustics, particularly singing performance, vocal pedagogy, choral singing and singing for health and well-being. Recent projects explore the potential of virtual reality to improve access to group singing activities and as a tool for singing performance research.

Helena and Gavin talk about the recently announced CoSTAR project – the initiative focuses on leveraging a novel R&D in virtual production technologies including CGI, spatial audio, motion capture and extended reality to create groundbreaking live performance experiences.

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Show Notes

Gavin Kearney Linkedin – https://www.linkedin.com/in/gavin-p-kearney/?originalSubdomain=uk

Helena Daffern Linkedin – https://www.linkedin.com/in/helena-daffern-32822439/?originalSubdomain=uk

AudioLab – https://audiolab.york.ac.uk/

University of York – https://www.york.ac.uk/

CoSTAR Project – https://audiolab.york.ac.uk/audiolab-at-the-forefront-of-pioneering-the-future-of-live-performance-with-a-new-rd-lab/

BBC Maida Vale Studios – https://www.bbc.co.uk/showsandtours/venue/bbc-maida-vale-studios 

AudioLab goes to BBC Maida Vale Recording Studios – https://audiolab.york.ac.uk/audiolab-goes-to-bbc-maida-vale-recording-studios/

Project SAFFIRE – https://audiolab.york.ac.uk/saffire/

Our Sponsors

Innovate Audio offers a range of software-based spatial audio processing tools. Their latest product, panLab Console, is a macOS application that adds 3D spatial audio rendering capabilities to live audio mixing consoles, including popular models from Yamaha, Midas and Behringer. This means you can achieve an object-based audio workflow, utilising the hardware you already own. Immersive Audio Podcast listeners can get an exclusive 20% discount on all panLab licences, use code Immersive20 at checkout. Find out more at innovateaudio.co.uk *Offer available until June 2024.*

HOLOPLOT is a Berlin-based pro-audio company, which features the multi-award-winning X1 Matrix Array. X1 is software-driven, combining 3D Audio-Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis to achieve authentic sound localisation and complete control over sound in both the vertical and horizontal axes. HOLOPLOT is pivoting the revolution in sound control, enabling the positioning of virtual loudspeakers within a space, allowing for a completely new way of designing and experiencing immersive audio on a large scale. To find more, visit holoplot.com.

Survey

We want to hear from you! We really value our community and would appreciate it if you would take our very quick survey and help us make the Immersive Audio Podcast even better: surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3Y9B2MJ Thank you!

Credits

This episode was produced by Oliver Kadel and Emma Rees and included music by Rhythm Scott.

Episode 93 Juergen Herre (MPEG-I)

Summary

This episode is sponsored by Innovate Audio. Innovate Audio offers a range of software-based spatial audio processing tools. Their latest product, panLab Console, is a macOS application that adds 3D spatial audio rendering capabilities to live audio mixing consoles, including popular models from Yamaha, Midas and Behringer. This means you can achieve an object-based audio workflow, utilising the hardware you already own. Immersive Audio Podcast listeners can get an exclusive 20% discount on all panLab licences, use code Immersive20 at checkout. Find out more at innovateaudio.co.uk *Offer available until June 2024.*

In this episode of the Immersive Audio Podcast, Oliver Kadel and Monica Bolles are joined by the Chief Executive Scientist for Audio and Multimedia fields at Fraunhofer International Audio Laboratories – Juergen Herre from Erlangen, Germany.

Juergen Herre received a degree in Electrical Engineering from  Friedrich-Alexander-Universität in 1989 and a Ph.D. degree for his work on error concealment of coded audio. He joined the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits (IIS) in Erlangen, Germany, in 1989. There he has been involved in the development of perceptual coding algorithms for high-quality audio, including the well-known ISO/MPEG-Audio Layer III  coder (aka “MP3”). In 1995, he joined Bell Laboratories for a PostDoc term working on the development of MPEG-2 Advanced Audio Coding (AAC).  By the end of 1996, he went back to Fraunhofer IIS to work on the development of more advanced multimedia technology including MPEG-4,  MPEG-7, MPEG-D, MPEG-H and MPEG-I, currently as the Chief Executive  Scientist for the Audio/Multimedia activities at Fraunhofer IIS,  Erlangen. In September 2010, Prof. Dr. Herre was appointed full professor at the University of Erlangen and the International Audio  Laboratories Erlangen. He is an expert in low-bit-rate audio coding/perceptual audio coding, spatial audio coding, parametric audio object coding, perceptual signal processing and semantic audio processing.  Prof. Dr.-Ing. Herre is a fellow member of the Audio Engineering Society  (AES), chair of the AES Technical Committee on Coding of Audio Signals and vice chair of the AES Technical Council. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Juergen  Herre is a senior member of the IEEE, a member of the IEEE Technical  Committee on Audio and Acoustic Signal Processing, served as an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Speech and Audio Processing and was an active member of the MPEG audio subgroup for almost three decades.

Juergen explains the science of the key technology concepts behind the worldwide adopted family of MPEG codecs and we discuss the latest addition of the reference model for the virtual and augmented reality audio standard – MPEG-I Immersive Audio.

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Show Notes

Juergen Herre – https://www.audiolabs-erlangen.de/fau/professor/herre

International Audio Laboratories, Erlangen – https://www.audiolabs-erlangen.de

Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits (IIS) – https://www.iis.fraunhofer.de/en/ff/amm/for/audiolabs.html

Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg –  https://www.fau.eu/

AES Paper MPEG-I Immersive Audio — Reference Model For The Virtual/Augmented Reality Audio Standard – https://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=22127

Perceptual Audio Codecs Tutorial “What to Listen For” – https://aes2.org/resources/audio-topics/audio_coding/perceptual-audio-codecs/

Survey

We want to hear from you! We really value our community and would appreciate it if you would take our very quick survey and help us make the Immersive Audio Podcast even better: surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3Y9B2MJ Thank you!

Credits

This episode was produced by Oliver Kadel and Emma Rees and included music by Rhythm Scott.

Episode 91 SXSW 2024 Panel Acceptance Announcement

Summary

We have a big announcement to make – Immersive Audio Podcast are going to SXSW 2024!

We are hosting the panel “State of Play of Immersive Audio: Past, Present & Future”.

It’s been almost six years since we started the Immersive Audio Podcast and as we are coming up to our 100th release anniversary we wanted to mark this milestone with a special edition at SXSW 2024. With the hindsight of releasing almost 100 episodes, we’ve met a lot of companies and experts covering a broad spectrum of topics fundamental to our industry. This panel will highlight the key indicative developments that have defined the immersive audio industry for the past decade, reflect on the current trends and look forward to the future.

Our expert guests will feature Audioscenic Limited covering binaural audio over speakers on consumer devices and HOLOPLOT discussing spatial audio for large-scale immersive events. We’ll moderate the panel as well as discuss our own work in the space of interactive live performance in immersive spaces and spatial and interactive sound design in immersive media production.

Audioscenic – https://www.audioscenic.com/

HOLOPLOT – https://holoplot.com/

If you’d like to learn more about our panelists go to your favorite podcast app or our website and check out Episodes 75/76 featuring Audioscenic (Binaural Audio Over Speakers) and Episodes 77/85 HOLOPLOT (3D Audio – Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis).

Our audience will receive a comprehensive overview of what defines immersive audio as a whole in the modern multifaceted world of digital media. We’ll provide an overview of core technologies, formats and distribution platforms along with associated challenges and opportunities. Attentive audience members will get a range of unique perspectives from panel experts that can be helpful for education and business development.

This panel is aimed at Sound Engineers, Sound Designers, Musicians, Mixers, Gamers, Writers, Audio Tech Consumers, Academics, Immersive Content Makers and general Tech Enthusiasts…

If you’re planning to attend and would like to arrange to meet us, please get in touch via [email protected]

The panel will be recorded and released on our podcast channel as Episode 100th.

We’d like to thank all our listeners who voted for us and your continued support!

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Show Notes

Panel Details, State of Play of Immersive Audio: Past, Present & Future – https://schedule.sxsw.com/2024/events/PP132288

Episode 75 Audioscenic Binaural Audio Over Speakers (Part 1) – https://immersiveaudiopodcast.com/episode-75-audioscenic-binaural-audio-over-speakers-part-1/

Episode 76 Audioscenic Binaural Audio Over Speakers (Part 2) – https://immersiveaudiopodcast.com/episode-76-audioscenic-binaural-audio-over-speakers-part-2/

Episode 77 HOLOPLOT (3D Audio-Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis) – https://immersiveaudiopodcast.com/episode-77-holoplot-3d-audio-beamforming-and-wave-field-synthesis/

Episode 85 Roman Sick (HOLOPLOT) – https://immersiveaudiopodcast.com/episode-85-roman-sick-holoplot/

Episode 83 SXSW 2024 Panel Picker Announcement

Summary

SXSW 2024 Panel Picker Announcement 📢 “State of Play of Immersive Audio: Past, Present & Future”

It’s been almost six years since we started the Immersive Audio Podcast and as we are coming up to our 100th release anniversary we wanted to mark this milestone with a special edition at SXSW 2024.

With the hindsight of releasing almost 100 episodes, we’ve met a lot of companies and experts covering a broad spectrum of topics fundamental to our industry. This panel will highlight the key indicative developments that have defined the immersive audio industry for the past decade, reflect on the current trends and look forward to the future. Our four expert guests and moderators Audioscenic, HOLOPLOT, 1.618 DIGITAL, Monica Bolles will cover the key sectors: large-scale immersive events, interactive live performance, spatial audio for consumer devices, virtual training for VR and immersive media production.

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Show Notes

Please support our idea and give us your vote!

Voting link -> https://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/132288

Voting Deadline Midnight 20th of August 2023.

Survey

We want to hear from you! We really value our community and would appreciate it if you would take our very quick survey and help us make the Immersive Audio Podcast even better: surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3Y9B2MJ Thank you!

Credits

This episode was produced by Oliver Kadel and Emma Rees and included music by Rhythm Scott.

Episode 72 Kasson Crooker (THX)

Summary

This episode is sponsored by Spatial, the immersive audio software that gives a new dimension to sound. Spatial gives creators the tools to create interactive soundscapes using our powerful 3D authoring tool, Spatial Studio. Their software modernises traditional channel-based audio; by rethinking how we hear and feel immersive experiences, anywhere. To find more go to https://www.spatialinc.com.

In this episode of the Immersive Audio Podcast, Oliver Kadel and Monica Bolles are joined by the Director of Product Development at THX – Kasson Crooker from Seattle, US.

Kasson has spent the past 30 years focusing his career and creative musical passions on the intersection of audio and technology. After graduating from Berklee College of Music (MP&E 1995), Kasson has worked in the videogame industry as Audio Director and Project Director on games like Guitar Hero, RockBand, and Dance Central for Harmonix, at Microsoft creating spatial audio experiences for HoloLens V1, and he is currently at THX as the Director of Product Development for their spatial audio initiatives. He is an electronic musician, composer, and mix engineer having released 20 albums and touring throughout North America and Europe. His current creative passions involve creating interactive music experiences with immersive spatial audio technologies for VR.

Kasson talks about the latest technology developments at THX and we explore the implementation of spatial and interactive audio for a music experience in VR.

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Show Notes

Kasson Crooker LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/kassoncrooker

Instagram/Twitter/YouTube: @symbionproject

THX –  https://www.thx.com

THX Spatial Audio for Games – https://www.thx.com/thx-spatial-audio-for-game-developers/

Symbion Project – https://symbionproject.bandcamp.com/

(m)ORPH –  https://www.oculus.com/experiences/quest/5857833644234313/

Saturnine – https://www.oculus.com/experiences/quest/5075664742454466

Survey

We want to hear from you! We really value our community and would appreciate it if you would take our very quick survey and help us make the Immersive Audio Podcast even better: surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3Y9B2MJ Thank you!

Credits

This episode was produced by Oliver Kadel and Emma Rees and included music by Rhythm Scott.

Episode 62 Nikunj Raghuvanshi & Noel Cross (Microsoft – Physics Based Virtual Acoustics)

Summary

In this episode of the Immersive Audio Podcast, Oliver Kadel, Monica Bolles and Bjørn Jacobsen are joined by a Principal Dev Leader at the Mixed Reality division at Microsft Noel Cross and Senior Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research Nikunj Raghuvanshi from Redmond, US.

Nikunj likes to invent techniques that create immersive sight and sound from computation. He is endlessly fascinated with simulating the laws of physics in real-time and finds it thrilling to search for simple algorithms that unfold into complex physical behaviour. He has over a decade of research and development experience at the intersection of computational audio, graphics, and physics, with over fifty papers and patents. His inventions have been successfully deployed in the industry, particularly Project Acoustics, which is bringing immersive sound propagation to many major AAA game franchises today. Nikunj is currently a Senior Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research. Previously, he initiated interactive sound simulation research at UNC-Chapel Hill during his PhD studies, whose codebase was acquired by Microsoft. 

Noel grew up playing games on my Commodore 64 and Amiga computers. His love for multimedia computing helped him to start working at Microsoft as an intern in 1991 in the multimedia team. This was the age of the SoundBlaster 16 ISA cards and CD-ROMs were just being introduced into PCs.  Out of the multimedia team, the DirectX team was born to accelerate the development of high-quality games for the PC. Noel worked on DirectSound and audio drivers for Windows getting a taste of the game development community attending several GDCs in the 90s. This was the first time he was introduced to 3D audio algorithms and at the time the technology didn’t impress much.  Through the 2000s, he worked on every release of Windows with the focus on improving the audio subsystem. This led to the complete overhaul of the audio infrastructure on the Windows Vista platform which has remained largely intact since introduced in 2006.  The most current stop on his Microsoft journey is working on Mixed Reality devices. He worked on the speech and audio functionality exposed from HoloLens and Windows Mixed Reality devices with a concentration on spatial audio. After having lackluster impact in the 90s with spatial audio, he’s been reinvigorated working on this technology with the introduction of high-quality HRTFs and head-tracking services to complete the experience. Spatial audio processing has also led Noel to better understand the impact of acoustics on virtual 3d worlds. His team is currently working on Project Acoustics which allows developers of 3d titles to take advantage of wave-based simulations to handle how audio propagates in the real world.

In this episode, Nikunj and Noel dive deep into the topic of physics-based virtual acoustics along with Project Triton and Project Acoustics covering fundamental theory, research, technology and case studies.

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Show Notes

Project Acoustics: Making Waves with Triton – https://youtu.be/pIzwo-MxCC8

Gears of War 4, Project Triton: Pre-Computed Environmental Wave Acoustics  – https://youtu.be/qCUEGvIgco8

NOTAM – https://notam.no/meetups/the-ambisonics-salon/ 

Nikunj Raghuvanshi’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikunj-raghuvanshi-a499172b/

Noel Cross’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/noel-cross-0b9a51167/

Microsoft Soundscape – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/product/soundscape/

Microsoft HoloLens – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/hololens

AVAR 2022: AES 4th International Conference on Audio for Virtual and Augmented Reality – https://aes2.org/contributions/avar-2022/

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II – Gameplay reveal – https://youtu.be/fukYzbthEVU //

https://twitter.com/dagadi/status/1470000580223504389)

Directional Sources & Listeners in Interactive Sound Propagation using Reciprocal Wave Field Coding – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvWlCQGZpz4

​​Project Acoustics | Game Developers Conference 2019- https://youtu.be/uY4G-GUAQIE

Interactive sound simulation: Rendering immersive soundscapes in games and virtual reality – https://youtu.be/2sKPDGBsM0Q

Project Triton Research website – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/project-triton/

Notes on Parametric Wave Field Coding for Precomputed Sound Propagation – https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/parametric-wave-field-coding-precomputed-sound-propagation/

Survey

We want to hear from you! We really value our community and would appreciate it if you would take our very quick survey and help us make the Immersive Audio Podcast even better: surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3Y9B2MJ Thank you!

Credits

This episode was produced by Oliver Kadel and Emma Rees and included music by Rhythm Scott.