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Spatial Audio

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Re: Spatial Audio

#71

Post by zamalek »

sidechaining wrote: post #50

Slightly related. But I’ve had single-sided deafness all my life (which means all I’ve experienced is mono audio) and now with this shift from stereo to spatial. I was wondering if some kind HN users could fill me in on what I’m missing out. (By listening to stereo tracks in mono and observing how it sounds or anything that could give me a picture of that— is it crowded? Distorted? Etc). The only pertinent study I co…

What the other comments said, but keep in mind that it's not very precise in normal circumstances: you have an extremely rough estimate of direction (along all axis) and distance.

You can increase the accuracy if you are afforded the opportunity to concentrate on the sound.

Re: Spatial Audio

#72

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

It isn't really that central to TFA's main points, but I find it very disappointing that the audio tech world seems to be settling for Dolby Atmos. Once again the choice is made to use licensable technology in preference over non-licensable, libre technology (Ambisonics). Both have their pros and cons, but only one of them is associated with a licensed-based revenue stream.

Re: Spatial Audio

#73

Post by Cybotron5000 »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #63
Cybotron5000 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re absolutely right that the most effective simulation would use a custom HRTF for each person, as the shape of the head, shoulders, pinnae of the ear etc etc. all play some part... There are some headphones that attempt to go some way towards this by taking pictures of/otherwise ‘scanning’ the users ear (eg. https://electronics.sony.com/360-reality-audio https://mysofa.audio/ …paper on the subject: https://www.a…

> Generally we are also much better at localizing sounds in the lateral plane than the vertical one Our ears are separated laterally but not vertically.

So they are. We’re better able to localise sounds in the horizontal plane if you prefer, though because of the shape of our ears/pinnae and so on, we can also detect to some extent whether they are above or below/in front of or behind our heads (perhaps there is more accurate terminology for it: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomical_plane )

Re: Spatial Audio

#75

Post by huslage »

salamandersauce wrote: post #51
hairofadog wrote: post #44

I'll say up front that I'm a non-audiophile, and so I'm offering my opinion from that point of view. I find the Spatial Audio / Dolby Atmos thing weird for a number of reasons. First, the dual branding seems clunky. "First I listened to music in mono. Then I listened to music in stereo. Then I listened to music in ____" I'd be willing to bet that even amongst people who care a lot about this stuff you'd have a hard t…

Doesn't basically every Hollywood movie since DVD pay a licensing fee to Dolby (or DTS) for 5.1 or Atmos (or DTS:X) support? Theaters too even? And wasn't Dolby B NR insanely widespread on pre-recorded cassettes? Like so common that most albums on cassette from the 80s have the Dolby logo on them? I don't think its that weird. It's clearly been done in the past. Apple's limitations on what devices works sucks and it'…

Apple doesn't have any limitations to devices. It works fine in normal headphones as well as AirPods.

Re: Spatial Audio

#76

Post by scoot »

danappelxx wrote: post #54
scoot wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, works with any headphones, as long as they have an apple brand sticker attached? There's nothing technologically special about most of these.

I’m assuming they also have some special hardware/firmware for the head tracking feature

Lol, no.

Re: Spatial Audio

#77

Post by lux »

basisword wrote: post #40

This sounds like the kind of thing someone would write when the world switched from mono to stereo. Quite a few parts of it are completely wrong too not to mention insulting ("... more music is being made by individuals in bedrooms, home studios, on a budget. They have neither the equipment nor the skill to mix in Dolby Atmos"). Apple has done quite a poor job showcasing it so far. Some of the tracks they've put in t…

Totally agree but wanted to add a point I found interesting doing some spatial audio work which is synths tend to spatialize poorly compared to more organic instruments. You can dirty them up with additional effects like distortion or an exciter, but I think it’s something to do with the evenness of the waveforms compared to the real world variance of a string or vocal cord vibrating.

Re: Spatial Audio

#78

Post by defaultname »

aaomidi wrote: post #70
smoldesu wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The barber shop is not spatial audio. It's a static stereo mix, and a terrible example of how the medium actually functions. I know what good spatial audio sounds like, too: I've used 6DOF with headphones and fancy Atmos filters, and it works great in VR. Everywhere else though, it's just distracting. We have lost the stems to probably 95% of all music ever made. If all of our old music sounds bad in spatial audio, h…

It literally has invoked a wow from everyone I've shared it with in real life. I'm glad you've had a much better experience, but lol this doesn't mean this is bad. The pretentiousness in your comment is outstanding.

smoldesu is pathologically anti-Apple, so the fact that this thread related to Apple instantly guaranteed their pissing and moaning, dismissive response. Don't take it as a sincere argument.

Re: Spatial Audio

#79

Post by danappelxx »

scoot wrote: post #76
danappelxx wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m assuming they also have some special hardware/firmware for the head tracking feature

Lol, no.

I mean, most headphones don’t have accel/gyro - makes sense for Apple to use proprietary protocols for this, no? Also, see HN guidelines for comments.

Re: Spatial Audio

#80

Post by Cybotron5000 »

basisword wrote: post #40

This sounds like the kind of thing someone would write when the world switched from mono to stereo. Quite a few parts of it are completely wrong too not to mention insulting ("... more music is being made by individuals in bedrooms, home studios, on a budget. They have neither the equipment nor the skill to mix in Dolby Atmos"). Apple has done quite a poor job showcasing it so far. Some of the tracks they've put in t…

I totally agree - there are real possibilities to do interesting new creative work afforded by this, particularly if the barriers to entry are kept low/non-proprietary/open-to-all (…as another poster noted, it would have perhaps been nice if an open standard had been used instead…). I would only add that I think there are even more interesting possibilities for using the same technological capabilities with AR. That was the focus of the iPhone app. I wrote, which was more along the lines of Microsoft Soundscape: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/product/soundscape/ (but to be fair, before Microsoft Soundscape was available :)
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