Some of you, who came across the term ‘3D sound’, probably are wondering what it actually is? Intuitively, we may understand it by analogy to 3D space, which as we know is made up of three dimensions: width, depth, and height. In real life, any position in space is characterized by these dimensions. Now imagine, that you are outside, for example in a park, full of various sounds. You can hear children laughing on the playground behind you; a dog is barking on your left, a couple of people are talking while sitting on a bench in front of you – you can hear their voices more and more clearly when you move towards them. We may say that you are in the 3-dimensional sound space. When you move, the sound you hear changes as well, corresponding to the position of your ears (its intensity, direction, height and even timbre). Reproducing this natural human way of hearing in the recording isn’t easy, however, we already have the technology which allows us to do it – it is binaural and Ambisonics sound.
The most common type of recordings – which you hear while listening to the music on your computer or watching TV –is stereo. You may also come across mono recordings but these have been outdated with the introduction of stereo mixing. Stereo sound basically allows you only to hear if the sound comes from left or right which is the main advantage over the mono-type of audio. Bellow, you may find some great recordings that will allow you to hear the difference between these different formats. We have also summarized their characteristics in the bullet points, to present the information most clearly.
MONO SOUND
STEREO SOUND
BINAURAL SOUND
AMBISONICS SOUND
#zylia #binaural #ambisonics #3Daudio #surround #spatial #sound
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by Tomek Ciotucha All concerts and gigs are canceled, and you are sitting at home and wondering what to do with your free time, how to show your creative work to the world, stream your concert from your apartment, or just play guitar for others? We have a solution for you! Take the ZYLIA microphone, connect it to your laptop and start streaming your home concert or solo session to the world. #stayhome #stayathome #homerecording #stream #music #concert #twitch #ambisonics #FOA #streaming #facebook #youtube
To download the software use the link below: https://jackaudio.org/downloads/ And choose to download JACK2 binaries: After restarting your computer when the installation is finished, open the app JackPilot. The “Preferences” window should show up when you open the app for the first time. If not, open it by clicking on the JackPilot/Preferences in the upper right corner. In the Preferences window choose leave the “Built-in Microphone” and “Built-in Output” in the devices settings. Set the Sample Rate to 48000 and set the number of Virtual Input and Output channels to 4. Click Save. Now go to OBS and specify the amount of input channels to 4 and select the JackRouter as an input device (Mic/Auxillary Audio). Click OK to save the settings. You might have to restart the OBS. Then, open the Reaper project called “ZM-1 FOA Streaming via JackPilot.RPP”. If you haven’t connected your ZYLIA microphone array already, do it now. Go to preferences and select ZYLIA as an Input Device and JackRouter as an Output Device. You have to tick the box marked in the image below to allow use of different input and output devices. In the Connections Manager window click on the two triangles highlighted in the image below. The Send Ports/REAPER list shows the output channels from Reaper, and the Receive Ports/obs list shows the input channels in OBS. There should be 4 channels per each list. Remember, that first you have to choose JackRouter as an Input Device in OBS and as an Output Device in Reaper for the channels show up in the JackPilot’s Connections Manager window. Now do the same with the rest of the channels: Out1 -> in1 Out2 -> in2 Out3 -> in3 Out4 -> in4 Now everything is set up and you should be able to stream first order ambisonics captured with your Zylia! You can use this project as an input - DOWNLOAD
Zylia introduced a six-degrees-of-freedom (6DoF) multi-level microphone arrays installation for navigable live recorded audio.What does it mean? We are working on technology that gives people the possibility to listen to a concert or live performance from any point in the audio scene. With our technology you are able to record an audio scene from different points of the space – the center of the stage, from the middle of a string quartet, audience, or backstage. Audio recorded in such a way can be used together with virtual reality projections and allow the user to freely move around the space giving the natural experience of audio scene and the possibility to listen to it from different perspectives. 6DoF installation and test setup The first step of test recordings was to install 9 3rd order Ambisonics microphone arrays on the same level and record musicians playing their performance. Such an approach allowed the listener to move around those 9 points and listen to their music from different perspectives. However, microphones placement on a single level introduced limitations in terms of audio resolution in the vertical plane. Since we like challenges we decided to increase the number of microphones to 53 and build an installation on five different levels. It allowed us to freely move in every direction of the recorded scene in a truly immersive experience. The second idea behind this test setup was to check the limits of Ambisonics recordings in order to achieve a fully navigable audio scene. We placed the microphones arrays densely in the recorded scene and we received a spatial audio image of very high resolution. Technical aspects: We used 53 19-channel mic arrays – which gave us 1007 audio channels recorded simultaneously. Microphones were connected to a USB hub and the recordings were operated via a single laptop. The audio recorded from each microphone array was converted to 3rd order Ambisonics using our ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter plugin (it can be done in real-time or offline). After the recording, we used our interpolation software. This software is a MaxMSP plugin, that generates 3rd order Ambisonics spheres based on the signal from all microphones in the position you are at the moment. When you put your headphones and VR headset and move around the space the algorithm in MaxMSP takes your position and interpolates 3D sound in the position you are at the moment. We used 3rd order Ambisonics microphone arrays. It is important because the higher the order the more precision we get in the spatial localization of sound around the listener. We are able to recreate the sound with a very high spatial resolution which influences the audio quality - an extremely important aspect for listeners. With this simple approach, you can record the natural audio scene for your VR/AR productions and use it right away without complicated work-flow in post-production. You can record live events and stream audio directly to the listener giving him the possibility to freely choose the position in this real-time recorded space for an ultimate immersive audio experience. Application: Cinematic trailers for VR, audio for games, live performances recording, domes with multi-loudspeakers installations
We are happy to announce a new release of ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter v. 1.2.0 and ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter Plugin v. 1.1.0. Here are all the changes. ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter v. 1.2.0
◦ Sensitivity of rotation slider
ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter Plugin v. 1.1.0
◦ Wrong sample rate warning Download link - ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter plugin
By Eduardo Patricio In this post we present two videos in different formats, but edited from the same source material captured on the 20th of June 2018, at Barigui park (Curitiba, Brazil). The audio was recorded with the ZYLIA ZM-1 3rd order Ambisonics spherical microphone array while the video was captured by a 360-degree camera (Gear 360). Below, you can watch both videos and find some information on how to achieve the two different results, with focus on preparing the audio recorded with the ZM-1 microphone for each scenario. Scenario AInteractive, immersive video with full 3D sound (media components: 360-degree video + Ambisonics audio) Scenario BNon-interactive video with fixed perspective 3D sound (media components: Tiny planet” video + binaural audio)
The microphone and the camera were placed on a single camera stand with a small clamped extension arm (see picture below). Both devices were aligned vertically with a small horizontal offset. We made sure the microphone and the camera always had the same relative facing direction (front of the microphone aligned with the camera side where the recording button is found).
For scenario B, we used the video from Gear 360 in ‘tiny planet’ format and a binaural audio track. Since, the source material is the same as the one from scenario A, we’ll list here only the steps that differ. Scenario B steps:
Choosing binaural preset on ZYLIA Studio PRO in REAPER #ambiencerecording #ambisonics #binaural #soundscapes #immersiveaudio #360recording
We are happy to announce a new version of ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter. We introduced a few changes based on your input and suggestions. We added a batch processing. Now, it is possible to process multiple 19 channels wave files within a single session.
There are also quality improvements and bug fixes for 2nd and 3rd order HOA. This update significantly increases the perceptual effect of rotation in HOA domain as well as corrects spatial resolution for 2nd and 3rd order. It is recommended to update to this new version. By Jakub Zamojski & Lukasz Januszkiewicz Recording and mixing surround sound becomes more and more popular. Among the popular multichannel representation of surround sound systems like 5.1, 7.1 or cinematic 22.2, especially worthy of note is an Ambisonics format, which is a full-sphere spatial audio technique allowing to get a real immersive experience of 3D sound. You can find more details about Ambisonics here (What is the Ambisonics format?). Our previous blog post “2nd order Ambisonics Demo VR” described the process of combining audio and the corresponding 360 video into fine 360 movie on Facebook. Presented approach assumes using of 8-channel TBE signal from ZYLIA Ambisonics Converter and converts audio into the Ambisonics domain. As a result we get a nice 3D sound image which is rotating and adapting together with the virtual movement of our position. However, it is still not possible to adjust parameters (gain, EQ correction, etc.) or change the relative position of the individual sound sources present in the recorded sound scene. In this tutorial we are going to introduce another approach of using ZYLIA ZM-1 to create a 3D sound recording, which gives much more flexibility in sound source manipulation. It allows us not only to adjust the position of instruments in recorded 3D space around ZYLIA microphone, but also to control the gain or to apply any additional effects (EQ, Comp, etc.). In this way we are able to create a fancy spatial mix using only one microphone instead of several spot mics! Spatial Encoding of Sound Sources – TutorialIn the end of July 2017, using ZYLIA ZM-1 microphone we have recorded a band called “Trelotechnika”. All band members were located around ZM-1 microphone, 4 musicians and one additional sound source – drums (played from a loudspeaker). During the post-production process, we applied ZYLIA Studio PRO VST plug-in (within Reaper DAW) on recorded 19-channel audio track. This allowed us to separate the previously recorded instruments and transfer them into the individual tracks in the DAW. Those tracks were then directed to the FB360 plug-ins, where encoding to the Ambisonics domain was performed. “Spatial Encoding of Sound Sources” - a step-by-step descriptionBelow, you will find a detailed description of how to run a demo session presenting our approach of recording and spatial encoding of sound sources. Demo works on Mac Os X and Windows. DOWNLOAD STAGE
TUTORIAL After opening the session, you will see several tracks:
3. Separated signals from ZYLIA Studio PRO are passing to 5 individual tracks. You are able to adjust the gain, you can also mute or solo instruments, or you can apply some audio effects. A good practice is to use a high-pass filter for non-bass and low-pass for bass instruments to reduce a spill between them. We applied these filters to our session: 4. Spatialiser track – receives 5 signals from tracks with separated instruments. Spatialiser allows to distribute sound sources in desired positions in the 3D space. a) Click on FX and choose FB360 Spatialiser.
d) Back to Spatialiser view. You will see an equirectangular picture and five circles with numbers. Each circle represents a sound source position in the space. By default, sources are located in the positions corresponding to the real positions of the instruments in the picture, but it is possible to adjust it by clicking on the circle and dragging it around the picture.
6. Now video is synchronized with audio. Adjusting the location of play-head in REAPER’s time line will affect the video’s time. Tap space bar to play audio and video. Rotation of the video in the player is tracked by the decoded and binauralized Ambisonics sound.
7. A good practice is to play video from the beginning of file to keep the synchronization. In some cases, it is necessary to close the VideoClient + VideoPlayer and load 360 video again to recover the synchronization. 8. Now you are able to rotate video across the pitch and yaw axis. Your demo is ready to run.
By Jakub Wasilewski
Nowadays the entertainment industry is more and more interested in immersive experiences when it comes to movies, video games and music. Along with already quite common 360 degree videos, there is also a growing demand for 3D audio. Surround systems like 5.1, 7.1 or cinematic 22.2 can surely deliver impressive effects, but none of them is an actual full spatial audio system. Mostly because once sources had been recorded, there is no way to change their positions freely.
At the same time when the music audience was thrilled for the first time with “The Dark Side Of The Moon”, an Ambisonics idea has been conceived by Michael Gerzon from the University of Oxford. He realised, that using three figure-of-eight microphones and additional omnidirectional one, he can make a soundfield recording that can be expressed as four speaker-independent channels, the so called B-Format. It allows to store soundfield information in four channels and decode it later into specific speaker setup.
As you can probably imagine, representing a whole soundfield using only four channels is not optimal. Spatial audio resolution is not very impressive when using a B-Format which is only 1st order of Ambisonics, In the 1970s It was difficult to achieve higher audio resolution due to the level of technical advancements at that time. Despite the fact that the Ambisonics technique was grounded on solid technical and mathematical foundation, it has not gained much attention or commercial success.
In order to obtain higher orders of Ambisonics, which provides better soundfield representation and spatial resolution, a dense microphone array and advanced signal processing algorithms are needed. Both of these advancements are the cornerstones of the new recording system developed by ZYLIA.
ZYLIA 3rd order Ambisonics microphone
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