Forthcoming Meetings
Ambisonics – the Once and Future System? [Leeds]
Title: Ambisonics – the Once and Future System? [Leeds]
Location: Lecture Theatre 1, School of Music, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT
Description: Lecture by Dave Malham, Music Research Centre, University of York
Start Time: 18:00 for 18:30
Date: Tuesday 21st February 2012
Abstract:
Ambisonics has been around as a system since the early 1970s, although its basics in some ways date back to Alan Blumlein’s work on stereo and Harry F. Olson’s development of directional microphones at the start of the 1930s.
Tarred with the same brush as the Quadraphonics debacle of the 1970s, it was kept alive by a small band of enthusiasts who realised the much greater capabilities inherent in the system. This continued to be the case until the advent of low cost digital technology towards the end of the 20th Century meant that it became, at last, accessible to many more people. In the past decade far more papers have been published on Ambisonics and Ambisonics-related subjects than in the whole of the preceding three decades. Does this mean it has finally triumphed?
Dave Malham has written VST plug-ins for Ambisonic processing, the ‘MRC Stereometer, a
K-system metering plug-in, and (with Matt Paradis) the ‘ambilib’ Ambisonic processing library for PD and Max/MSP. He also has a patent, WO02085068, for the Ambisonic Sound Object Format. Dave teaches digital audio, signal preservation, sound spatialisation and recording techniques on the Music Technology MA course at York.
Whose voice is it anyway? [London]
Title: Whose voice is it anyway? [London]
Location: Royal College of Pathologists, 2 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AF
Description: Lecture by Jeff Bloom, Synchro Arts
Start Time: 18:30 for 19:00
Date: Tuesday 13th March 2012
Abstract:
Editing audio to fix timing and tuning problems has now become so commonplace that listeners would be hard-pressed to know when the timing, pitch or other characteristics of a recorded actor or singer have been manipulated to be more accurate or to simply sound better.
However, even with sophisticated software tools, in many situations the editing work required to achieve such polished precision can still be tedious and time consuming, and require considerable skill.
In this talk new processing techniques will be demonstrated which offer automated and precise solutions to certain common situations. These techniques involve automatically extracting, from an accurate ‘guide’ voice or instrument recording, selected characteristics such as timing, pitch, vibrato and loudness, and imposing these features on other less accurate recordings of similar performances.
This approach has many applications in consumer and professional audio processing products, including the following…
For professional applications:
1) Double and triple (or more) tracks can be made quickly to match, with adjustable precision, an accurate lead vocal.
2) Alternative performance characteristics can be transferred to a lead vocal.
3) Prosodic features (including timing, inflection and stress) of recorded dialogue can be transformed to have different but natural sounding features transferred from another recording.
For consumers:
4) In websites or mobile applications, recordings of amateur singers can be automatically transformed to have the characteristics of a professional vocalist.
5) A language student’s recording of his or her attempt at mimicking a teacher’s recorded sentence can be modified to make the student’s timing and pitch sound like the teacher’s and provide constructive feedback.
Jeff Bloom – who in 1984 invented the first audio time-alignment algorithms upon which these new techniques are based – will also chart the history of automatic time alignment in dialogue replacement and music applications.
DSP – Why so Hard? [London]
Title: DSP – Why so Hard? [London]
Location: Royal College of Pathologists, 2 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AF
Description: Lecture by Peter Eastty, Oxford Digital
Start Time: 18:30 for 19:00
Date: Tuesday 10th April 2012
Abstract:
If you’ve ever wondered why audio DSP programming is so hard when the algorithms are so simple, this is the place for you. Hundreds of strange and wonderful audio processors have been developed over the past four decades and the presenter has struggled with dozens of them.
In order to learn from our mistakes this master class will tour examples of gross bad practice (suitably anonymized to protect the guilty) and in doing so we’ll extract some general principles useful to those who will design audio DSPs in the future. As a practical example of what can be achieved, we’ll go from simulator based algorithm development to listening to production quality code in a matter of minutes.
Visible Sound [London]
Title: Visible Sound [London]
Location: Royal College of Pathologists, 2 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AF
Description: Lecture by Ian Butterworth, National Physical Laboratory (NPL)
Start Time: 18:30 for 19:00
Date: Tuesday 8th May 2012
An abstract will be posted shortly
