Richard Dobson wrote:
On 23/01/2013 01:39, Stefan Schreiber wrote:
..
Why are you actually not reading what I was posting? One of the
requirements is "arbitrary" speaker layouts. Full stop. (There will be
some fixed layouts, I guess. But still.)
...
of multi-channel audio programs and the ability to flexibly render an
audio program to an arbitrary number of loudspeakers with arbitrary
configurations.
Possibly people were working on the basis of your initial comment:
"However, my impression is that the MPEG's intention is more to settle
on something relatively simple, like 22.2, Auro-3D speaker layout etc.
"
Which would narrow the range of layouts considerably.
I can well understand the attraction that dealing with specific
companies would have for the MPEG committees. They have clearly
identified and authoritative individuals to deal with who represent
the company - whether a CTO or a CEO. Who will stand up to be the CTO
or CEO of "Ambisonics", with the support of the community? It would
ostensibly need to be someone (or a small group) not encumbered by
possible conflicts of interests with commercial organisations they
work for. But also someone who can discuss and accommodate the
special needs of cinema while making the broader argument too. So they
would still need one way or another to speak with the authentic voice
of "the industry".
Ambisonics may in all sorts of ways be both the superior and the most
appropriate technology, but even now it has barely escaped the
laboratory and the concert hall. We can be sure Auro-3D etc will be
lobbying intensively, not least on the strength of existing industry
adoption (e.g. Auro-3D's list of cinemas using their system). So
ambisonics has quite a bit of ground to make up, in effect not only to
make its case, but also to make the case against the existing and
already more established choices.
Richard Dobson
I would suggest that the "fast track" Ambisonics based proposal which I
have made - relying on already defined elements, or elements which could
be defined and implemented in an easy and fast way, like a "modified B+
scheme with higher order and more direct channels" - is way superiour to
Auro-3D, even if using "only" 3rd order.
In fact, the "3D performance" of any reasonable .AMB/HOA based approach
(referring to the potential "vertical resolution" of 2nd+ order height
elements) seems to beat any proposed commercial 3D audio solution for
cinemas which I have seen recently. (Let us also consider that the "3D
performance" of classical WFS doesn't seem to be that good, too. :-) )
Therefore, Ambisonics fits best into the official requirements of the
MPEG's CfP: It is a very natural approach for 3D audio, and arbitrary
speaker layouts are no problem.
If I am right (and it seems like...), it would be a no-brainer to chose
some Ambisonics based solution as the fexible part of the new MPEG-H
part 3 standard. (Of course they still might want to define 11.1 or 22.2
as typical "fixed" solutions. If we speak about solutions for 3D audio,
I would not expect that you can install dozens of speakers everywhere.
However, you should keep the chance to implement some "excellent"
solutions for concert halls/big cinemas etc. But you would have to cover
smaller/cheaper installations, home installations, mobile audio via
headphones...)
In spite of a former commentary of Dave Malham I would expect that it
would be < very > difficult to agree on any standard for audio objects,
as there isn't any common approach available. (They would have to chose
some clearly propietary solution, and this doesn't look like a
reasonable standard definition.)
Therefore, Ambisonics seems to win again. In spite of different opinions
on some issues, the technique is based on a mathematical theory, and
there is a considerable implementation tradition.
If anything, there is far more experience available to implement sound
field based solutions than to implement to completely new object based
solutions.
In this sense, I think we don't have to be too shy. Ambisonics is used
in many installations. In fact, Dolby Atmos and (DTS) Headphone:X or
MDA are the newcomers Ambisonics is used for open air concerts.
FLAC made it without CEOs or CTO's, so what? (It got a typical de-facto
standard for lossless audio compression, without < any > company support.)
But also someone who can discuss and accommodate the special needs of
cinema while making the broader argument too. So they would still need
one way or another to speak with the authentic voice of "the industry".
Yes. Audio "for 3D movies" was the initial motivation, and they are
certainly interested in 3D audio for UHD TV...
I gave some feedback to think about a flexible and broad solution for
everything. They should present a 3D audio codec in the wide sense,
because this is what they really seem to need. If the required and "to
be defined" 3D audio codec is strong enough for cinema use and not too
"heavy", it should fit for UHD, games and mobile audio, too.
Best regards
Stefan
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