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Re: Surround Sound on a Very Small Budget

Subject: Re: Surround Sound on a Very Small Budget
From: "Rob Danielson" danielson_rob
Date: Sat Feb 17, 2007 8:51 pm ((PST))
At 2:28 AM +0000 2/18/07, Greg Weddig wrote:

>http://www.archive.org/download/GTWeddigSanhillCranes/Cranes_Surround_Test=
.wma

Greg,
  Thanks for sharing the mellow cranes.  On my Mac, the file embeds in
a FireFox 2.0 browser window as a "audio/x-ms-wma Object" using the
QuickTime 7.1 plug.  Stereo, of course.  On Windows, has the day come
when the file plays directly through a browser window and through
your 6 channel audio card in 5.1?

Tom,
  I downloaded your files. It will be a while before I can set-up the
Message: 5.
Subject: 1 player. Thanks for the concise collection of PC freeware links
too. Rob D.


>This was done with a set of wide sub-cardioids in the front and
>hyper-cardioids in the back, A-B-C-D, a quad pattern with the mics
>spaced about 1 meter from each other.
>
>--greg
>Baltimore, MD
>http://www.ourmedia.org/user/627
>http://home.earthlink.net/~gweddig
>
>
>--- In  "tk7859" <> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>  Hi All
>>
>>  Acouple of posts from Rob Danielson and Rich Peet in the recent
>>  "Ergonomic Barriers" thread set me thinking how i could try some
>>  surround recording at low cost (it was to be an experiment).
>>  Following Rob's suggestion I cobbled up a four channel barrier mic
>>
>>  http://ad2004.hku.nl/naturesound/TomR/Surround%20Tests/surroundmic.JPG
>>
>>  Don't laugh - it was an experiment.
>>
>>  The Rapid triplets formed the front facing stereo mic and the
>>  Panasonic triplets the rearward facing mic.  Two MZ-NH1 minidisc
>>  recorders were used for recording.
>>
>>  I used Audacity to make the FL, FR, FC, LFE, BL and BR mono tracks -
>>  splitting the Rapid stereo trac fto make FL and FR.  Similarly the
>>  Panasonic stereo track was split and changed L to R to make the BL and
>>  BR tracks.  I made new mono tracks, filled with silence, for the FC
>>  and LFE tracks.
>>
>>  I followed up Rich's suggestion and downloaded the MP3 surround
>>  encoder ((this software is free for trial purposes until end December
>>  this year) and the free MP3 surround player from
>>
>>  http://www.iis.fraunhofer.de/fhg/iis/EN/bf/amm/mp3sur/index.jsp
>>
>>  The MP3 Surround encoder require a single, six channel wave file as
>>  its input.  Easier to say than to make.  I eventually managed to do it
>>  with an 30 day evaluation copy of Audition 2.  I had earlier tried to
>>  use the MultiWave freeware, as suggested by Bill Thompson in the
>>  "Surround 5.1 Without Hardware Soundcard" thread on the Yahoo
>>  Phonography Group, but did not manage it.  After cutting my teeth
>>  making 6 channel wave files with Audition 2 I went back to MultiWave
>>  and found it very easy and quick.  Look for MultiWave under the  the
>>  digital audio/dsp banner on the left of the webpage
>>
>  > http://www.nicolasfournel.com/
>>
>>  The end result of the experiment is the MP3 Surround file
>>
>>  http://ad2004.hku.nl/naturesound/TomR/Surround%20Tests/StoepMP3S.mp3
>>
>>  This plays on a normal MP3 player - but only in stereo.  If you want
>>  to hear it in surround you can download the MP3 surround player from
>>  the "fraunhofer" website mentioned above.  This file was made using
>>  Audacity > MultiWave > MP3 Surround Encoder.
>>
>>  The equivalent stereo file, made with the forward facing Rapid
>triplets is
>>
>>
>http://ad2004.hku.nl/naturesound/TomR/Surround%20Tests/afrontpair12amp3.mp=
3
>>
>>  The surround file comes into its own when the light aircraft flys over
>>  my backyard.
>>
>>  I don't have a 5.1 surround playback system so I used two stereo
>>  amplifiers fed from a low cost, Creative 5.1 external soundcard.  I
>>  just did not connect a lead to the FC, LFE feed.  The four, good
>>  quality (but old) speakers no doubt sound a lot better than a typical
>>  5.1 speaker set designed for DVD players/computers.
>>
>>  For me, the resulting surround sound is sufficiently intrigueing to
>>  merit further experimentation.  A first step will be the construction
>>  of a more serious looking surround mic based on 12 Rapid capsules
>>  (four triplets).
>>
>>  Cheers
>>  Tom Robinson
>  >
>
>
>
>
>"Microphones are not ears,
>Loudspeakers are not birds,
>A listening room is not nature."
>Klas Strandberg
>Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>


--
Rob Danielson
Peck School of the Arts
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
http://www.uwm.edu/~type/audio-art-tech-gallery/





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