GET YOUR HEADPHONES READY NOW

[Chris Sommovigo]

Virtual Reality in Recording

I've recently become interested in binaural recording again, and rediscovered (with more information) the RINGO recordings of Hugo Zuccarelli. Hugo was and is a genius and has been lambasted for his theories about human hearing, namely that the human ear not only receives impulses ... but generates them as well. The ear doesn't act as a microphone, it rather uses the ear-generated tone(s) to crate an interference pattern with the incoming signal - and decoding that pattern is what allows the brain to so precisely locate sounds in three dimensions.

Hugo posited that, instead of using the rough phase differences between sound arrival times to the two ears, it combines those phase characteristics with a more sophisticated interferometry that increases the brain's precision to locate sound sources. And though he was lambasted for his theories and doubts were cast on his credentials, Hugo managed to provide a taste of the pudding and thus - the proof that his process was more than simple binaural recording.

First, a brief brief: Binaural recordings are not at all new. They are made, typically, by placing microphones in the ears of a lifecast "dummy head" and allowing sound to do what it naturally does - just as if it were arriving to your own ears. The dummy's ears act in your stead, and the resulting recording can be fairly realistic when listened to through headphones.


Here's an example of a binaural head recording made the traditional way:

http://gallery.mac.com/o.liebert#100000 BE SURE TO LISTEN WITH HEADPHONES!

You'll notice that, like most headphone listening, some sounds tend to appear as if they are embedded inside your head. The more center a signal is, even with a "kunstkopf" (fake head), the more it tends to sound as if it is emanating from between your ears.

Now for the Holophonics difference. Hugo coined the term Holophonics to describe what he accomplished with his interferometry approach to binaural recording, the difference is not subtle ... it is STARTLING (remember - you still need headphones)! You'll notice how much easier and more precisely you can locate the sound sources that were recorded ... in fact, if you're afraid of bees, stop here. You'll be swatting at your own ear at one point in the recording!


I've been in contact with Hugo recently, and he's working on some interesting new things, including a single-point stereo loudspeaker that generates a sonic hologram in the room, as well as 3D cinema inventions. I hope to have more to report about this revolutionary thinker and audio genius in the future. For now - I think you'll agree - there is no greater "virtual reality" in recordings than what Hugo has managed to achieve.

[Alan B. Cook]

Pink Floyd and it's various members have used binaural recording pretty extensively. Off of the top of my head they include:

Roger Waters-"The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" (uncredited)
Roger Waters-"Radio K.A.O.S"
Roger Waters-"Amused to Death"
Pink Floyd-"Division Bell" (I think)
Pink Floyd-"P.U.L.S.E"
Richard Wright-"Broken China"
David Gilmour's "On an Island" (Might have used it too but I can't remember for sure.)

[Chris Sommovigo]

Hugo Zuccarelli actually helped with some of those recordings, including "The Final Cut" and Roger Waters' "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" - he was the binaural guru of the 80's.

Also - Psychic TV had an LP using Hugo's RINGO head, if I recall my history of this correctly.

But there are other P/F and Roger Waters disks that used other methods of 3-D recording, including a "normal" Fritz dummy head, and Q-Sound processing.

Of note lately is a process by Starkey called "Cetera" that has achieved a similar effect to the Zuccarelli methods.

Alan B. Cook said:

Pink Floyd and it's various members have used binaural recording pretty extensively. Off of the top of my head they include:

Roger Waters-"The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" (uncredited)
Roger Waters-"Radio K.A.O.S"
Roger Waters-"Amused to Death"
Pink Floyd-"Division Bell" (I think)
Pink Floyd-"P.U.L.S.E"
Richard Wright-"Broken China"
David Gilmour's "On an Island" (Might have used it too but I can't remember for sure.)

[Alan B. Cook]

Damn, forgot "The Final Cut" but I often do because Richard Wright didn't play on it. I imagine for these effects to work on records the Cartridge alignment and tracking force would be very, very important.

[Chris Sommovigo]

Cartridge alignment is always critical, but way more important than tracking force for this kind of stuff is azimuth adjustment.

Alan B. Cook said:

Damn, forgot "The Final Cut" but I often do because Richard Wright didn't play on it. I imagine for these effects to work on records the Cartridge alignment and tracking force would be very, very important.