Meeting Date: January 23, 2009

Place

Studio `Hibiki', Pioneer Corp., Tokyo

Reporter

Eiji Asahi (Representative Director, Real Sound Lab Japan Corp.)

Subject

The latest acoustic power equalizer 'APEQ-2pro'

Participants

30

Report

Technical specifications and features of the latest acoustic power equalizer 'APEQ-2 Pro' were introduced. After brief introduction of the technology, actual measurement of acoustic power by moving a microphone in front of the loudspeakers was demonstrated to show its easiness, stability, and robustness. Reproduction with and without equalization using a speech sound and music materials were conducted to demonstrate the effect of equalization. CONEQ WORKSHOP software provides the computational power needed to acquire the hundreds of broad-band measurement points that drive CONEQ's patented Acoustic Power Frequency Response measurement correction algorithms. After acquiring and integrating the measurement points, CONEQ WORKSHOP software generates a high resolution correction curve (typically 4096 points, but user-scalable to fit different needs) on the Windows platform. Coefficients of 4096 point correction filter are uploaded to the dual channel Acoustic Power Equalizer, APEQ-2pro.

Meeting Date: February 19, 2009

Place

Demo Room, TAC System Inc. Tokyo

Reporter

Kazuya TANIGUCHI (System Designer, DiMagic Co., LTD)

Kazutaka SOMEYA (Sound Designer, DiMagic Co., LTD)

Subject

Report on AES 35th London UK International Conference ``Audio for Games''

Participants

14

Report

The reports on 35th AES International Conference ``Audio for Games'' held in London UK was made by two Reporters. Mr. Kazuya TANIGUCHI lectured on Paper Sessions, Tutorials, Events, and Demos. Mr. Kazutaka SOMEYA who presented in a Special Event (Techniques for Building Virtual Worlds: Perspectives from Leading Japanese Game Studios) with 7 GAME-SAMURAIS in the conference reported on Workshops. He is a vice chair of Audio for Games.

Meeting Date: March 19, 2009

Place

Demo Room, TAC system Inc., Tokyo

Subject

A brand-new plug-in software for de-reverberation unique in the world

Presenters

Keisuke Kinoshita (NTT Commication Science Laboratory)

Toshiyuki Kubota (NTT Learning Systems)

Participants

20

Report

A brand-new plug-in software on the ProTools platform for de-reverberation was introduced. In the beginning, Mr. Keisuke Kinoshita described history, previous methods, and problems of de-reverberation. Formulation, solution, mechanisms of de-reverberation, and perceptual evaluation of the de-reverberated speech sounds were presented. After that, Mr. Toshinori Kubota presented practical problems in the post-production processes of audio track and requirements of de-reverberation. Actual operation of de-reverberation software were demonstrated. Also, applications and abilities of the software for the musical sounds, such as a piano performance or orchestra ensemble, were discussed, while the theory is based on speech sounds. The theoretical background ensures successful de-reverberation to various kinds of sound.

Meeting Date: April 16, 2009

Place

Sound Production Studio, Senju Campus, Tokyo University of the Arts

Presenter

Akira FUKADA (NHK Technical Operations & Engineering Center Broadcast Engineering Department)

Subject

5.1 Direct Broadcasting Production at Concertgebouw

Participants

47

Report

Connecting Amsterdam and Tokyo, impressive transcontinental live program was broadcasted in Japan on March 8th. It was the world's first HDTV broadcasting in 5.1-channel surround sound from Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, one of the renowned classical concert hall for its acoustics. Mr. Akira Fukada, famous as a surround recording / mixing engineer, took charge of a technical supervision of this program. In this meeting, he gave a lecture on production system, technology and direction of the program, and the audiences were able to enjoy the recorded version of this superb program.

Meeting Date: May 21, 2009

Place

Nittobo Acoustic Engineering Co. LTD., Tokyo

Reporter

Yasushi SATAKE (Nittobo Acoustic Engineering Co. LTD.)

Subject

A proposal of the new mechanism for room acoustic tuning ---Acoustic Groove System---

Participants

36

Report

One of the important issues in designing the professional studios is how to make the walls diffused. Nittobo Acoustic Engineering proposes the Acoustic Groove System, which is consisted from the assembly of multiple poles of random diameters, in order to control diffuseness of reflections from the walls. In the beginning, simulations conducted by the visualization and auralization techniques were presented to show how the Acoustic Groove System works in terms of the diffuseness of the reflections in the room. After that, the audiences experienced audition of music in the listening room whose walls were covered by the Acoustic Groove System, with or without drapes in front of the System. Although the comparison was made not between different types of diffusers or reflectors but between absorbent and diffusive conditions, the audiences experienced the effect of the diffuser on the walls.

Meeting Date: Jun 18, 2009

Place

Demo Room, TAC System Inc. Tokyo

Reporter

Ryota ONO (Engineer, NHK Technical Operation and Engineering Center)

Subject

Report on 126th AES Convention in Munich Germany

Participants

14

Report

The report on 126th AES Convention held in Munich Germany was made by Mr. Ryota ONO. The Convention included 169 paper presentations from 20 sessions, 53 poster presentations and 103 exhibitors. Mr. Ono attended various kinds of programs at the convention, so that his report covered broad contents from paper sessions, workshops, special events, technical tour to the exhibition. Especially, Jim Anderson's Lecture and the technical tour for BMW were explained in detail.

Meeting Date: September 7, 2009

Place

Faculty of Design, Kyushu University, Fukuoka, Japan

Presenter

Dr. David Griesinger

Subject

Perception of ``engagement'' or ``near'' vs ``far'' in concert hall acoustics

Report

Dr. David Griesinger gave us a wonderful lecture. After detailed introduction describing importance of the precise binaural recording in judgment of sound field quality, the new concept of ``engagement'' in concert hall acoustics was introduced. Auditory engagement or involvement is defined as perception that we are acoustically close to the sound sources. The assumed mechanism of engagement and the method of quantitative examination using impulse response were also introduced. Practically, the well known acoustical quantities such as loudness, initial time delay gap, and direct to reverberation energy ratio were examined as the important parameters of auditory engagement. Additionally, relevance between engagement and auditory localization in azimuth angle was discussed. The thirty-six audience including more than twenty students really enjoyed his attractive talk and interesting demonstration.

Meeting Date: October 22, 2009

Place

Demo Room, TAC System Inc. Tokyo

Reporter

Toru KAMEKAWA (Associate Professor, Tokyo University of the Arts Department of Musical Creativity and Environment)

Jun YAMAZAKI (Product Designer / Manager, Tac System,Inc.)

Subject

Report on 127th AES Convention in New York

Participants

15

Report

The reports on 127th AES convention held in New York was made by two reporters. Mr.Kamekawa, who was awarded a Board of Governors Award in the convention, reported on Papers, Posters, Workshops, Seminars, Master Classes, Ceremonies, and Meetings. Mr.Yamazaki reported on Tutorials, Events, Demos, and Exhibition. He was also one of the exhibitors who released a new product (Reverb Reduction Plug-in for Pro Tools) at Neyrinck booth in this convention.

Meeting Date: November 26, 2009

Place

Demo Room, TAC System, Inc., Tokyo

Speaker

Paul Neyrinck (Neyrinck Audio)

Subject

Dolby E Encoding/Decoding and Post production workflow

Summary

Paul Neyrinck (Neyrinck Audio) gave a seminar about the overview of 'Dolby E Encoding/Decoding and Post production workflow'.

It was a wide range lecture from the history of audio encoding such as LtRt downmixing to the usage of metadata on digital audio encoding and decoding workflow. Detailed information of Dolby E signal format that is suitable for video-audio post-production was included in the talk. Also, he suggested that it is very important for audio postproduction engineers to make sure to check the details of metadata before digital encoded delivering. He showed us how to check all metadata and what is the point for inspection to deliver it using actual software tool.

Meeting Date: December 17, 2009

Place

SONA Corporation

Speaker

Sungyoung KIM (Yamaha Corporation)

Subject

Explanation of VIRTUAL CEILING SPEAKER

Summary

This year's last regular meeting was an interesting lecture by Dr. Sungyoung Kim of Yamaha Corp. about VIRTUAL CEILING SPEAKER that enables sound image localization in the height direction using a 5.1-channel surround loudspeaker setup.

This VIRTUAL CEILING SPEAKER was also presented at the paper session of this year's 127th New York AES convention (P9-7 Virtual Ceiling Speaker: Elevating Auditory Imagery in a 5-Channel Reproduction).

The theory is based on a basic principle of 3-D sound perception based on HRTF (Head-Related Transfer Function) with an idea of transaural audio reproduction system.

Participants enjoyed the experience of the sound expression which makes ``Beyond Surround'' feeling, in a brief demo session after the presentation.