Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

Mad Scientist wrote:
Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

I saw an API configured that way in a theatre install.

You can always use the aux busses to pan stuff around, though. Strap for
postfader, of course.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

In article writes:

Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

Roland had a gadget (it was a hardware box) that worked with a stereo
signal and allowed you to steer things vertically. It worked
remarkably well but I guess it was something before its time so it
didn't last long. There was another gadget before that, abbreviated
B.A.S.E. that did the same sort of thing and was even more expensive.
They turn up every now and then.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

The Ambisonic system permitted positioning the signal anywhere in space
(including above/below), plus "interior" effects where the sound seemed to
advance toward or recede from the listener. Of course, this encoding required
correct playback, and as Ambisonics was never adopted as a standard, it's
practically useless.

You should have no trouble finding a mixing system that permits panning the
sound anywhere around a rectangle of four speakers. This does not, however,
guarantee that the listener will hear the effect you intended, as pair-wise
mixing is not psychoacoustically correct.

"Mad Scientist" wrote in message
om...
Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Roland had a gadget (it was a hardware box) that worked with a stereo
signal and allowed you to steer things vertically.

thanks...
do you know the name of any of these gadgets?

You can always use the aux busses to pan stuff around, though. Strap for
postfader, of course.

you mean have 2 levels of faders? interesting...

Mad Scientist wrote:
You can always use the aux busses to pan stuff around, though. Strap for
postfader, of course.

you mean have 2 levels of faders? interesting...

No, no. I mean strap the aux busses so that the aux sends are postfader.
Then if you have, say, eight channels up front and three channels in the
rear, you can pan the sounds around using the aux buss controls as pans.
If you run out of aux busses, you can use the stereo buss for lower left
and lower right, too, although you're stuck sending full fader level to
the stereo buss.

You still use the faders to mix, but you use the aux controls to position
the sound among all the channels.

For theatrical work where you may have far more speakers than you have
aux busses, there's no easy solution short of an external panning box
or routing on the fly with patch cables.

This is assuming you have a modern console with one aux send per buss per
channel and not something ancient with switched aux sends like I have.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Thanks for explaining - although it is kind of over my head. I am not
really much of an "engineer" - I know how to use a 4 track mixer but
haven't really gotten into anything pro yet. I have access to an
Alesis studio 32 which has diff. busses but I haven't really taken
advantage of anything on it yet beyond the basic faders. What do you
mean "strap" the aux bus? Sorry, maybe a diagram would help... Thanks
anyway

No, no. I mean strap the aux busses so that the aux sends are postfader.
Then if you have, say, eight channels up front and three channels in the
rear, you can pan the sounds around using the aux buss controls as pans.
If you run out of aux busses, you can use the stereo buss for lower left
and lower right, too, although you're stuck sending full fader level to
the stereo buss.

You still use the faders to mix, but you use the aux controls to position
the sound among all the channels.

For theatrical work where you may have far more speakers than you have
aux busses, there's no easy solution short of an external panning box
or routing on the fly with patch cables.

This is assuming you have a modern console with one aux send per buss per
channel and not something ancient with switched aux sends like I have.
--scott

There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?
thanks

You should have no trouble finding a mixing system that permits panning the
sound anywhere around a rectangle of four speakers. This does not, however,
guarantee that the listener will hear the effect you intended, as pair-wise
mixing is not psychoacoustically correct.

what do you think would be the right way to go about it?

Mad Scientist wrote:
Thanks for explaining - although it is kind of over my head. I am not
really much of an "engineer" - I know how to use a 4 track mixer but
haven't really gotten into anything pro yet. I have access to an
Alesis studio 32 which has diff. busses but I haven't really taken
advantage of anything on it yet beyond the basic faders. What do you
mean "strap" the aux bus? Sorry, maybe a diagram would help... Thanks
anyway

Okay, on many consoles there is a way to select whether the signal for
the auxes is prefader or postfader. Some of them have a button on the
panel. Many older consoles required you to pull each channel module out
and change some jumpers inside to select it, which is what I mean by
strapping. Unfortunately with the smaller Mackies Mackies, all of the
auxes are prefader, but there are some modifications you can make
(cutting traces and adding jumper wires) to make them prefader, and
Mackie will send you a little sheet on doing it if you ask.

Dunno about the Studio 32.

But the whole idea here is that your signal goes through the preamps, then
it goes to the fader, then it goes to the aux sends, and so you can use the
aux sends to route the signal to any combination of speakers you want. If
you have 12 aux busses on your console, you can drive 12 speakers this way.

Most PA guys like the aux sends to be prefader, so they can use the aux
busses for monitors; you want the monitors to be independant of the main
mix. But there are lots of reasons to want them postfader if you are
using them for other things, which is why a lot of consoles allow you to
select it.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

what do you think would be the right way to go about it?

The only currently "correct" method is Ambisonic mixing. But only a handful of
people have Ambisonic playback -- and there is no standard for conveying
Ambisonic recordings over SACD and DVD-A.

So just use what you have.

Mad Scientist wrote:
There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game joys=
tick
to pan the sound any place you want.
=20
Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?=20

Prosoniq Ambisone [1]. There used to be another one for ProTools, but=20
forgot the name.

[1]=20
http://products.prosoniq.com/cgi-bin...tail&refno=3D=
12

Johann
--=20
ich habe bemerkt, dass meine Website in Opera/Mozilla schrecklich=20
aussieht. Das sind ja auch Schei=DF Browser.
(Gudrun J=FCrgens in )

Mad Scientist wrote:
Roland had a gadget (it was a hardware box) that worked with a stereo
signal and allowed you to steer things vertically.=20
=20
do you know the name of any of these gadgets?

Roland RSS-10. Pretty hard to come across on eBay. I've seen one being=20
sold recently for around 850 EUR on eBay.de. Too much IMHO - they don't=20
have digital I/O and there's software that does the same more or less.

Roland reused RSS in quite a lot of products, their reverbs, a delay=20
processor and at least in the VS-880.

RSS sounds pretty good, although the version in the VS-880 didn't have=20
elevation and a very coarse resolution (autopanning didn't sound very=20
smooth).

Then, there's QSound, which works pretty well, although it just widens=20
the stereo space a lot.

Johann
--=20
ich habe bemerkt, dass meine Website in Opera/Mozilla schrecklich=20
aussieht. Das sind ja auch Schei=DF Browser.
(Gudrun J=FCrgens in )

(Mad Scientist) wrote in message . com...
There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?
thanks

I think a lot of people do this sort of thing with Max/Msp which
requires a little bit of programming or modular plugging and
patching. But because multichannel diffusion is a common application
for Max, I'm sure you can find some patches that people already made
if you ask around Max/Msp forums.

You can pretty much rig-up any type of controller to Max. For example
you could use 2 usb joysticks to control the horizontal plane and the
vertical plane and create a patch that routes the audio to a
multichannel sound card. Or you could create an on-screen interface
that you just use with your mouse. Of course this is a very DIY route
but it sounds like there are no real off-the-shelf solutions so it may
be just what you need.

Here's the website... http://www.cycling74.com/products/maxmsp.html

"Mad Scientist" wrote in message
om...
There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game
joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?
thanks

There's quite a few. Here's some I found (not sure if they use joystick or
not):

http://www.spinaudio.com/products.php?id=18

If you can tie MIDI data to panner position you could probably use this
freeware program: http://members.nextra.at/hubwin/midi.html (MIDI Joystick)

http://www.jlcooper.com/pages/mcspan.html

http://www.xkeys.com/xkeys/xkcontrol.php

http://www.cakewalk.com/Products/SONAR/sonitus9.asp

"Mad Scientist" wrote in message
om...
There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game
joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?
thanks

There's quite a few. Here's some I found (not sure if they use joystick or
not):

http://www.spinaudio.com/products.php?id=18

If you can tie MIDI data to panner position you could probably use this
freeware program: http://members.nextra.at/hubwin/midi.html (MIDI Joystick)

http://www.jlcooper.com/pages/mcspan.html

http://www.xkeys.com/xkeys/xkcontrol.php

http://www.cakewalk.com/Products/SONAR/sonitus9.asp

(Mad Scientist) wrote in message . com...
There's software. I've even seen ones that will let you use a game joystick
to pan the sound any place you want.

Are there any program names I can look up, or web URLs?
thanks

As a follow up to my last message here's a link to a thread on the
max/msp forum discussing 3d panning.
http://www.synthesisters.com/hyperma...r04/17263.html

thanks, i'll look it up. i think i'm going to try programming
something in .NET and DX9 ...

Of course this is a very DIY route
but it sounds like there are no real off-the-shelf solutions so it may
be just what you need.

thanks, i'll look it up. i think i'm going to try programming
something in .NET and DX9 ...

Of course this is a very DIY route
but it sounds like there are no real off-the-shelf solutions so it may
be just what you need.

(Mad Scientist) wrote in message . com...
Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

We've actually made something like this in a software application. It
can support up to 32 channels of surround, but it also does true 3d.
The product is called VibeStation. It allows you to mix sounds in 3d
space and output via rewire to your DAW. You can also drop a video in
the application if you're interested in doing surround for a film.

Paul
VRSonic

(Mad Scientist) wrote in message . com...
Does anyone make a true 3-D mixer - with pan (left/right), faders
(back/front), and up/down (what are these called?) - either physically
or as a software program? The most basic output would be to 8
speakers, one in each corner of the room, or possibly with 4 or less
speakers using 3-D audio technology.

We've actually made something like this in a software application. It
can support up to 32 channels of surround, but it also does true 3d.
The product is called VibeStation. It allows you to mix sounds in 3d
space and output via rewire to your DAW. You can also drop a video in
the application if you're interested in doing surround for a film.

Paul
VRSonic