SurroundView 96

Bringing Surround Sound Home

9:00-9:05 AES Toronto Exec

• Welcome

  • Introduce Master of Ceremonies, Tomlinson Holman

9:05-9:15 Tomlinson Holman, TMH Corporation

• Introduction

  • Set up the theme of the day, Bringing Surround Sound Home

9:15-9:45 Ian Masters, Sound&Vision

• Surround Sound at Home: The Consumer's Perspective

  • what do consumers own, what do they want, where are things headed?
  • market penetration
  • is this Quad II?
  • will DVD fly?
  • is surround only for movies or for music-only too?
  • is this marketing hype to sell more speakers and amps or do consumers want this in their homes?
  • how the industry is pitching this to consumers
  • who are the players (consumer gear & software manufacturers)

9:45-10:30 Brad Hohle, Dolby Laboratories

• How Surround Sound Came Home

  • Dolby's contribution to bringing surround sound home
  • multichannel media
    • which ones are making use of encoded sound
    • what media is Dolby Digital positioned for
  • evolution from encoded multichannel to discrete
    • how do they co-exist, what are the benefits of pushing ahead
  • how does the audio professional get involved, why should s/he
  • practical realities of current home market
    • matrix vs discrete

10:30-10:50 COFFEE

10:50-11:40 Tomlinson Holman

• How Many Channels?

  • review of literature and own research on appropriate number of channels for surround sound playback
  • should there be a defined limit?
  • how will manufacturers determine what is optimum number?
  • direction manufacturers currently appearing to be headed
  • work that AES has been doing to influence the outcome
  • work that other organizations have been doing

11:40-12:30 John Eargle, Delos Records

• Production Techniques for Surround Sound Music

  • when, why and how to record music for multichannel playback
  • what are practical considerations
    • equipment
    • monitoring
    • post-production
  • what extra cost in dollars and time
  • direction he is headed with Delos and why
  • promise of DVD-Audio format

12:30 - 1:15 LUNCH (included in admission)

1:15-2:00 Tomlinson Holman

• What Multichannel Audio Does for Music

  • why the music industry should/may/will move toward multichannel audio
  • info on newly formed association
  • how seriously is this being taken by music industry?
  • who is involved and what directions are being taken?

2:00-5:00 Demonstrations

Discrete Multichannel Music Recordings

• John Eargle

  • demonstration of source material in discrete multichannel room (PSB)
  • what effects can be achieved
  • what are potentials
  • what are pitfalls

Multi-channel mixing: sound-for-picture

• Brad Hohle, Dolby Laboratories

  • matrixed and discrete multichannel mixing concepts
  • overview: Dolby Surround and Dolby Digital
    • what these technologies are
    • basic review of how they work

Surround Sound in the Home

• Ian Masters

  • Home Theatre demo

TV Broadcast/Transmission Issues

• Neil Muncy

  • consumers' expectations for audio are higher given introduction of home theatre and competition from other media
  • how do broadcast and cable companies stack up?
    • are they competitive?
  • the importance of delivering a quality product to the home
    • how to do it
  • tapes of cable distributed and off-air compared to source

5:00-5:30 Panel Discussion

• panelists discussion
• questions from the floor
• wrapup