Mark, > I guess this is where this whole discussion so far has left me confused. > There certainly could be 2, or 3, or more CDs (or LPs) released. The > question is how does a consumer know which one to purchase? Does he/she > purchase only for headphones? Do they purchase for bad living rooms? Great > tuned stereos? Cars? > > I don't see how this can work practically. [snip] I agree completely than eight different versions of a CD wouldn't work. But this isn't purely a discussion of headphones versus speakers. Yes, there appears to be some interest in 3-D audio, but it isn't limited to headphones. My demo is for headphones, yes, but the same thing can be done with speakers by taking another step with the wave equation, and that is to do retrodiction in the listening environment (or in a generic one). Many people already balance all of the speaker environments you mention; they just don't include headphones. So I don't view inclusion of headphones as another environment to become sensitive about to be a big deal. It would seem to me that as soon as people become accustomed to better headphone listening, they may prefer it just like I do, even though I used not to. As headphones become more prevalent --- as they almost certainly have lately --- mixes that favor headphones or at least include them may be more popular than those that don't. (I just saw Joe's comment which tends to support what I'm saying here, at least as I read it.) But again, what I've done is by no means limited to headphones, despite my demo. The headphone solution is a reference point where everyone will hear pretty much the same thing, assuming they have decent headphones. In addition, what I've done also includes more realistic instrument generation, and to some degree, integration of instruments and environments. It's a more physical way of thinking about all of it as opposed to the DSP-oriented approach (of the previous century, now long past...). ----------- Maybe that's the key point I should emphasize: I'm developing more physical ways to model audio, including effects of rooms (including fictitious rooms, by the way), instruments, impulse generation (modelling actual playing such as picking a string on a guitar), etc. I believe that this physical modelling may very well make creating and mixing music easier and more realistic sounding. My demo is a small part of that to show that 3-dimensional rooms can be modelled to obtain headphone solutions which sound better than the usual mix --- at least they do to me. This headphone demo led me to wondering if people would begin to prefer headphones over speakers, like I now do. Previously I didn't. ----------- By the way, I'm still curious about the questions I asked about those IR's you're working with. Or are you proscribed from discussing them? I'm sure others would also like to hear about what you're seeing if you can discuss it. Thanks for any discussion about them! Dave.
