Surround Sound 101

By John Sciacca

It’s not often that you get the chance to listen to a true luminary and industry pioneer speak. Even less often when you get the opportunity to do it for free. But that’s exactly what’s being offered by Audyssey in their next Webinar, where you can hear the true Jedi Master of surround sound discuss “The History and Future of Surround Sound.”

For those unfamiliar with Tomlinson (Tom) Holman, his biography reads like the history of modern surround sound. He is credited for naming 5.1, the most commonly used surround speaker set-up today. He was also Chief Engineer at Lucasfilm where he developed a set of standards in 1982 for “Return of the Jedi.” The standards insured that theatrical playback matched what was heard in the mixing room and were called THX. In fact, he is often referred to as being the “T” and “H,” as in the “Tom Holman eXperiment.”

Holman also developed the world’s first 10.2 channel surround system – front left, top front left, front right, top front right, surround left, top surround left, surround right, top surround right, center, top center above the screen, and front and back subwoofers – which completely envelopes listeners.

In 2001, he won an Academy Award for Scientific and Technical Achievement. And recently, he co-founded Audyssey, where he continues as Chief Scientist. Audyssey’s MultEQ technology is widely used for sophisticated room correction and equalization in many home theater receivers and processors. Most recently, Audyssey has introduced Dynamic Volume to tame wild swings between loud and soft passages, Dynamic EQ to deliver consistent bass response, tonal balance and surround levels regardless of volume level, and DSX which adds height and/or width channels. (See Brent Butterworth’s impression of DSX by clicking here: http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/newproducts/3250/first-listen-audyssey-dsx.html)

Holman is currently a professor of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California (USC), and his book Sound for Film and Television is considered required reading for any film majors. I’ve had the opportunity to hear Holman speak, and it is always incredibly entertaining and enlightening.

The Webinar is being held on Friday, December 18th, from 11 AM to 1 PM PST. To reserve your spot, sign up now by clicking this link: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/424560306?utm_source=Audyssey+Master+List&utm_campaign=b30e8ec3df-emailblast20091119&utm_medium=email

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 25th, 2009 at 1:10 pm and is filed under Distributed Audio, MP3, Media Room Design, Speakers, Surround Sound. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.