You big dummy—Casey Abrams with his binaural microphone muse. (Photo credit: Julienne Schaer)
3D sound recording and mixing is seeing a fast expansion. There’s a plethora of plugins—more every day—that will help audio engineers to place ambisonic audio all over the place working in the box (ITB). But there are other classic techniques available for creating immersive effects.
In this world premiere video from Chesky Records, the time-honored practice of binaural recording—commonly accomplished by using a single two-eared “dummy head” microphone to capture a 3D sound field—is clearly demonstrated.
Centered around an inventively soulful performance by bassist and vocalist Casey Abrams, the song “Robot Lovers” is the lead single from his upcoming Chesky Records album debuting in Spring 2018.
We talked to Chesky engineer Nicholas Prout about the techniques that went into recording this single, which launches Friday, November 10th on iTunes, Spotify, Amazon, and HDtracks. (To help promote interest in the format, the label offered SonicScoop readers 25% off any release at HDtracks. Just use the code ROBOTSCOOP at checkout.)
It Happens in Real Time
Recorded at the Hirsch Center in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Abrams’ single is the latest in the Chesky “Binaural+” Series, which presents the listener with spacious, lush and multi-dimensional 3D sound experiences.
“The video for ‘Robot Lovers’ shows how we make a binaural recording,” engineer Nicholas Prout told me. “The position of each player and their distance from the mic is critical as they cannot be changed in post production.
“The dummy head records the whole space that it is in and everything about the sounds around it,” Prout continues. “When we explained this to Jacob Scesney, the saxophone player in Casey’s band, he saw it as an opportunity to add his own special effects by moving 360 degrees around the microphone when soloing on this and one other song — one of the more imaginative uses of the technology.”
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Source: Sonic Scoop