# How good is Aether for positioning?



## lee (Mar 7, 2009)

I´m really interrested in anyones experience of Aether http://www.galbanum.com/products/aether/ when it comes to positioning your soundsources and the listener in the room?

/Johnny


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## Peter Emanuel Roos (Mar 8, 2009)

This sure looks very interesting! Haven't tried out the demo, but will surely do!


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## rayinstirling (Mar 8, 2009)

Simple,

You can use ER or LR separately by switching one off, which also cuts the amount of processing. This of course would be irrelevant if the resulting sound was full of unwanted artifacts but if they exist I don't hear them. Others may have better equipment (ears) than me :D


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## lee (Mar 8, 2009)

I really should be trying out the demo more. Will do!

rayinstirling: How good do you think it is creating that 3d space, putting instruments in there?

Anyone else got opinions on the virtual stage positioning going on in Aether? Hannes??


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## lee (Mar 9, 2009)

Quote from their homepage: "...the interface provides five additional control knobs to customize their most important aspects. These controls allow adjustment of the size and geometrical shape of the Space Type default as well *the positioning models used to determine where the sound source and listener are in the room.*"

/Johnny


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## Hannes_F (Mar 9, 2009)

Johnny,

I did not really understand what the "position" knob in Aether does. I would have expected that it moves the sound source forward and back but I cannot hear any of this, what happens is more like the change of the phase.

I mailed this question to the developer a while ago but he did not respond (twice). Have tried to phone him up several times but all I got was a different mail adress ... not an answer.

I will try this again but my guess is that the developer is not really aware of how valuable this feature for us is or at least could be. Maybe I can convince him, since the rest of the program is working very well.

That being said you can use other controls for positioning like the general dry/wet amount, the amount of ERs and tail, room size, different room type, predelay and reverb time to adjust distance. But this is of course a workaround and not what we actually want. 

The "distance" that is created by "more wet" is definetely not the same thing as "real distance". Not many people, even those who deal professionally with reverb in its varous manifestations, seem to be aware of that.


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## lee (Mar 9, 2009)

Hannes_F: Interesting! I guess it would take more than one knob to do proper positioning. I hope they will eventually program it, more advance than a single knob. Let´s see, we´d like forward/back, left/right, instrument/ensemble width and perhaps an angle knob? 

Here´s a resized screenshot btw, where you can see the position knob, if someone havent seen it:


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## synergy543 (Mar 9, 2009)

Why would the reverb move? Really, its only the first reflections that would noticably be different and after that, as the sound bounces around a room (or virutal room) it comes from all directions.

To hear the ER panning well, you'd need a rather short impulse sound (like wood blocks) as longer slow attack sounds will get mushed into the reverb and not be very well defined. 

It would be interesting to A/B a real world recording of only the reverb portion of an impulse sound as it moves around the room. Does anyone know of such a recording? I'm not exactly sure what it would sound like! But that is the holy grail everyone seems to want to emulate.

I suppose, we could take a wood block sample recorded far to one side of a stage and then flip the L/R returns, cut off the initial attack and then compare the results. Anyone have time to try this?


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## Hannes_F (Mar 9, 2009)

Hmm Synthetic, I see where you are coming from but I want to move the instrument _and _its reverb. 

That being said the ER of a hard panned signal is very different from a centered one in Altiverb but only if you use "true stereo" (or ER cross as it is put in Aether). And my own records and tests have shown me that the ear does not really care whether the notes are long or short, it can tell panned ERs from centered ERs as well for slow music.

If you put an instrument to the left side of the stage in real world the left side of the ER should be earlier but also much stronger.


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## synergy543 (Mar 9, 2009)

Hannes, I agree, although it affects all sounds, some simply allow focus on the reverb more than others. Still, I think it would be interesting to hear and analyze some examples or this L/R location panning that we speak of.

btw, while Synthetic is cool guy, I'm more into synergy.


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## lee (Mar 10, 2009)

synergy543 @ Mon Mar 09 said:


> btw, while Synthetic is cool guy, I'm more into synergy.



Haha, what´s even cooler is that you seem to have split personalities, and two users on this forum, synergetic!


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## synergy543 (Mar 10, 2009)

When Jeff shares his life secrets, 5DMarkII and bank account, we'll be synergetic. Untill then, we're two different people.


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## Hannes_F (Mar 10, 2009)

synergy543 @ Tue Mar 10 said:


> btw, while Synthetic is cool guy, I'm more into synergy.



Haha, I know you are different people but it was a typo, sorry! :wink:


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## synergy543 (Mar 10, 2009)

No problem Hannes, just protecting Jeff's reputation here. 

But back on topic, how does Aether sound with sample libs? I haven't had a chance to try it yet. Does anyone have an example?


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## lee (Mar 10, 2009)

Hannes_F @ Tue Mar 10 said:


> synergy543 @ Tue Mar 10 said:
> 
> 
> > btw, while Synthetic is cool guy, I'm more into synergy.
> ...



I know this too, just teasing synergy.. :D Ok, sorry, lets get back on topic now.


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## synergy543 (Mar 17, 2009)

I suppose this is what you really wish the position controls on Aether to accomplish - both L/R and front/back positioning as Maarten Spruijt demonstrates with Altiverb.

http://www.audioease.com/Pages/Altiverb/AltiverbStagepositions.html (http://www.audioease.com/Pages/Altiverb ... tions.html)


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## Hannes_F (Mar 17, 2009)

You know what is funny? Although so many people are using reverb, ERs etc. for positioning and creating depth I have not read one single description that really nails it. They are all falling into the same pit.


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## bryla (Mar 17, 2009)

Hannes, may I recommend Mike Novy's book 'The composer's approach' for this


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## Hannes_F (Mar 17, 2009)

bryla @ Tue Mar 17 said:


> Hannes, may I recommend Mike Novy's book 'The composer's approach' for this



I don't know this book but have ordered it now. Let's see ...

The only person that nailed it in a public article or information is Dan Kury IMO. All other methods or tutorials that I have seen add reverb to the dry signal and this way you never get it right in regards to depth. There are many misinformations around.


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## rayinstirling (Mar 18, 2009)

Hannes_F @ Wed Mar 18 said:


> There are many misinformations around.



So Hannes,

Does this mean, we should use these reverbs of any type to create a nice musical effect without getting too concerned with the impossible. "sounding exactly like the real thing".

I agree on the Dan Kury way being impressive when I first read and heard the results but now, a couple of years later I've listened to many more impressive virtual instrument orchestrations where other methods sound very musical to me.

Ray


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## synergy543 (Mar 18, 2009)

Hannes, what is it that you don't like about the AudioEase method the Maarten Spruijt demonstrates?

What do you mean the Dan Kury way? Can you send me a link? In the lastest videos Dan posted on NI and Motunicornation, he is using Altiverbs on each stem with an Altiverb "Lexicon" on the overall mix. This is not so different from what Marteen demonstrated.

What isn't nailed? I don't get it.

Positioning of ER is the most critical as those provide the room cues and positioning of the instruments. Beyond that, it becomes a long wash of reverb that is colored by the room resonances.

It would seem someone could build an algorithm that would vary the ERs depending upon the location of the source. This shouldn't be too hard to do. I could do the maths on this! Just an ER box with no reverb. Surprising no enterprising sole has done this yet. Sort of a complex Haas panner with preset locations for orchestral instrument positions.


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## Hannes_F (Mar 18, 2009)

Hi,

I mean general aspects of Dan Kurys general approach, not necessarily his exact settings.

For example I sometimes prefer a much dryer sound but want it to be dimensional. I want my first violins not to be in my face but also not way back in the hall, and I want to hear the depth of the group. Not very reverby but a little of it, something along the lines of this

http://www.strings-on-demand.com/demos/ ... ins_S2.mp3

To get back to the topic, I can only achieve this with Altiverb, not with Aether.


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## Andrew Souter (Mar 19, 2009)

Hi Guys.

Thanks for the comments and questions. Sorry we are late to the party, this is our first time on this forum.

Hannes, I had provided you with my personal email b/c that is the fastest way to reach me, since I receive it both in he office, and via iPhone when I am out of office. So I gave you that info in effort to try to be MORE available to you. Generally, we try to be very receptive and available to customers.

Position info to follow...

Best,

Andrew Souter
_______________________________

2C-Audio | creative precision
www.2caudio.com

Galbanum | sonic science aural allusion 
www.galbanum.com


_______________________________


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## Andrew Souter (Mar 19, 2009)

Hi Guys.

Regarding positioning, there is no way in Aether to achieve specific control over "stage positions" of individual instruments directly per se. (but keep reading the rest, as there are some great tricks at the bottom. :wink: ) This is something we are considering exploring for future updates/products. Our goal with Aether was to provide a reasonable amount of user control, while at the same time combine parameters where possible to keep things usable and less complicated. 

The Space Type Macros are a good example of this. Behind the scenes there are 75 parameters in the alg that are controlled by the Space Type control. We could have opted to expose these controls, and add 75 more knobs to the GUI, but obviously that would be overkill. So, we found an eloquent way to wrap this complexity into a single GUI element, and we took the liberty to have a little fun by using a stylized sketch of these spaces to keep things interesting. The additional 6-9 knobs that control the ER engine control other parts of ER model, and these are NOT part of the 75 parameters that make up the Space type. So in total the ER section of the alg has about 84 parameters internally.

The current Position control is actually similar in concept. It is sort of a macro control that controls several parts of ER model with a single control. Basically we do the following:

1 Each space type has X Y Z dimension Ratios. These vary depending on the Space type. We can perhaps publish this info in the next update of the manual.

2 The ratios multiplied by the current Size setting determine XYZ dimensions in meters.

3 Next we have Position. Position controls two aspects: Source position, and (virtual) Mic position. For both of these we have a Min and Max location for two channels (L and R) for each. We choose these locations based on study of models of acoustic spaces, and sound micing techniques used in real recordings etc. So we have an array of coordinates, each of which was carefuly chosen by use to make sense for the given Space Type:

a) Source Position Min L defined by XYZ coordinates. 
b) Source Position Max L defined by XYZ coordinates. 

c) Source Position Min R defined by XYZ coordinates. 
d) Source Position Max R defined by XYZ coordinates. 

e) Mic Position Min L defined by XYZ coordinates. 
f) Mic Position Max L defined by XYZ coordinates. 

g) Mic Position Min R defined by XYZ coordinates. 
h) Mic Position Max R defined by XYZ coordinates. 

The Position Control creates a path between all these points. When the Position control on the GUI is at the Min or Max settings you end up with the one of the points we have defined in the profile for the given Space Type. If it is somewhere in the middle, all of these point positions are interpolated to give a smooth path from the possible extremes. 

Thus the positioning scheme is quite well thought out and designed, but we do not allow you to say place the Cello stage left, and the Flute stage right directly per se. Instead we choose a range of useful parameters and allow you to "morph around" inside this 3D parameter space with a single control. And we have chosen parameter bounds for you that make sense for the given space type.

Thoughts? Comments?

Also, one thing to note, which we do elsewhere already but we will say again, one powerful things to do with Aether is to turn OFF the LR engine and insert an instance on each track you are working with. Then insert an instance on a Send/Aux/Bus and only use the LR engine. This will not use a lot of CPU power BTW, b/c bypassed sections do not process on the CPU (this is by design). If you do things this way, you can select a desired space type (maybe one of the Halls for symphonic material) and use the same ER settings for all audio tracks, EXCEPT, change position for each. And since all tracks share the same LR diffuse engine, the result will be quite close to what you are after-- i.e. You will have all tracks feel like they are in the same room, but each coming from a slightly different location in this room.





Best,

Andrew Souter
_______________________________


2C-Audio | creative precision
www.2caudio.com

Galbanum | sonic science aural allusion 
www.galbanum.com


_______________________________


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## Andrew Souter (Mar 19, 2009)

I should also note that the Cross and Width controls also have an important role in the pursuit of positioning sources in virtual space. If you pan your signals before they enter Aether this L-R position can be retained, expanded, collapsed, or reversed using the cross and width controls. Please see the PDF manual section titled "Understanding Cross and Width".

http://www.2caudio.com/products/aether/pdf/2CAudio _Aether_Manual.pdf



Best,

Andrew Souter
_______________________________

2C-Audio | creative precision
www.2caudio.com

Galbanum | sonic science aural allusion 
www.galbanum.com

_______________________________


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## lee (Mar 21, 2009)

Haha, I was just going to quote you from kvr Andrew Souter, with the exact text you wrote.

I sure hope you succeed with developing more advanced stage positioning, since this would interrest alof of us virtual orchestrators.


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