Multichannel audio formats?

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mos6502

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Greetings,

If I were to produce a "quadraphonic" recording (stereo 4.0) is there any format I could put that on? I've heard a little about DVD-A, but having never created one or listened to one I'm not sure how to proceed. I already know I'd only be able to play it back in a DVD player connected to a surround system... but would a quad mix translate into something one could do on a DVD-A?

Thanks,
Owen
 
mos6502 said:
Greetings,

If I were to produce a "quadraphonic" recording (stereo 4.0) is there any format I could put that on? I've heard a little about DVD-A, but having never created one or listened to one I'm not sure how to proceed. I already know I'd only be able to play it back in a DVD player connected to a surround system... but would a quad mix translate into something one could do on a DVD-A?

Thanks,
Owen
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Welcome to the nightma...er...board, Owen! ;)

There is an alternative that does not require DVD, Fraunhoffer (the lab that devised the first and best MP3 algorithm) has made available the MP3Surround format, that will go up to 5.1 surround. There are (as usual) pluses and minuses here.

On the plus side:
- it does not require DVD for distribution; it is an encoded computer file format just like MP3 and can be distributed/played back on any machine that will support MP3 playback.

- it is also reverse-compatible with standard stereo MP3 players. That is, if you have just a regular stereo MP3 player like an iPod or Winamp or a standard CD-R or DVD-r player, your quad files will play just fine, they will simply decode in stereo.

- while it is a newer format (2004), it is becoming more accepted every month. they have added Playstation to their list of MP3Surround support, and there is a free player available for it.


On the negative side:
- it's a different format than what's used for most other surround purposes such ad surround video and DVD-A. It would for the present require (AFIK) rendering/exporting separate versions for those formats if you wanted compatability across the board. Whether that will still be true 18 months from now or not is only a guess, though.

- as it's a newer format, there's not a lot of current players that will playback the surround file in surround, but rather in stereo only. I suspect that will change pretty rapidly in the near future, but for today, the number of legacy/popular MP3 players that will play an MP3Surround file in actual surround rather than in stereo is small.

- I'm not sure of how many current editors have the MP3Surround encoder available to them. There is a separate encoder available, but whether it's an option in a lot of current editors, and which ones, I'm not sure. maybe others can chime in here on that for us.

G.
 
I just mastered a quad project last month for DVD-A. It was an album of electronica with real strings and was amazingly fun to work on. The final quad files were 24/48. We also did stereo 24/48 for the dvd-a release and stereo 16/44.1 for cd.

You need to get software that can take audio files derived from any format of surround, and encode them into a single file in preparation for DVD authoring with DTS compatibility.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=439464&Q=&is=REG&A=details

The producer/composer originally mixed in DP which lets you export quad sound designer files.

So 4.0 quad will work/play great in dvd-a format and will play through a home theater surround system or car set up with that with no problem and with great fidelity. You can also mix to the LFI channel if you have LF efx but don't necessarily have to because most systems have a crossover set which automatically filter LFI there anyway. Levels can be set just like you would set normal CD level.

If you were going to release quad I would highly recommend releasing on DVD-A as the high definition audio is a major plus. I want to bring back QUAD w/HD. Good luck.
 
Thanks for the welcome.

The MP3 Surround format seems simple enough and I might investigate it as a future portable option, however if I'm going to take the trouble to create a quad mix, I don't think I want MP3's relatively poor audio quality getting in the way.

The "Minnetonka SurCode DVD-DTS - 5.1 Surround DTS Encoder for DVD"... what does this actually do? Bear in mind, I've never created a DVD, video or audio, except for a couple of discs of video that I once made via dragging and dropping .AVI's into a program called DVDflick (which is really nice BTW, and free). To be blunt I'm not even entirely sure what "authoring" a DVD means in either the video or audio world, nor am I sure what DTS actually is in practice :o I'll probably hit up Wikipedia when I find the time.

I don't have a 5.1 surround system in the studio or even around my home, just enough monitoring to do quad and I thought it might be a fun experiment. But of course, if the experiment goes well, a way to share the results becomes a little more important.

-Owen
 
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