03/08/07
(March 8, 2007) — Every few weeks Audio Ease releases free new impulse responses for their convolution reverb Altiverb. This is a brief update on what was released recently and a preview of what is to come.

Since the summer of 2006 acoustics samples (Impulse Responses or “IR's”) have been added of the renowned small concert hall Kammermusiksaal in Berlin, the beautiful dark church Iglesia San Miguel from Cuenca, Spain and the modern concert hall of Bruges Belgium. But also audio post production samples have seen light. Most notably historic train interiors, rock clubs from Manhattan and the Netherlands, and a series of indoor sports stadiums from Germany in December 2006.

Today’s release is one Audio Ease is particularly proud of: the home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic — Walt Disney Concert hall. This modern hall opened on October 23, 2003, and while the architecture evoked mixed opinions, the acoustics of the concert hall were widely praised in contrast to its predecessor, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. This IR release is as complete as always with many microphone set-ups in stereo and surround, interactive surround VR photography and Google Earth Placemarks.

On the LA trip another valuable recording was made, to be released soon: the famous 20th Century Fox Film Scoring Stage. Audio Ease is currently processing recordings made in the halls and churches of Stockholm and Oslo and the spectacular Trakai Castle in Vilnius Lithuania.

"When we started out making these samples in 2000, I wasn't so convinced there would be enough difference between concert halls to justify so many in our library of acoustics," says Arjen van der Schoot, co-owner of Audio Ease and recording engineer for the majority of the samples. "But now, if in Altiverb you switch between all these halls of Sydney, Amsterdam, Berlin , Scandinavia and the US there really is no doubt that there is still place for a bunch more. That's how different they are. That means we can remain doing what we are really good at: finding and recording great spaces. I just returned from a sampling trip to India. Apart form the stunning acoustics recordings I made there my mouth watered from the other possibilities in that country. I am aching to pack my recording gear and go back someday."

Audio Ease Adds Expansion Chassis Support to Altiverb 6 TDM and Announces HD Chip Support

Broadening its support for Mac Pro Tools|HD systems, two additional projects have commenced since the release of the original Altiverb 6 TDM plug-in in January.

The result of the first: last week’s release adds compatibility with the most recent Digidesign Expansion|HD Chassis. Owners of such setups can now load Altiverb on HD-Accel chips inside their computer and in their Expansion|HD Chassis.

"The TDM version of Altiverb can produce 2.1 seconds of stereo reverb form a single HD|Accel chip," says Peter Bakker, lead TDM engineer and co-owner of Audio Ease. "But more chips are required if the TDM hardware is to produce 8 second long surround reverb tails from cathedrals. Support for the Expansion|HD Chassis is therefore a major feat in the usability of Altiverb in larger TDM set-ups."
A release supporting (non-Accel) HD chips is close as well. This will enable more instantiations of Altiverb 6 TDM on small and large TDM systems alike.
At audioease.com the update from Altiverb 5 HTDM to Altiverb 6 XL, which includes the TDM plug-in, costs US$100 or US$129, depending on the date of purchase of Altiverb 5.

Altiverb is the first convolution reverb as a real-time plug-in. It has become the industry standard and has won many awards including the latest "Best signal processing software 2006" from Electronic Musician Magazine. A 19 minute demo movie can be viewed at http://www.audioease.com/demo.