Dolby's immersive Atmos audio is coming to your living room

[SAWYER]

lol@audiophiles

 

[mmntech]

Are there even any Blu-ray or digital sources that support that many audio channels?

As a filmmaker, this annoys me to no end. I can understand why they blast the commercials when you're watching live TV, but there's really no excuse for a ridiculously huge range of sound in a movie. Action scenes should be loud, but not to the point where you have to adjust your equipment.

This is a personal pet peeve of mine as well. When I was taught editing, I was told to keep the audio levelled at about -12dB. The compressor/limiter tool should have an anti-abuse warnings attached to it.

A lot of internet videos are notorious for this. It falls somewhere in between autoplay and vertical videos on the level of annoying.

 

[Kaido]

Are there even any Blu-ray or digital sources that support that many audio channels?

I think Atmos only came out to theaters in 2012 or so, and we're just starting to see residential receiver support announcements as of last month:

http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/P...Atmos-Enabled+Elite+Speakers+and+SC+Receivers

http://www.cepro.com/article/onkyo_goes_all_the_way_with_dolby_atmos_enabled_a_v_receivers/

So Pioneer, Onkyo, and Integra already have support coming in the form of 9.2 & 11.2 receivers. I've heard that movie soundtrack quality can be hit & miss - it seems like a lot of audio houses base the mix off a 7.1 setup, so it can either be lame or really great. But it's the same with 5.1 - I've seen very few movies where 5.1 was used well. Most of them make great 3.1 movies - the center for dialogue & the left & right fronts for the rest of the sounds & some off-center vocals, plus a subwoofer for bass.

I want to try Atmos as a DIY project using a truckload of homemade mini-cube speakers - I've built several sets of Wolf's PC speakers from the PE Techtalk forums and have cutout a dozen or so extra sets for future usage...this would be perfect to try it out with! :awe:

 

[Kaido]

Interesting note...you'll need Atmos speakers or a module to add to your existing speakers:

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/23/dolby-atmos-coming-to-living-rooms/

Also:

Studios plan to release Atmos-ready movies on Blu-ray and streaming services starting this fall. Logically, supporting hardware will also surface in the "next few months."

 

[Kneedragger]

Interesting note...you'll need Atmos speakers or a module to add to your existing speakers:

http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/23/dolby-atmos-coming-to-living-rooms/

Also:

Sounds like it's already set up for failure.. I'll stick with 5.1 and 7.1..

 

[purbeast0]

lol @ thinking they can stream atmos ready movies. they can't even stream hd audio tracks yet, but they plan to stream the atmos soundtrack? i'd think it requires a lot more data than the hd tracks do.

 

[mmntech]

lol @ thinking they can stream atmos ready movies. they can't even stream hd audio tracks yet, but they plan to stream the atmos soundtrack? i'd think it requires a lot more data than the hd tracks do.

We're not the target market for this. Sony already has a streaming service for 4K IIRC. You would need very fast internet, though wealthy people buying this gear probably already do.

 

[Kaido]

We're not the target market for this. Sony already has a streaming service for 4K IIRC. You would need very fast internet, though wealthy people buying this gear probably already do.

If you have the money, the things you can do would amaze you. I've seen some of the craziest stuff installed in high-end home theater rooms (scratch that, home cinema rooms). For example, you can get a Prima system installed in your home. It's a RAID-5 box that requires a static IP and has a fingerprint sensor to authenticate the user. It downloads the movies in the background so there's never any issues streaming it and gives you 4:2:2 10-bit resolution (basically twice the sharpness of Bluray). It costs $500 to watch a single movie, which you cannot rewind (you can pause it tho) and is only available for 24 hours:

http://www.primacinema.com/

Pretty cool if you have the bucks tho! Granted, my LED projector only cost as much as a single viewing on the Prima system, so I'm pretty happy with what I've got :biggrin: Check out more glorious examples of excess in the 2014 "Home of the Year" winners at Electronic House:

http://www.electronichouse.com/specials/hoty14

 

[Kaido]

lol @ thinking they can stream atmos ready movies. they can't even stream hd audio tracks yet, but they plan to stream the atmos soundtrack? i'd think it requires a lot more data than the hd tracks do.

Eh, they'll figure out a way. RED makes UltraHD+ cameras and has a codec that carries 4K at 2.5 MB/sec. That translates out to 20 Mbps, which a lot of consumers now have access to. If the data is too heavy, I'm sure they can do a partial-loading trick to avoid buffering, something like Youtube does with DASH (which we all know works perfectly, /snicker).

 

[mmntech]

If you have the money, the things you can do would amaze you. I've seen some of the craziest stuff installed in high-end home theater rooms (scratch that, home cinema rooms). For example, you can get a Prima system installed in your home. It's a RAID-5 box that requires a static IP and has a fingerprint sensor to authenticate the user. It downloads the movies in the background so there's never any issues streaming it and gives you 4:2:2 10-bit resolution (basically twice the sharpness of Bluray). It costs $500 to watch a single movie, which you cannot rewind (you can pause it tho) and is only available for 24 hours:

http://www.primacinema.com/

Pretty cool if you have the bucks tho! Granted, my LED projector only cost as much as a single viewing on the Prima system, so I'm pretty happy with what I've got :biggrin: Check out more glorious examples of excess in the 2014 "Home of the Year" winners at Electronic House:

http://www.electronichouse.com/specials/hoty14

Working at a TV station, I'm used to being around expensive gear. Though I still think that's going overboard. Makes you wonder if it's not better to just buy the 35mm stock at that point.

Eh, they'll figure out a way. RED makes UltraHD+ cameras and has a codec that carries 4K at 2.5 MB/sec. That translates out to 20 Mbps, which a lot of consumers now have access to. If the data is too heavy, I'm sure they can do a partial-loading trick to avoid buffering, something like Youtube does with DASH (which we all know works perfectly, /snicker).

I know they're working on the H.265 standard, which is said to double the compression of H.264 while maintaining the same level of visual quality. Which can do 4K at 25mbps at 30fps, or 40mbps at 60fps. Which means it's doable with current Bluray technology.

The PS4 and Xbox One already support 2160/30p over HDMI 1.4. You'd just need a firmware update to add the new codec.