From: txtj@vax5.cit.cornell.edu (Scott Glazer)
Subject: Re: Virtual Sound
Date: 21 Feb 91 12:35:26 EDT
Message-ID: <1991Feb21.123526.2905@vax5.cit.cornell.edu>
Organization: CIT, Cornell University



I know Jaron Lanier's worlds (or some of them) have fairly realistic
directional sound, stuff like a ticking clock that comes from the right
direction and if you put your head read close it sounds louder in one ear
(though come to think of it, this is a much easier trick than getting the
phase differences correct and compensating for pinna distortions).

I've thought for a while that virtual sound could provide a real inroad
for a consumer application of virtual reality.  If we could get all the
sound processing neccessary on a chip, you could stick it into a walkman,
mount a real cheap head-rotation sensor on one of the earphones, and
produce some fairly interesting effects.

It would work best with sound recorded binaurally, of course.  The idea is
that is you hear, say, a trumpet player in front of you and a drum to the
right, you could turn toward the drum, and hear it in front.  Give you
some real interaction with whatever you are listening to.

-Scott Glazer
"Our universe is probably closed, its spacetime structure resembling a
tremendous doughnut.  Scientists have recently initiated the search for
the cream filling."