Simulate Hardware Stereo to Quadraphonic

ursamtl · 30th September 2005, 12:58

You're absolutely right about the excitement this "journey" can bring. Back when I was in university in the 70's I discovered something called a Hafler circuit in one of those 1001 electronic projects magazines. It provided a pseudo-surround effect by connecting a speaker across the two positive speaker outputs, resulting in a difference signal going to the speaker. By today's standards, it might be somewhat primitive (although Dolby Pro Logic II's music mode is basically the same thing with a couple of tweaks), but the door it opened up into the center of the music mixes was amazing. The one big reason I added the on/off switch to V.I was to be able to switch back and forth instantly between the two version to hear just what's happening to the sound. It truly amazes me how stuff that's buried in the mix or sitting there sounding one-dimensional jumps out and takes on a whole new level of realism when the the plugin is switched on. It's almost like putting on the special glasses glasses at a 3D film.

One thing I noticed is that you mentioned that it's 100% about the music. There is one school of thought that believes music should never have a center channel at all! I was reading comments about this recently on the Sursound mailing list. Some people feel that a center channel should only be used for movies to help "lock" the dialog to the screen. I'm not entirely convinced of this myself, but it does provide food for thought. One thing I do need needs to be avoided it piping all the vocals or dialog through just the center speaker. That can end up sounding like a mono source sitting in the middle of a separate stereo field, with the whole thing sounding disjointed. That might give maximum separation, but the whole listening experience isn't as unified or full.

Yes, specise_8472 has done some VSTs for these threads, although he doesn't seem as active on this forum lately. You might also talk to johnman on here. He's a very talented programmer who's done some amazing work on wavewizard. I use a development program to do my VST plugins. I did start studying C++ but I'm not nearly at the level required to take the source code for Center Cut and turn it into a VST plugin. I did look at it and some of the code looks quite understandable, but I'm not ready to start coding on that level yet.

Have a good weekend,
Steve.

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30th September 2005, 12:58	#22 \| Link
ursamtl Registered User Join Date: May 2004 Location: Montreal Posts: 729	You're absolutely right about the excitement this "journey" can bring. Back when I was in university in the 70's I discovered something called a Hafler circuit in one of those 1001 electronic projects magazines. It provided a pseudo-surround effect by connecting a speaker across the two positive speaker outputs, resulting in a difference signal going to the speaker. By today's standards, it might be somewhat primitive (although Dolby Pro Logic II's music mode is basically the same thing with a couple of tweaks), but the door it opened up into the center of the music mixes was amazing. The one big reason I added the on/off switch to V.I was to be able to switch back and forth instantly between the two version to hear just what's happening to the sound. It truly amazes me how stuff that's buried in the mix or sitting there sounding one-dimensional jumps out and takes on a whole new level of realism when the the plugin is switched on. It's almost like putting on the special glasses glasses at a 3D film. One thing I noticed is that you mentioned that it's 100% about the music. There is one school of thought that believes music should never have a center channel at all! I was reading comments about this recently on the Sursound mailing list. Some people feel that a center channel should only be used for movies to help "lock" the dialog to the screen. I'm not entirely convinced of this myself, but it does provide food for thought. One thing I do need needs to be avoided it piping all the vocals or dialog through just the center speaker. That can end up sounding like a mono source sitting in the middle of a separate stereo field, with the whole thing sounding disjointed. That might give maximum separation, but the whole listening experience isn't as unified or full. Yes, specise_8472 has done some VSTs for these threads, although he doesn't seem as active on this forum lately. You might also talk to johnman on here. He's a very talented programmer who's done some amazing work on wavewizard. I use a development program to do my VST plugins. I did start studying C++ but I'm not nearly at the level required to take the source code for Center Cut and turn it into a VST plugin. I did look at it and some of the code looks quite understandable, but I'm not ready to start coding on that level yet. Have a good weekend, Steve.