http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUDTlvagjJA&feature=related

Listen to this with your eyes closed. Wear headphones for the best effect.

This is so cool!

I had an entire album made up like this once. My favorite moment was when a subway train went by. The creators of the album said they couldn't figure out why listeners insisted the train was "behind" them. They finally came to the conclusion that without visual cues, the brain decided the sound was coming from behind them.

Disappointing- I was expecting a virtual barber shop... quartet.

As for sound positioning, I believe some audio scientists have done studies, and discovered some minor quality of sound that cues the human brain to recognize a sound as being behind you, as opposed to in front. This is what allows Bose to achieve their virtual surround sound with only two speakers.

A book to check out- Oliver Saks' Musicophilia. One of the cases he writes about is a man who went deaf in one ear- and lost the ability to mentally position music in space. For him, all concerts sounded literally 'flat' and lost a subtle, yet vital quality. Eventually, his brain learned to cope with the problem- he would unconsciously turn his head, and piece together the sonic landscape (if the strings were close or far away, or to the left or the right, for example)- achieving a sort of virtual stereophonic hearing.

-Erik

Have you noticed that the WEATHER Channel is doing SOUND EFFECT on their 8 minute forecasts? This morning we were expecting snow and 40 mph winds and the visual on the Weather Channel had the snow falling moving cartoon WITH the sound of the Howling wind. I thought That was just WILD, but cool. I loved it!

I don't get it. What's the big deal? Am I missing something? This idea seems as old as Fantasia.

I don't get it either - it's stereo - and it is nothing new. I am gonna go listen to some pink floyd

Heh - every generation thinks that they invented two things - sex and music.

Cool!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereo

Like I said, as old as Fantasia (Disney), the first movie in stereophonic sound

Well, all you guys are smarter than I, that's for sure. I wasn't aware that you could get that "behind you" sound by just using stereo. Peculiar.

Of course, I found the clip rather boring and fast forwarded through most of it, but that's another story. The basic idea I found intriguing.

It is stereo, but very good stereo.

The recording method is different than just a microphone with 360 degree recording where the sound is dimensionally flat. Regular recording methods can do left and right speakers one at a time, both at the same time and a sweeping effect.

This is recorded using a bust of a human head with the microphones in the ears, two microphones. This way it picks up the sound the way human ears would.

The effect is a very clear, three dimensional piece of audio.

floyd was the first thing I thought of.
from wikipedia-:

The Final Cut was recorded using "Holophonics" - an audio processing technique used to enhance the aural three-dimensional 'feel' of the recording. Holophonics was used to make sound effects on the album appear more three-dimensional to the listener - sound effects, particularly when heard on headphones, appear to pass not just from left to right in the stereo spectrum but also from in front to behind of the listener and around them. Perhaps the most notable use of holophonics on the album is on the song 'Get Your Filthy Hands Off My Desert' - during the intro, an aeroplane is heard to fly swiftly overhead, passing from in front of the listener to behind them, before a huge explosion from the bomb it has dropped is heard surrounding the listener both in front and behind them and to either side of the stereo picture. The use of this technique was in keeping with Pink Floyd's long standing interest in using atmospheric sound effects combined with advances and innovations in audio technology to enhance the listener's experience of their music. It was also claimed that this process could not be duplicated if one made a copy of the recording i.e., copying from the vinyl record to tape cassette.[citation needed]

the final cut was one of there later albums, thought most of their work used this sound system. dark side fo the moon has a lot of weird stuff on it...

I hear everytime I go to a movie theatre and that Dolby part comes up where the "ting" sound goes around the room.

But Bill, isn't the DOLBY stuff done with several tracks? One in front, two to the side and two to the back?

Man,I wanted a free hair cut.It was pretty wild.

Honestly, I don't know. It could be quadrophonic sound. Quadrophonic sound has been used at certain raves for over a decade now. Richie Hawtin has been playing with it for a while.