WELCOME No. 277  December 2013 www.audiomedia.com


Our pick of the year's top new product releases p24


IN THIS ISSUE  CAPITOL THEATRE


p28 After two years of upgrades


the Polish theatre is finally ready to open its doors


 FAR HEATH


A recent update brings even more to this secluded studio


p30  KILLZONE


How to transfer the sound of an iconic franchise to the mobile format


p32  TECH FOCUS


Microphone preamplifiers p34


December 2013 Issue 277


MEET THE TEAM


Deputy Editor – Jory MacKay jory.mackay@intentmedia.co.uk


Staff Writer – Jake Young jake.young@intentmedia.co.uk


Managing Editor – Jo Ruddock jo.ruddock@intentmedia.co.uk


Sales Manager – Graham Kirk graham.kirk@intentmedia.co.uk


Head of Design & Production – Adam Butler adam.butler@intentmedia.co.uk


Production Executive – Jason Dowie jason.dowie@intentmedia.co.uk


Designer – Jat Garcha jat.garcha@intentmedia.co.uk


Publisher – Steve Connolly steve.connolly@intentmedia.co.uk


Press releases to: pressreleases@intentmedia.co.uk


© Intent Media 2013. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior permission of the copyright owners.


Audio Media is published by Intent Media London, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18-26 Essex Road, London N1 8LN, England. Editorial tel +44 (0)20 7354 6002 Sales tel +44 (0)20 7354 6000


Audio Media ISSN number: ISSN 0960-7471 (Print)


Circulation & Subscription enquiries Tel: +44 (0)20 7354 6001 email: audiomedia.subscriptions@c-cms.com


Printed by Stephen & George, Wales Jory MacKay, Deputy Editor


THERE was a short, hand-drawn comic circulating around the internet a while back outlining the ‘modern’ recording process. Without going into the details of it, the gist of the strip was that these days, instruments are recorded and processed through expensive, often vintage gear, before being converted to MP3 format, sold for £0.99 and listened to through £5 earbuds. The humour comes from the truth of it, and the truth of it is painfully obvious. Spend any time in a studio watching the blood, sweat, and time (not to mention cold hard cash) that gets poured into any recording and the fact that MP3s are still the preferred format for distribution and listening will bring a tear to your eye.


With the exponential rate in which technology is advancing, why have we not seen any sort of adoption of higher resolution audio formats? When I spoke to mastering guru and all-around industry legend, Crispin Murray, last month he made a few excellent points on the subject. First, we tried and failed. Ten years ago there was the release of DVDA and SACD (developed jointly by Sony and Philips). As with any new technology, a format war ensued, marketing tore each other to pieces, and MP3 once again rose to the top due to its smaller size and ease of download. In essence, the public chose quantity over quality.


“As download speeds continue to increase, it’s not hard to


imagine users downloading audio files that are 10-times the size of an average MP3 within a few years.”


Second: storage and bandwidth. With most people downloading music from services like iTunes and Amazon, flipping the switch and all of a sudden providing 96kHz/24-bit audio files would slaughter their data centres. As Crispin put it: “There are bottlenecks in the infrastructure”. The flipside of this all is, of course, the resurgence of vinyl, with the BPI stating that vinyl sales hit their highest level in over a decade this year. Yet vinyl is still niche and the question remains of how to bring higher quality audio to the everyday listener. Delivery isn’t an issue anymore, and as download speeds continue to increase, it’s not hard to imagine users downloading audio files that are 10-times the size of an average MP3 within a few years. We’ve even overcome the issue of portable storage as more people curate smaller playlists to keep on their phones rather than carry an entire library around on a massive player.


So are we on the verge of a high-resolution audio revolution? Apple hasn’t been shy about amassing a 96kHz library ‘for the future’ and Sony recently launched its new high-resolution audio range at IFA in Berlin. With these heavy hitters on board we seem to be closely approaching the tipping point. And, for all of our ears’ sake, I sure hope so.


www.audiomedia.com


December 2013 03


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