The Best Mics for 3D Audio, Virtual Reality Sound & “Ambisonics”

In our newly-expanded “Outside Scoop” section, we highlight some of the very best posts of the week on audio and music production. This time, a roundup of 3D Audio and virtual reality mics from Peter Kirn.

Peter Kirn of CDM rounds up a big handful of some of the most innovative 3D mics for creating immersive sound experiences.

Microphones have come quite a long way since their inception. First, microphones recorded in mono, then in stereo, then in surround sound, and now some microphones record in 3D.

The most obvious application of 3D microphones is in crafting Virtual Reality content, but Peter Kirn of CDM claims that “The microphone technology itself may wind up being the future of recording with or without consumers embracing VR tech.”

These 3D microphones contain “a mic capsule with multiple diaphragms for capturing full-spectrum sound from all directions,” and “software processing so you can decode that directional audio, and (generally speaking) encode it into various surround delivery formats or ambisonic sound.”

Ambisonics is a full-sphere surround sound format that covers sound sources above and below the listener. It uses B-format to transmit speaker-independent representations of a sound field. This means that you can think in terms of source signal direction rather than monitor position.

Beyond the usefulness that 3D microphones play in VR, they “…are useful in modeling different microphones, since you can adjust the capture pattern in software after the fact.” This makes 360-degree microphones a hot commodity in the world of music, and post-production for modeling expensive classic microphones.

For a fairly comprehensive list of 6+ of the latest 3D microphones to hit the market, read the full article by Kirn on Create Digital Music. It includes the Ambeo, Hebatoah, Zylia, Hear360 8ball, the RØDE NT-SF1 (pictured above) and even a portable VR audio recorder from Zoom called the H3-VR. Check out the full list in more detail here.

Charles Hoffman is a Mixing and Mastering Engineer at Black Ghost Audio. After graduating from the University of Manitoba with an English degree, Charles completed his education at Icon Collective in Los Angeles, CA.

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