gehring@dgp.toronto.edu (Bo Gehring) (04/25/91)
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FOCAL POINT(tm)
3D Audio For The Macintosh II
FOCAL POINT brings directional binaural sound to the Macintosh. Multiple
sounds or audio icons come from anywhere around the listener, localized and
animated in real time. Sounds come from Macintosh soundfiles, synthesizers,
or outside sound sources.
FOCAL POINT is an INIT for the Macintosh. It goes in the System Folder, uses
about fifty kbytes of memory, and creates a group of new function calls similar
to Toolbox calls which provide system-wide access to 3D sound. Each 3D sound
channel requires one Digidesign Audiomedia card, up to as many as you want to
install.
On startup, FOCAL POINT DSP code loads into the Audiomedia's Motorola 56001
processor. Spatial audio processing then goes on independent of the Macintosh.
Applications or INITs using 3D sound don't slow down.
Using FOCAL POINT, you can quickly
-create a multi-object spatial audio display system
-create a spatial audio interface for the visually impaired
-create a many-voice teleconferencing system
-create the audio equivalent of the Graphical User Interface
-use directional audio icons to declutter the graphical screen
-use directional audio as a navigation tool in your application
-create MIDI-driven 3D sound objects
-create 3D sound edits with Soundtools, Audiomedia, and other editors
-add 3D sound to your multimedia presentations
Some of these uses can be demonstrated right away by simply turning on audio
mouse pointing in the FOCAL POINT Control Panel. FOCAL POINT will work while
you're running a related application or INIT which produces its own sounds.
FOCAL POINT's output is two channels just like stereo but with spatial
information built into the signals. It's equalized for headphones but for
some applications, particularly sound editing, loudspeakers work too.
FOCAL POINT convolves the audio signal with head-related transfer functions
to generate binaural outputs for the left and right ears. Transfer functions
are computed in the Motorola 56001 processor, not the Macintosh. Audio is
44.1 KHz, 16 bit CD quality.
Adding FOCAL POINT 3D audio to an application is easy. There are only two
main calls, Init3D() and Set3D(). They act like part of the Toolbox and can
be called from any programming environment. Init3D(Ptr channel) is called once.
It installs FOCAL POINT 3D code in the DSP and returns a pointer to the channel
if an Audiomedia card is available. Set3D(Ptr channel,int az,int el,int dist)
changes a sound's location. Its arguments are channel, azimuth, elevation, and
distance. Set3D() is fast and can be updated in the main event loop without
waiting around.
Sample applications which support headtracking and RS232 host functions come
with FOCAL POINT. Also included are the THINK C library objects for these
extra functions so programmers can use them to build new applications.
FOCAL POINT is available for quantity licensing. The FOCAL POINT 3D DSP code
also quickly ports to other platforms with the Motorola 56001 processor.
PRICES
FOCAL POINT INIT and software package, per channel $295.00
Digidesign Audiomedia card with required modification at no cost $995.00
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COST PER CHANNEL $1290.00
Customer-supplied Digidesign Audiomedia cards can be modified and tested for
$245.00 each. Shipping is additional.
Order FOCAL POINT from:
BO GEHRING
318 W. Galer Street
Seattle, WA 98119
206-286-8922
gehring@dgp.toronto.edu
FOCAL POINT is a trademark of Bo Gehring
Audiomedia and Soundtools are trademarks of Digidesign Inc.
THINK C is a trademark of Symantec Corporation
Macintosh is a trademark of Apple Computer Inc.