For Audio Companies, VR Is the New Frontier, by Vipin Pungalia

From Beyoncé’s Lemonade to VR games, virtual reality is becoming a fixture of the entertainment industry. It has given rise to the era of 360-degree videos, on YouTube and elsewhere. These videos immerse you into the recording and make you feel a part of it. Beyond the video though, the audio side of the equation is just as important, and 360-degree sound recording is a growing trend for this reason.

As VR content continues to grow, one concern for VR and 360 content creators is recording 360-degree audio that can fully immerse viewers in an environment. Therefore, with developments in technology, audio brands are now focusing on products that have the ability to capture immersive sound, as the human ear would perceive in a natural environment.

Your brain responds to sound faster than any other sense, so sound and music cues direct attention, trigger emotions, and guide participants in very powerful ways – organising all your other senses together. Today’s consumers are accustomed to capturing incredibly realistic videos, yet as mainstream technology makes immersive visual experiences ever more accessible, the power and emotion of this footage is too often let down by the quality of sound that these devices can capture. Thus it is safe to say that 3D audio adds to the feeling of presence that we strive so hard to achieve with just visuals in VR.

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