How to use our audio files in your DAW or any editors, specifically B-Format and Double-M/S. If you need more deepfull informations than the screencasts above.

 

Depending on the format you chose to download, you may need to get specific plugins or use special routings to use our sounds in your DAW. At the moment, only two formats need specific processing : B-format, and Double-M/S.

Actually, B-Format and Double-M/S as is, even if allowing a monitoring check concerning timbre and frequency, do not provide a correct representation of spatialization when listening to the channels. That's why we provide stereo audio samples.

At this stage, you can use either dedicated hardware equipment (Soundfield SPS451 to decode B-Format for example), or more simply specialized plugins that are way more efficient.
We'll focused on these last ones, as most of them are free, at the exception of Surround Zone and Harpex-B which are the only commercial ones (sadly quite expensive) and unfortunately the only way to decode B-Format under Pro Tools at the moment (TDM or RTAS). We're working with Soundfield and Harpex to obtain a better price for our regular consumers, but don't hold your breath, they need to make money with their products, so...

 

There is an "universal" plugin to decode ambisonic B-Format, which is sold by the manufacturer of the most popular ambisonic microphones, it's the Surround Zone from Soundfield. It works under OS X and Windows, in TDM for Pro Tools, and AU and VST. The newcomer Harpex-B "en plus du VST et de l'AU" works in RTAS, which is great for native only systems, but it also offers a great set of parameters (spectral representation, binaural compatibility (HRTF), and much more).
Unfortunately again, they both have a cost : about 600$...

Happily, except for Pro Tools users, there are many other free solutions available for Mac and Windows to decode ambisonic.
The first coming to mind is VVMic from Mc Griffy, a VST plugin firstly developped for Windows which works very well, and that is also working under OS X.
The second one, that we love a lot on SurLib, is the B2X suite from Daniel Courville, a complete set of tools in AU and VST that allows all kind of sound manipulations (recommended!), but that only works, unfortunately again, under OS X.
There are a lot of other tools and plugins available, but these are the most usable in a real post production environment, in my opinion at least. Until you want to enter command lines with a terminal, which is at least very counter productive. Or if you want to use esoteric Jack / Alsa routing under Linux...

You'll find on our Demo / Templates section many DAW templates fully configured for Pro Tools (Surround Zone, Harpex-B), Nuendo (Surround Zone, Harpex-B, VVMic, and B2X), Pyramix (Surround Zone, Harpex-B, and VVMic), and Reaper (Surround Zone, Harpex-B, VVMic, and B2X).

Basically, B-format is made of 4 channels (W, X, Y, Z), and you'll have to route them in a 5.1 or 7.1 bus / plugin (you can do better than that like Cube-8 etc. but it's out of our focus here).
The technique vary depending on the DAW you're using, just look at the following screencasts to understand the mechanic, or just use one of our template for your DAW.

Template 1 Template 2 Template 3

 

Here, Schoeps developped a universal plugin that works under both Windows and Mac OS X, in RTAS and VST. You'll have to fill a form to get the Schoeps Double M/S Tool, but it's free.

Basically, Double-M/S is made of 3 channels (M1/S/M2), and you have to route them in a 5.1 or 7.1 plugin. The technique vary depending on the DAW you're using, just look at the following screencasts to understand the mechanic, or just use one of our template for your DAW.

Template 1 Template 2 Template 3

 

These systems only need 4 channels from the beginning to the end. All the 360° space is covered by the recording angle of the mics (keep in mind that the mic angle is different from the recording angle). Just send the 4 channels respectively to Left, Right, Left surround, and Right surround.

The LFE channel is kind of recorded through each channel (our mics are capable of it!), just manage your bass channel as you want in your mix with filtering.

If you want a centre channel, here are two different methods:
1: Just add L and R, put a -9 dBfs of gain, you have your centre channel.
2: With the plug-in « M 360 Surround Manager » from Waves (or similar), make a half turn. It creates automatically a 5 channel output (or 7 in a 7.1 mix). The front is now in the rear, if you need to correct it, just change the channel order. Rs, Ls, R, L instead of L, R, Ls, Rs.

Template 1 Template 2 Template 3

 

If you don't know how to use these kind of sounds, well... :-)
Just keep in mind that our sound are given splitted, so that there is no error possible when importing. Each channel is represented by its extension, basically .L/.R/.C/.Ls/.Rs/.LFE for a 5.1 sound.
We would love to propose interleaved audio, but there is no insurance that the DAW will interpret the channel order correctly (no metadata for this). So we'll have to do with splitted files for the time being.

Template 1 Template 2 Template 3