Archaeoacoustics Scotland
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Glossary of Terms
Ambisonic - Multi-channel format audio processing and reproduction, ambisonic recordings are compatible with mono, stereo, through all surround formats and beyond

Archaeoacoustics - An emerging new field of science examining the sound of archaeology and imagining the soundscape as our ancestors would have.

Archaeology - The study of human material culture through the recovery and analysis of artefacts.

Anthropology - The study of human society and culture.

Acoustics - The analysis and study of sound behaviour in different spaces, both man-made and naturally occurring.

Binaural - A stereo recording format that most accurately mimics the human hearing process, invented by Alan Blumlein

Convolution (convolution reverb) - A digital signal processing filtering system that in lay terms uses an impulse response to recreate a digital model of the acoustic and resonant qualities of a room.

Ethnomusicology - The study of musical culture and development.

Musicology - The analysis and research of music.

Impulse Response/IR - The introduction of a short, loud, wide-band sound into an acoustic space in order to measure and assess the reverberation characteristics. Impulse - short sound, response - the reverberant reflections from the space.

Immersive sound - Similar to binaural sound, however with the advent of virtual reality technologies immersive audio is capable of tracking the head position in relation to the sound source creating a more authentic listening experience.

Resonance - Frequencies that respond to acoustic space in a particularly pronounced way, the lower tones of the male, human voice between 100Hz and 200Hz.

Reference Class - Audio equipment adhering to International reference standards; class 2 - exhibits linear frequency response no more than 2dB + or - across the audible frequency spectrum.

Digital Heritage - The study and archiving of heritage in a digital format, photographic, video, audio, documentary, 3D laser mapping etc...

Fast Fourier Transformers - Digital process of filtering audio content to manipulate in a particular way.

Sine Sweep - A full range sweep through the human auditory frequency range, 20Hz to 20,000Hz (20KHz).

Acoustic Ecology - The study of and evaluation of our sound environment, includes urban post industrial, the natural world, environment noise control and acoustics and the design of environment and equipment with the long term effects in mind.

Waveform - The visual representation of a digital sound file.

Spectrogram - A visual representation of sound energy measured on 3 plains, time, frequency (Hz) and intensity (Decibels).

Frequency Response - The range a piece of audio equipment is capable of detecting or reproducing.

Digital Audio Workstation/DAW - Software used for recording and processing audio files. Used for recording music, radio and post production sound for film, television and video games, sound design, software such as ProTools, Logic Pro, Reaper, Studio One etc...

Convolution - The digital process of filtering an audio signal in order to manipulate it, with an IR this effectively means removing the sound of the the IR, balloon burst for example and leaving behind the the reverberant charactersic of the space from which is recorded. This is a very specific type of digital audio filtering.

De-convolution - The digital audio process of compressing a sine sweep or random noise burst into an IR. This compresses an extended audio file of broadband energy into an IR.

Plugin - The most used type of digital audio processor involved in IR processes are software programmes such as Spacedesigner by Apple, IR 360 by Waves, the reverberant charcteristics from these plugins can be applied to audio tracks to recreate the sound context of the space they were recorded in.

DSP - Digital Signal Processing.

MAXMsp - Open source audio programming code which uses drag and drop to create audio processing software from scratch. See HISS tools on the links page.

Impulse Response Utility - Software designed by Apple as an extension of their Logic Pro software. Capable of generating and recording sine sweeps in multi-channel formats including ambisonic and 7.1. Rendered files can be uploaded into Apple's Space Designer plugin.

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  • About
  • Main Hub
    • IR Audio Files
    • IR Edits Download
    • Documentaries 1
    • Documentaries 2
    • AES Scotland
    • IR Video Tutorials
    • Site Data Sheets
    • Archaeology Month Performances
    • Evolution Sound Design
    • The Guerilla Impulse
    • Auralisation Map
    • Site links
    • Links: Further reading
    • Glossary
  • Journal
  • Gallery
  • Wemyss Caves Auralisation Project