Narrative contribution of immersive audio sound design in audio-visual works

Abstract

Audio-visual works, whether it be a film, tv show, documentary, animation, live/recorded performing arts or an entirely abstract work of artistic representation; often relies heavily on sound. It can be argued that this is a reflection of how human senses work in tandem to make sense of reality. This reliance on observation and comprehension with ears, puts an emphasis on sound design to take charge in structuring a world, describing a scene, enhancing what's seen and collectively furthering the storytelling. With the advancement of technology and knowhow, this effect has been more prominent as time passed. One of the most apparent re-imaginings of the aural part of audio-visual mediums came with an approach called immersive audio. This is somewhat of an umbrella term that encompasses any form of soundstage reproduction that has spatial components to it. This was a revolutionary step towards a more enhanced experience for the viewer to enjoy. It also opened many paths towards creativity, considering there are a multitude of ways to achieve a given thing. Music, dialogue, sound effects and other miscellaneous audio events coming from not only the screen (or in a stereoscopic array very close to the screen) but possibly all around the audience's aural perception sphere, stimulated the industry towards experimentation and creativity. In the decades following the invention of this approach we saw many standards were being implemented both in recording, editing and playback phases of a production. As in all things, there are advantages and disadvantages to an approach that is developing so fast and is prone to change. Most attempts to standardize it has either changed and evolved into something else or became obsolete. And some have emerged as dominant as prominent forms and have promising potential future use cases. One of these come in the form of ambisonics. Of the many benefits of working with ambisonics, a couple stand out and in fact, are the reasoning behind this study being done with it. The ease of use, accessibility, future proofing aspects are industry leading to say the least. Also the scalability and expanded/enhanced playback options to it are arguably unmatched. In this thesis, main purpose is to explore the possible narrative contributions of an immersive sound design in an audio-visual work, made with ambisonics method. This is achieved through both a manner of thought experimentation and a scientific observation approach that is highly repeatable.