Hi guys

Anyone using this one? What do you reckon?

From their website: "Panorama is a specialized tool for creating stunningly realistic 3-D audio scenes using regular stereo sound. The DSP technology in Panorama reproduces psychoacoustic sound localization and distance cues, allowing you to pan sounds in three dimensions: not just left and right, but up, down, front, back, near, and far. Panorama combines HRTF-based audio panning with acoustic environment modeling...."

Sounds very interesting, so I downloaded the demo and tried it. Unfortunately it didn't convince me. I played a lot with the various parameters, but in the end it sounded like any other reverb. Actually, the reverb module sounds quite bad IMO.

Do you guys know any other alternatives for "3D" positioning (HRTF-based or not), preferably free or not very expensive?

Thanks
Last edited by KTlin on Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:50 pm; edited 1 time in total

If you use Logic, it has these features built in.

Thanks, but I'm on PC. I use Live.

you might have a look at longcat 3D
http://www.longcat.fr/web/

Thanks. Anything else?

Just tried the H3D demo wow thanks Tweiss for the headsup.

I wasn't going to buy anymore 32bit plugs but if theirs no better than this I will get it. Reminds me of the barber shop 3D audio on youtube.

Panorama was good with the reverb parts off and ValhallaDSP Vintage added after the 3D effect.
Last edited by Kaboom75 on Mon Jan 21, 2013 10:02 am; edited 2 times in total

Not free, but pretty good ones:

H3D
http://www.longcat.fr/web/en/prods/h3d-plugin

GRM Tools Doppler
http://www.inagrm.com/doppler

Soundhack +binaural
http://www.soundhack.com/spectral-shapers/

I bought waves arts panorama several years ago for a binaural project.
Some aspects of the 3D- spatialization works quite good with the big problem that everything had the tendency to come from behind (also the stuff that should be in front of the listener).
Anyhow, since 3D perception is a learned function (ears are only 2 channels), this may be subjective.

Apart from that, the plug in colors the signals in a way i don't really like.

So in my opinion, the best solution for this tasks by far is the use of a dummy head microphone.
The difference in quality is huge...

Are they true binaural effects like H3D?

dw

By far indeed, totally agree unfortunatly. Would love to have a plugin that easily & perfectly mimic binaural recordings, but I don't know any altough the ones I listed are pretty interesting. But not binauraly perfect

I've struggled with these plugins for a couple of years and nothing is really convincing. Anything HRTF-based is based on an "idealized" ear, which is rarely the same as our own. I gave Longcat a shot a while back and the automated movement stuff is really cool, but again, the 3D effect isn't 100% convincing. Flux's Ircam HEar, is much the same (it'll reduce 5.1 to binaural). Iosono's Anymix Pro upscales to multichannel but doesn't offer any binaural processing. I was curious about Panorama...

The only convincing binaural 3D processing I've heard is from Q-sound, and the barber shop track on youtube is a QSound Demo. But they quickly got out of the software plugin business (they had a few DX plugins available over a decade ago) in favor of big-time OEM software and hardware implementations.

The interesting thing about QSound is their technology doesn't seem copyrighted. So either they never got around to copyrighting their tech, or they're doing something clever but relatively unoriginal. I get the feeling they just carefully mapped out spatial positioning with delays, distance attenuation and Fq attenuation. The site is worth a visit but it seems rather inactive (the latest news item is from 2010). They have an online shop for a few software products, but it seems dead.

BTW: what binaural processing features are built into Logic?

Panorama is great- on headphones.

"spatial audio designer" is good but unfortunately very expensive

http://headphone-surround.de/products

Space360
Kickhaas

*rant mode on*
IMHO there should be more plugins like these. My gripe with exisiting ones (or the ones I've seen)has to do with the interface. As an example let's say I want the plugin to start with a snare source is in a open space. Now I want to add a back wall and a "mic" in between. I would have lost count of the amount of paramaters that would have been adjusted by now. Not to mention the pain of drawing sources and mics in a graphic box and trying to get things centered/symmetrical. It's no wonder most people reach for something like a plate emulation in this situation. Instant gratification but you loose some control.There's doesnt seem to be a middle just yet.
*rant mode on*

Thanks for the suggestions, markanini!
Never heard of those two. I'm gonna check them out.