Over 90 delegates gathered from June 18–20 at the University of Surrey, Guildford,
UK, for the second international conference on Sound Field Control presented by the
Audio Engineering Society. Chaired by Filippo Maria Fazi and Philip Jackson, the
conference broke new ground in the understanding of the active management of
audio delivered within an acoustical environment.

Over 30 papers were presented on topics ranging from sound zones through higher
order ambisonics, mode matching and psychoacoustics, to sound field control
theories, microphone arrays and array transducers. Delegates had ample
opportunity to experience fascinating demonstrations of sound field control
technology including personal sound zones, 3D audio capture and adaptive object-
based stereo reproduction, among other fascinating listening opportunities. Bruce
Drinkwater’s invited talk on ultrasonic levitation proved a remarkable tour of a new
technology that enables small objects to be lifted using ultrasonic “tractor beams,’
something that a few years ago would have seemed like science fiction. He brought
along a small demonstrator of the technology that could hold little balls in midair,
which held conference delegates riveted during the lunch session on day two (see
attached photo).

Keynote Philip Nelson is Professor of Acoustics in the Institute of Sound and
Vibration Research at the University of Southampton, and a leader of research
council activity in the UK. Introduced by Fazi as a “scientific superstar,’ Nelson’s
tour of the history of sound field control on the first day provided an excellent
scene-setter for the event, illuminating the connections between the active control
of sound and contemporary approaches to sound reproduction within the consistent
framework provided by multichannel digital signal processing and the physical
behavior of linearly superposed sound fields.

The day two keynote speaker was Gary Elko, president of mh acoustics. With Jens
Meyer, Elko developed the Eigenmike, a spherical microphone array that
decomposes the sound field into a compact set of orthogonal spherical harmonic
signals. The Eigenmike is now gaining commercial interest in the field of immersive
audio. In his keynote address, Elko offered delegates a comprehensive review of
differential microphone array technology at the start of day two. Steven van de Par
reviewed the effects of reverberation on auditory perception, concluding with a
description of a system for reproducing the most perceptually important parameters
of direct and reflected sound in a room that already has its own reverberation.

The AES is particularly grateful to conference sponsors Comhear, mh acoustics,
HARMAN and Hyundai, for helping to make the event a great success. Delegates to
the conference were enthusiastic about having a third SFC in a few years’ time. As a
benefit of membership, all AES members can download the Conference proceedings
at http://www.aes.org/publications/conferences/?confNum=52.