Throwing Sound

The concept of throwing sound is a very interesting one. Placing a sound in a specific place is very difficult due to the eternal movement of sound waves. There is product out now that can throw sounds wherever you want them. Granted the speaker is the size of an old flip phone so theres not much output volume but nonetheless it is very cool.

Basically there is a small parabolic speaker that has a coned shape in order to "shoot" sound wherever you want. The effect is that you can point the speaker at someone and only they can hear it, like a whisper in their ear; when you move it away from the person it sounds like the sound is bouncing off the wall behind them. Difficult to explain in words but very easy if its actually been done to you. I found out about this product from a guest speaker in one of my classes who used chirping crickets to demonstrate the soundlazer to my astonishment. I had never heard such precise placement of sound I almost cried. In the entertainment industry, parabolic speakers are becoming increasingly popular in mixing sound for movies due to the precise location of the sound. Many new speaker systems are incorporating these speakers so engineers can adjust not only the direction of the sound but the HEIGHT of the sound. So say you're watching a movie and spaceship moves from the bottom of the frame to the top, you would hear the sound "underneath" you. Once the spaceship moves to the top half of the screen it would sound like it is "above" you. This was used in Gravity with amazing results and will soon become the new normal for mixing action movies.