Home Theater and UAV senior editor Tom Norton and I share setup tips for your home theater, including speaker and subwoofer placement, seating distance vs. screen size, video and audio connections, picture mode and basic picture settings, and answers to chat-room questions.
Alan Kraemer, CTO of SRS Labs and president of the 3D Audio Alliance, talks about the new Multi-Dimensional Audio standard, which replaces channel-based formats with an object-oriented transport stream. This future-proof transport stream specifies where each sound-emitting object is and how it moves in 3D space, and the rendering/playback system uses whatever resources it has—from a single-speaker cell phone to a full-blown multichannel home theater—to reproduce the sounds as best it can in their intended spatial locations.
Digital-cinema consultant David Reisner discusses the transition from film to d-cinema and the differences between them, such as resolution, colorimetry, cameras, production, and delivery as well as the creation of the Standard Evaluation Material (StEM) and Camera Assesment Series (CAS) of images, which are used to verify the performance of d-cinema projectors and help filmmakers select the right digital camera for each project, respectively.
Run Time: 56:00
Click below to see some graphics from the show and a list of scenes from various movies that David uses as test material.
Kevin Wines, Image Technology Director for THX, talks about the history of THX and its commitment to preserving the content creators' artistic intent, what's involved in THX certification of 2D and 3D displays, the variability of measurements in THX mode, 3D technology at home and in the commercial cinema, how to optimize the 3D experience at home, THX Optimizer on discs and in set-top boxes, and answers to chat-room questions.
Legendary amplifier designer Dan D'Agostino talks about how he got started in the business, co-founding Krell, the evolution of amp design, leaving Krell and starting a new company under his own name, his new Momentum amp, the demise of audio quality in the MP3 generation, his about-face on the sonic effect of cables, the poor timing of CES, and answers to chat-room questions.
Ty Roberts, CTO of Gracenote, discusses how his company maintains a huge database of metadata about CDs, DVDs, and other electronic media that can then be accessed by anyone who wants more info about those titles and/or discover new music and movies they might like; the future of IPTV; Gracenote algorithms that analyze musical structure based on the audio itself; and answers to chat-room questions.
Chief Twit Leo Laporte and I visit several booths at CES 2011 to see what's new, including passive 3D at LG, glasses-free 3D at Toshiba, future technologies at Sony, and an amazing "video room" at Sharp. Along the way, Leo and I discuss the state of home theater as we navigate our way through the crowded aisles of the Central Hall at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
Don Eklund, Executive VP of Advanced Technology at Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, provides a studio's perspective on 3D, 4K, online content, what happened with the original Blu-ray release of The Fifth Element, and more.
Barb Gonzalez, aka the Simple Tech Guru and the first female geek to appear on the podcast, shares her extensive experience with network media players and streamers, downloading to own or rent versus streaming, why she doesn't like Roku but does like Apple TV and Western Digital's Live Hub, the ins and outs of various online content providers such as Netflix and Vudu, getting content from one place to another around the home, physical media versus online streaming, and answers to chat-room questions.
Electronic-music composer and mastering engineer Robert Rich discusses the creative process, how making and consuming music has changed over the last 25 years, the audible and cultural effect of data and dynamic-range compression, why surround music hasn't been more successful without a visual component, his all-night "sleep concerts" and 7-hour Somnium music DVD, and answers to chat-room questions.