Eurecat presents its new Sfëar interactive 3D sound technology at Sónar+D

Researchers from the Eurecat technology center (a member of Tecnio) have developed an immersive and interactive 3D audio technology, called Sfëar, which makes it possible for sound to react to head movement.

From this Wednesday until Friday, June 16, Eurecat (member of Tecnio) presents its new immersive and interactive 3D audio technology at Sónar+D Swear which makes it possible for the sound to react to the movement of the head. Sónar+D is an international conference that brings together a set of activities with a common axis: the relationship between creativity and technology and the digital transformation of cultural industries that it entails. The event is held in Barcelona at Fira Montjuïc, parallel to Sónar by Day, and brings together experts from all over the world (technologists, entrepreneurs, artists, companies and researchers) to present and project the initiatives and tools that will shape future creative experiences in the fields of music, image, interactive content and transmedia platforms.

The Sfëar technology has been developed over the last year and will soon be on the market, with the aim of “providing the music industry with immersive 3D sound tools for production, post-production and playback of music with headphones”, highlights the director of Audiovisual Technologies at Eurecat, Adan Garriga.

“At Sónar+D we present the music production tools with immersive 3D sound that we have developed in the last year, with the added value that they are totally interactive,” so that “artists and producers can see how they work,” Garriga details.

Sfëar offers music production tools that allow production to be done with headphones and headtracking, so that “the sound reacts to the movement of the head of the person listening to it,” adds the researcher, who highlights the potential of the technology to create live three-dimensional songs and music sessions and produce and distribute music and immersive audio content on mobile devices using headphones.

The Sfëar tools, he points out, “are compatible with the majority of software used by creatives,” so that “now an artist can make 3D music without changing their work system.”

According to Garriga, “3D sound will be the new standard in the field of audio, as was the emergence of stereo sound in the 1950s and the transition from stereo to the 5.1 system in the 1980s.”