Dolby Atmos within the Studio: How the 3D Sound Stage Expertise Is Reshaping Music Manufacturing in India

Dolby Atmos entered India in 2012 with the launch of the primary Atmos-enabled display on the Sathyam Cinemas in Chennai. The identical 12 months, Rajinikanth’s Sivaji 3D was launched with Dolby’s object-based audio expertise and premiered at Sathyam. Since then, Dolby Atmos has turn into a family identify, related to earphones, headphones, house theatres, sensible TVs, smartphones, and every other system with a speaker. And that’s how most of us perceive the expertise – a 3D sound stage that creates a surround-sound impact whereas watching films or listening to music utilizing Atmos-enabled units.

However that is only one half of what Dolby Laboratories does. The opposite half of the Atmos implementation happens nicely earlier than the tip consumer hears the expertise. That is the post-production stage of a tune or film, the place Atmos-enabled software program is used to upmix the music or remaster the film audio, making a 3D sound stage impact.

Then, when a tune combined utilizing Atmos is performed by means of an Atmos-enabled system, customers get to listen to music which was finest described by The Weeknd as an expertise that takes “music to a brand new place by creating an immersive world the place you may really feel each element. It is surreal.”

To expertise this and be taught extra about how expertise shapes the music creation course of, I just lately travelled to Recent Lime Studios in Saket, New Delhi’s sole Dolby Atmos–licensed studio.

Music Creation Inside a Dolby Atmos Studio

Recent Lime Studios, based by Berklee Faculty of Music alumnus Tanishq Seth, includes a Dolby Atmos-certified recording room, the place he and his workforce help musicians in creating and upmixing their songs within the 3D soundstage format.

The room is constructed round a 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos configuration. It options three monitoring rooms, together with an ISO sales space, a dwell room, and a vocal sales space, and comes with a full suite of drugs from Neumann and Sennheiser. Notably, a 7.1.4 speaker setup refers to seven {surround} audio system positioned across the listener at ear stage, one subwoofer for low-frequency results, and 4 overhead or top audio system used to ship 3D spatial audio.

Dolby Atmos setup
Picture Credit score: Dolby

On the coronary heart of the music creation course of is a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW), a software program (usually Avid Professional Instruments or Steinberg Nuendo) that acts because the central hub to file, edit, combine, and produce audio (consider it because the Photoshop of sound). The DAW runs the Dolby Atmos Manufacturing Suite, a software program toolkit developed by Dolby that permits sound engineers and music producers to create, combine, and monitor Dolby Atmos content material inside the DAW.

Inside this toolset, music producers acquire entry to Atmos Renderer, which permits the position of particular person devices, vocals, or results as separate “audio objects” in a digital 3D area. Not like conventional stereo, the place parts are mounted to the left or proper channel, Atmos permits full freedom of motion by inserting a vocal instantly in entrance of the listener, panning guitar riffs behind, or letting ambient results swirl above.

Notably, a typical setup helps as much as 128 audio tracks, which may embody as much as 118 audio objects and 10 channel beds. The audio objects permit particular person parts, akin to a vocal line or snare hit, to maneuver independently in 3D area, in accordance with the producer or artist’s choice.

Seth instructed Devices 360 that each producer can have a unique imaginative and prescient for a tune, they usually can upmix or produce the file otherwise, making the soundscape really feel fully distinctive. After all, there are some fundamentals to be adhered to, however every part else is a inventive course of.

As talked about above, a monitor can both be created natively in Atmos or it may be upmixed (if the stereo model of the monitor already exists). For the previous, the artist and the blending engineer take spatial selections from the bottom up, and these might be extra experimental in nature. When upmixing, the engineer recreates the intent of the stereo combine whereas enhancing it with extra depth and dimensionality.

As soon as the Atmos combine is created, it’s exported as an Audio Definition Mannequin in Broadcast Wave Format (ADM BWF) file to retain all of the positional and timing knowledge. This grasp file is what platforms like Apple Music, Amazon Music, and Tidal use to ship spatial audio to listeners.

Singer Sanjeeta Bhattacharya, who showcased a tune upmixed utilizing Atmos, defined that this 3D sound stage additionally offers artists a number of freedom in creating a singular audio expertise. She highlighted that, in contrast to stereo, the place audio arrives in a linear aircraft and might typically really feel flat, Dolby Atmos makes the listener really feel like they’re in the identical room because the artist and the band.

“With Dolby Atmos, we calibrate the surroundings to replicate how the content material was combined, not only for choice, however for spatial accuracy and emotional depth. This strategy permits sound to maneuver organically by means of any area, connecting with listeners in a manner that feels each genuine and deeply participating, thereby guaranteeing a constant premium and immersive expertise, regardless of the system or setting,” stated Sameer Seth, Director, Advertising and marketing-India, Dolby.

Whereas most individuals know Dolby Atmos as a playback function in headphones or TVs, its actual affect might lie earlier within the studio, the place it’s quietly remodeling how music is crafted, layered, and spatially designed.