“Genelec Aural ID is a significant first step towards the use of headphones for actual reference audio monitoring and listening. It’s a big step for Genelec and a giant leap for the professional audio community.”

Siamäk Naghian / Genelec Managing Director

Audio engineers know that Genelec monitor loudspeakers established the sonic reference for professional audio monitoring. They also know that Genelec GLM calibration software revolutionised the way that studio monitors could be optimised for any acoustic space. Today, Genelec is determined to help bring standards of sonic truthfulness to headphone reproduction too.

Genelec Aural ID is a software technology advancement that will dramatically improve the delivery of more accurate, reliable sound, and enable an audio engine to precisely render stereo, surround or immersive content via headphones.

The challenges of headphone monitoring

Our head, outer ear shapes and head movements provide us with a wonderful ability to localise sound sources, which is why monitoring over loudspeakers works so effectively. Headphones, however, break the link to these natural mechanisms we have acquired over our lifetime, making it harder to localise sounds – since sounds from headphones seem to reside ‘inside’ our heads rather than all around us.

What does Aural ID do?

Aural ID computes how your head, external ear and upper body affect and colour audio arriving from any given direction. This effect is called the Head-Related Transfer Function (HRTF), and is totally unique to every user. Aural ID models your personal head and upper torso features to calculate your own individual HRTF, delivering a file to you that then can be integrated into your audio workstation via a growing number of third-party plug-ins including those from Sparta, Noisemakers, SSA and Harpex. You’ll find your headphone listening experience becomes much more truthful and reliable, with a far more natural sense of space and direction.

How does it work?

After you upload a 360 degree video of your head and shoulder region from your mobile phone camera, Aural ID builds an accurate and detailed 3D model scaled to exactly the correct dimensions of your head and upper torso. From this, your personal HRTF is formed and delivered to you as an internationally recognised SOFA file format, which supports 44.1, 48 and 96 kHz sample rates and contains data for both ears in 836 different orientations.

Who is it for?

Anyone using headphones for stereo, surround and immersive audio monitoring. Whether you are active in music recording, post production, academic research, VR or games development, Aural ID will elevate your headphone listening experience to a whole new level of realism.

For more in-depth information, view the Aural ID User Manual .

Pricing

The price of your personal Aural ID is 500 € + VAT.