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J. Audio Eng. Soc., Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008 March 217
next to computers. In such cases it can
be very hard to identify the ENF, as
shown in Fig. 9, where the top plot
shows the spectrum recorded from a
voice recorder placed next to a laptop
computer, which is predominantly
broadband noise. Mobile phones can
have a similarly disturbing effect. He
also shows evidence that even very lowbit-rate compression schemes such as
MP3 at 8 kbit/s manage to preserve the
basic ENF component information when
recording other audio information such
as the sound in a room.
One interesting application of ENF
analysis that is shown by Brixen is its
use in analyzing sections of a recording
that may have been mixed together with
another recording. An example is
shown in Fig. 10 where it is clearly visi-
ble that two ENF components are
present for a period of time, before
which only one component can be seen.
CONCLUSIONThere is clearly a wide range of differ-
ent ways in which the challenging prob-
lems of forensic audio analysis can be
tackled. Like fingerprints, the mains
power frequency can provide a unique
identifier for the time a recording was
made and whether more than one
recording is present. Edits may be spot-
ted and voice patterns matched using
sophisticated digital signal processing.
Although in practice these processes are
not usually as miraculous or conclusive
in bringing evil-doers to justice as
implied by television series such as CSI,
they can help to generate a wide range
of supportive evidence capable of deter-
mining the veracity of recordings.
Forensics Audio Analysis
Editors note:The papers reviewed in this
article, and all AES papers, can bepurchased online at and
. AES
members also have free access to a large
number of past technical review articles
such as this one and other tutorials from
AES conventions and conferences; go to
.
The upcoming AES 33rd International
Conference, June 57 in Denver, will be
devoted to the topic Audio Forensics
Theory and Practice. For more information
go to .
OF THE
SECTIONSWe appreciate the assistance of the
section secretaries in providing the
information for the following reports.
Statements reported here are the per-sonal opinions of the presenters, which
may not represent the opinions of the
AES or the audio industry at large.
NEWS
Clark discusses car audioin Motor CityThe Detroit Section held its February
7 meeting at Alpine Electronics. After
new officers were elected at a short
business meeting, David Clark gave a
presentation entitled Perceptual
Transfer Function (PTF) Measurement
System, a Progress Report. He began
with some history on automotive
audio, discussing the development of
the technology from 1930 Motorola
car radios to present day. The first
Bose system (in a 1983 Cadillac) was
discussed, and the more recent B&O
system for the Audi A8 was also pre-
sented. He gave an overview of his
Listening Technology subjective eval-
uation technique. This method is
widely used within the automotive
industry and has been the inspiration
for Clarks advancement with PTF.
The interest in automotive audio is
growing, and the needs for industrial
processes and procedures to ensure
consistent high-quality output are as
relevant as ever. It was this realizationthat inspired Clark to develop Listen-
ing Technology in the 1990s. By
agreeing on an ideal sound or goal
for a system, trained evaluators are
able to build conclusions about a sys-
tem from small comparison tasks. The
results are reliable, unbiased evalua-
tions as free from opinion and emotion
as possible.
The goal of PTF is to use objective
measures to simulate subjective or
perceptual responses to a sound sys-tem. Starting with frequency
responseor to use perceptual lan-
guage, tonal balancehigh-level
analysis of a spectrum allows
attributes to be extracted and given a
score by the computer. This has been
extended to loudness tests with a mul-
titone test measuring compression and
distortion simultaneously.
Clarks most advanced work with
PTF is location detection. Using an
advanced ear-brain model sound stage,
imaging and ambiance can be mea-
sured using interaural level differ-
ences, interaural time differences, and
interaural group delay; this was
demonstrated at the meeting. Atten-
dees could see how the different
image-detection methods work at dif-
fering frequency ranges and could see
the detection of left, right and phan-
tom images.
Alan Trevena
Ilmenau SectionreactivatedIn December, 80 interested students
met to reactivate the Ilmenau StudentSection and discuss the development
of student activities in the field of
audio engineering. The event took
place at the Fraunhofer Institute for
Digital Media Technology in Ilmenau,
on the initiative of Karlheinz Branden-
burg, AES governor. Brandenburg is
the director of this research institute
and well known for his important role
in the development of MP3.
With the support of the Fraunhofer
Institute as well as the establishmentof media technology courses at the
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of the audience on this topic led to a
lively discussion. The audience greatly
appreciated Beristains lecture. Every-
one extended thanks to him for an
excellent lecture that fortified the
efforts of the Mexico Section on edu-
cating and connecting professionals
through its activities.Following the lecture, more details
were presented on the 2008 AES
International Latin American Confer-
ence New Concepts in Audio, which
will be held April 2729 at the World
Trade Center in Mexico City.
On behalf of all the members of the
Mexico Section, we want to thank
everybody at the AES for their support
and for helping us in our efforts in
consolidating the section for the pro-
fessional industry in Mexico. Weinvite you all to the conference. Please
go to
for more information. See you in
Mexico!
Mintel Alonso
MTSU visits Harrison
On invitation from Harrison Con-
soles, maker of the digital consoles
used in premier film, postproduction,
and broadcast facilities throughoutthe world, the MTSU Student Sec-
tion attended an open house at the
companys Nashville headquarters
duces a homogeneous soundfield fill-
ing the entire room. And the group
heard about other developments
Fraunhofer IDMT is working on.
Beristain on control room
acousticsThe Mexico Section held its January
29 meeting at Estudio 19 Recording
Studios, Mexico City, with over 50
people attending. This first meeting in
2008 was a presentation on special
issues and considerations in proper
control room acoustic design and con-
struction by Sergio Beristain, who is
widely recognized for his outstanding
work in this area. He began by analyz-
ing the whole scope of variablesinvolved in an acoustic design. Next
he discussed materials and his favorite
building techniques. The keen interest
Technische Universitt, Ilmenau has
become a center of excellence in the
research field of audio technologies.
In order to develop and promote thestudent activities in this area, employ-
ees of Fraunhofer IDMT and the Insti-
tute and media technology students of
the Technische Universitt Ilmenau
organized this event for reactivating
the Ilmenau Student Section.
In the future, the Ilmenau Student
Section will bundle the various
research activities in the field of audio
engineering and report the latest
advances in technology and applica-
tions through a strong representationof student work at AES international
conferences. The strong scientific col-
laboration between the TU Ilmenau
students and engineers of Fraunhofer
IDMT will play an important role in
the success of the section.
The idea of reactivating the student
organization attracted a lot of interest
from all attendees. Brandenburg
pointed out that Only by cooperation
and communication with other stu-
dents and leading international scien-tists can research move forward. The
AES Student Section offers young sci-
entists and students international con-
nections and a platform to exchange
informationan important corner-
stone for scientific progress.
A demonstration of IOSONO, the
innovative wavefield synthesis sound
system of the Ilmenau Fraunhofer
Institute, gave the attendees a practical
insight in the research developed by
the institute. This is a main researchtopic at the Fraunhofer IDMT. It pro-
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218 J. Audio Eng. Soc., Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008 March
Karlheinz Brandenburg facilitated thereactivation of the Ilmenau StudentSection
Sergio Beristain, one of the mostrenowned acoustic specialists inLatin America
From left, Robert Luckey, Michael Zuehsow, Jordan Shirks, and Michael Gregoryduring MTSU tour of Harrison Consoles
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discussion of several excerpts from a
2002 concert shoot featuring music
from the Chieftains Down the Old
Plank Road: The Nashville Sessions
at the Ryman Auditorium done by
Gordon and Repp. The presentation
also included information about the
opportunities available to audio engi-
neers in the television industry. Gor-don also gave the members valuable
advice on succeeding at internships
and entry-level jobs. His advice was,
just show up, do what youre asked,
and be pleasant about it.
Robert Luckey
NY hears from archivingprosThe 92nd Street Y in New York City
has a substantial historical archive,much of it on magnetic tape. Today,
performances are recorded on Pro
Tools systems. As the New York Sec-
tion learned at its February 12 meeting
at NYUs Jazz Performance Space,
David Nolans job at the 92nd Street
Y encompasses both conversion of the
tape archive to digital format and
preservation of new recordings.
Original tapes were rarely labeled in
a standardized (or even adequate)
fashion. For example, an entire shelfof tapes where each box contains
mixing. Using tracks from one of his
many recent projects, MTSUs new
SSL Duality console, and a variety of
outboard gear, he then demonstrated
and explained several of his favorite
and most useful mixing techniques.
Finally, after a short break, Chuck
fielded several questions from the
members. This Q&A session led tomany interesting anecdotes and
insights on the mixing process, audio
technology, and the recording industry
in general.
Robert Luckey
Gordon and Repp discussChieftans projectIn an ongoing effort to bring in a
diverse field of guest speakers on top-
ics not usually covered in music
recording classes, the MTSU StudentSection hosted independent television
director Robert Gordon and mix engi-
neer Mark Repp of MTV Networks on
February 6. The two spoke at length
about the process and challenges of
recording and mixing live audio for
television, and later, editing and
postproduction. Every aspect of the
process from initial concept to final
mixing was covered, including inter-
esting and useful information on mik-
ing, signal flow, and communication.The focus of the event then turned to a
on January 29. The night began with
refreshments and an informal meet
and greet with Harrisons engineers
and several other members of the
Nashville audio community. Once
everyone had their fill, the attendees
received a presentation on Harrisonssystem architecture and the features
of the nights main attraction, a 30-
foot-long, 112-fader, 384-input
MPC-4D film console. The event
then moved to the assembly floor
where two newly assembled con-
soles, the MPC and a smaller Trion,
were on display. Everyone had the
opportunity to touch and explore
both consoles while talking to sev-
eral Harrison engineers. The open
house was a rare opportunity for thesection members to see such a large
and complex console, as such con-
soles are used only in the most exclu-
sive and restricted film mixing stages
in the world. Both of the consoles on
display were purchased by Mosfilm,
the largest film production studio in
Russia, and were scheduled to be
shipped shortly after the event.
Robert Luckey
Chuck Ainlay mixes at MTSUIn the latest installment of the MTSU
Student Sections long-running series
of mixing events with industry profes-
sionals, the chapter hosted acclaimed
engineer Chuck Ainlay on February 2.
Chuck began the seminar by introduc-
ing himself and giving a brief sum-
mary of his history in the Nashville
music industry. He then went on to
discuss the technology and gear he
uses on a daily basis, his reasons for
choosing them, and how he uses themto his advantage while tracking and
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J. Audio Eng. Soc., Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008 March 219
Chuck Ainley, center, with MTSU students
Robert Gordon, left,and Mark Repp
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such as a machine called IRENE that
can play a disc recording by analyz-
ing a high-resolution image of the
disc. McCoy reports that this is partic-
ularly valuable for playing broken
discs, which would be difficult or
impossible to play with a conven-
tional stylus.The NAVCC is grappling with the
problem of preserving born digital
material, which may arrive in many
different formats. They will always
seek to preserve a copy in the original
format, although access copies may be
created in other standardized formats.
They have a facility that captures
material from the Internet, which has
been dubbed the TIVO room. Much
more information on NAVCC facili-
ties can be found online at. The
presentations were followed by a
lively audience discussion.
Noah Simon
Schueller reviewsPhilippine music archiveDietrich Schueller, director, Phono-
grammarchiv, Austian Academy of
Science, spoke at the February 21
meeting of the Philippines Sectionabout his evaluation of the progress in
the preservation and digitalization of
the Jose Maceda Collection. The col-
lection was recently included in the
Memory of the World Register of the
United Nations Educational, Scien-
tific, and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO). This collection, known as
the Jose Maceda Philippine Music
an entire floor dedicated to audio. It
includes a media prep area where
discs and tapes can be properly
cleaned prior to playback, critical lis-
tening rooms, and transfer studios.Current practices, which are still
under development, call for transfer of
analog recordings to 96-k, 24-bit
broadcast WAV files. Digital restora-
tion work is never done during the
original transfer. Metadata is extracted
and entered into a database. The digi-
tal files are stored on a large local file
server, with tape backup. Copies are
also sent via fiber links to off-site
backup facilities. Files will be
migrated to more modern servers asneeded.
In addition to preserving original
media, NAVCC seeks to preserve
legacy equipment needed to play the
original media. They have an antique
format room, which among other
things includes a large collection of
wire recorders. They also have some
new methods of playing old media,
only the notation Poetry and a date
poses a real problem for the archivist,
who must then review the recording to
create metadata.
Recordings at the 92nd Street Y arenow archived as Pro Tools sessions.
Nolan stressed the importance of
establishing a style for track names
and layout and ensuring that all ses-
sions conform to that style before
committing them to the archive. He
refuses to call anything a backup if its
stored on site. Two copies sitting on
the same shelf? That's not a backup.
Brad McCoy, the meetings second
presenter, works at the National
Audio-Visual Conservation Center inCulpepper, Virginia, 60 miles south of
Washington. This new 415,000-
square-foot campus, which was
created in collaboration with the
Packard Humanities Institute, includes
underground storage space for the
Library of Congresss moving image
and sound recording collections and
modern, well-equipped workspace for
the archivists.
McCoy agreed with Nolan
on the importance of generat-ing adequate metadata, con-
verting it to a standardized
format, and storing it in a
database.
He told the group that the
AES Library, an extensive
collection of audio-related
publications donated by AES
to the Library of Congress, is
now on display at NAVCC. It
can be visited by appointment.
The Conservation Building, atthe center of the campus, has
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220 J. Audio Eng. Soc., Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008 March
NY Section meeting:from left, JohnChester, AESpresident-elect JimAnderson, meetingmoderator RobertAuld, andpresenters Brad
McCoy and DavidNolan
Philippines Section meeting: from left, Dayang Yraola, Mark Laccay, Martin Galan, DietrichSchueller, Ramon Santos, Dodie Lucas, and Jiggs Hermano
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recording facilityin their shipping
room. He also designed their disc-cut-
ting facility. Contemporary did have
some state-of-the-art equipment for
the time, with Ampex tape recorders, a
stereo Westrex lathe, and AKG and
Neumann mikes.
Bill Smith, now a retired University
of Washington Emeritus Professor of
Music, gave some of his recollectionsof those days and got reacquainted
with Roy for the first time in decades.
Bill went on to do five albums at Con-
temporary with Roy engineering. He
recalled the warehouse-cum-studio
being spartan, but with Roy still able
to get a marvelous sound. Close mik-
ing and some baffles were used, and
the ladies room got pressed into ser-
vice as an echo chamber.
Tom quoted some of the accolades
others said about Roys recordingfrom his Stereophile article, including
this from recording and mastering
engineer Bernie Grundman: Roy did
a lot for this industry. He showed us
all how good it could be. His best
recordings are not just good for their
era. They are some of the best-sound-
ing recordings of all time.
The evening finished with a Q&A
session, and by playing Sonny Rollins
from his Airegin album (Nigeria
spelled backwards). Gary Louie
how to improve the AES. Then Tom
Conrad sat down with Roy, assisted
by the occasional playing of musical
excerpts, and discussed the studios,
artists, equipment, and techniques of
the early analog tape days.
While other engineers may have
received more publicity, Roys work
stands up to anyones. Capitol
Records first engineer, he recorded,among others, Nat King Cole, Frank
Sinatra, Dean Martin (including
Thats Amore), Peggy Lee, Kay
Starr, Jo Stafford, Stan Freberg, and
the Stan Kenton Band (a louder band
than Navy planes, he says).
Later, lured to Contemporary
Records, he worked on many jazz
classics featuring the likes of Barney
Kessel, Ray Brown, Shelly Manne,
Art Pepper, Andr Previn, Leroy Vin-
negar, Sonny Rollins, Ornette Cole-man, Bob Cooper, Curtis Counce,
Teddy Edwards, Victor Feldman, and
Hampton Hawes.
Roy told of his early years and how
he got a job at Capitol Records in the
Quality Control Department, testing
record players that Capitol made and
sold. Ultimately, he advanced to the
recording studio as an engineer, later
going to work for Lester Koenig and
Contemporary Records.
By 1956, Roy was charged withbuilding the Contemporary Records
Tape Collection, records the tradi-
tional music of 68 ethnolinguistic
groups before these styles vanish or
substantially change as a result of
social change and cultural globaliza-
tion. Launched in 1992, the collection
consists of more than 2000 hours of
tape recordings. It includes cassettetapes, field notes, photographs of dif-
ferent musicians and instruments, and
some films. It has been preserved and
used by academic scholars in the con-
tinuing study of Philippine traditional
music. For more information on the
collection go to .
The University of the Philippines
Center for Ethnomusicology throughits executive director Ramon Santos
and technical assistant Dayang Yraola
are spearheading work on the Jose
Maceda Collection with the technical
assistance of Dodie Lucas and Martin
Galan, members of the AES Philip-
pine Section. Digitalization work will
be done by Mark Laccay, an officer of
the Institute of Audio and Acoustics,
the educational arm of the AES Philip-
pine Section.
Martin Galan
An evening withRoy DuNannThe Pacific Northwest Sections
November meeting was a very special
evening with an unrecognized giant of
the recording engineering business,
Roy DuNann, long retired and living
near Seattle. Chance circumstances
and the discovery of an April 2002
Stereophile magazine article on himby jazz writer Thomas Conrad led to
this meeting. Conrad was enlisted to
be the meeting host/interviewer, and
an RSVP capacity audience of 50 (23
being AES members) gathered at
Opus 4 Studios in Bothell, Washing-
ton. Also on hand was clarinetist Bill
Smith, who recorded five albums with
Roy in the 1950s and 1960s at Con-
temporary.
PNW Chair Rick Chinn opened the
meeting, with AES president BobMoses on hand to ask the audience
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J. Audio Eng. Soc., Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008 March 221
PNW tribute to Roy DuNann: from left, Bill Smith, Roy DuNann, and Tom Conrad
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