Very exciting news, not just the Elton stuff but the entire scope of what he talks about working on. I took "unfolding" as simply a metaphor for how he thinks about translating a stereo mix into the 3D workspace that Atmos provides.
Also interesting how many mixers and studios he says are working basically non-stop on mixing Atmos material. Like I said in the other Atmos thread, I'm positive that Dolby isn't pushing this whole initiative simply for the Amazon echo speaker - someone is bankrolling all this mixing, and record companies (especially in this day and age) aren't in the habit of spending money on something unless they know they're going to make money off it. Maybe they've finally learned from some of the mistakes of surround launches past, and they realise that for a new format to succeed it has to a) have a large content library at launch and b) have a wider scope than simply the moldy oldies from the 60s and 70s - I for one, am OK with waiting 6 months for that.
I know there's a few thousand of us here that would buy anything released, but imagine pitching it to your friends who aren't surround savvy - it's a much easier sell if they can say "look, it's a $350 Echo Studio device and 10 bucks a month for a streaming subscription to a service that has hundreds (or thousands) of albums availabe in Atmos" than "well, you need a blu-ray player, and an Atmos-enabled home theater setup, and make sure you have HDMI 2.0 or better, and there's about 20 Atmos albums on Blu-Ray..." etc. Much like sex, i don't care what people do behind closed doors, as long as I can enjoy it the way I want to - if people buy Echo Studios and are happy with them (not everyone has the time, space, money or inclination for a full-blown surround system) and they make Atmos a profitable venture than all the better for us, we get more music available in surround on an ongoing basis. It's not like any Atmos mixes are done specifically for the Echo Studio device (ie no rear-channel information), they're all mixed in fully immersive studios that are at the very least 7.1.4 equipped. The Echo is just a delivery device - I see the difference between it and a home theater amplifier like the difference between headphones and speakers - and I'm sure it won't be long before Atmos is rolled out to every platform.
ETA: The "playing it back on consumer gear" is a tale as old as time for mixing engineers - in the olden days they'd cut acetates and play them on their home stereos, disco mixers would do the same and take an acetate to a club in New York, and even more recently Elliott Scheiner would audition his 5.1 mixes in his ELS system in his Acura. It's just about getting another perspective to make sure your mix "works" outside the controlled nature of a perfectly-calibrated studio environment.
Also interesting how many mixers and studios he says are working basically non-stop on mixing Atmos material. Like I said in the other Atmos thread, I'm positive that Dolby isn't pushing this whole initiative simply for the Amazon echo speaker - someone is bankrolling all this mixing, and record companies (especially in this day and age) aren't in the habit of spending money on something unless they know they're going to make money off it. Maybe they've finally learned from some of the mistakes of surround launches past, and they realise that for a new format to succeed it has to a) have a large content library at launch and b) have a wider scope than simply the moldy oldies from the 60s and 70s - I for one, am OK with waiting 6 months for that.
I know there's a few thousand of us here that would buy anything released, but imagine pitching it to your friends who aren't surround savvy - it's a much easier sell if they can say "look, it's a $350 Echo Studio device and 10 bucks a month for a streaming subscription to a service that has hundreds (or thousands) of albums availabe in Atmos" than "well, you need a blu-ray player, and an Atmos-enabled home theater setup, and make sure you have HDMI 2.0 or better, and there's about 20 Atmos albums on Blu-Ray..." etc. Much like sex, i don't care what people do behind closed doors, as long as I can enjoy it the way I want to - if people buy Echo Studios and are happy with them (not everyone has the time, space, money or inclination for a full-blown surround system) and they make Atmos a profitable venture than all the better for us, we get more music available in surround on an ongoing basis. It's not like any Atmos mixes are done specifically for the Echo Studio device (ie no rear-channel information), they're all mixed in fully immersive studios that are at the very least 7.1.4 equipped. The Echo is just a delivery device - I see the difference between it and a home theater amplifier like the difference between headphones and speakers - and I'm sure it won't be long before Atmos is rolled out to every platform.
ETA: The "playing it back on consumer gear" is a tale as old as time for mixing engineers - in the olden days they'd cut acetates and play them on their home stereos, disco mixers would do the same and take an acetate to a club in New York, and even more recently Elliott Scheiner would audition his 5.1 mixes in his ELS system in his Acura. It's just about getting another perspective to make sure your mix "works" outside the controlled nature of a perfectly-calibrated studio environment.
