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Meeting Recaps

Meeting Attendance Statistics — wonder about the demographics of our meetings?

Meeting notice archive. Meeting notices from past meetings. If it's not there, it likely doesn't exist. If you have a meeting topic that you'd like to see covered, please let someone from the Section Committee know about it.

Note that the Meeting Recaps follow the calendar year (the year that the meeting actually occurred in).

2012

January 2012
What the @#$%$% is FFT all about? PNW Committeeman JJ Johnston led an all day exploration in the use of the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) in the evaluation of audio signals and sound systems. Also discussed was the open source Mathematical Modeling program Octave. Significant time was devoted to using Octave to evaluate audio signals and as a way to analyze the performance of a sound system. The meeting was held at the Old Firehouse Teen Center (OFTC) in Redmond.
January Meeting Report, including JJ's scrips, PPT Decks, etc.
February 2012
Audio Development for Android Games Pete Dresher, Sound Designer at Twittering, discussed and demonstrated several aspects of game audio programming for Android devices. He used FMOD, an open source tool as a way of connecting bits of score, ensuring they stayed in sync with aspects of the game, and that they stayed musically relevant to each other. The meeting was held at the Art Institute of Seattle.
February Meeting Report, with audio recordings of the meeting.
March 2012
Desktop Mastering: Book Release Our own past Chair and Committee Member, Steve Turnidge, has gone off and written a book. A book you say? But not just any book, one covering a topic near and dear to any recording engineer: <ta-da> Desktop Mastering. Desktop Mastering is a conceptual guide, intertwining a broad range of knowledge regarding audio engineering principles and practical applications for those wishing to enhance their own as well as their clients' work. In addition to providing a step-by-step in-depth survey of a successful mastering plug-in chain, Desktop Mastering covers real-world practical applications as well as the fundamentals of audio and electronics. Also included is a personal guide to the business of mastering and how to leverage emerging social networks for positive personal and business results.
with audio recordings of the meeting.
April 2012
2012 Legal Update: Patents and Copyright The devil is in the details, and for a number of good reasons, a lawyer's expertise is in those details. Our resident lawyer, Kevin D. Jablonski, will update us on changes and nuances in Patent and Copyright Law.
Here is an overview of the evening's discussion topics:
- Intellectual Property in General
- The America Invents Act
- The Google Book Settlement -- uhhh... not so fast there!
- Termination Reclaim
- Interesting cases in 2011
- SOPA/PIPA
- DJ Girl Talk
Kevin is a practicing attorney whose practice involves several aspects of intellectual property including patent, trademark, and copyright law. Kevin's background of electrical engineering and music make him especially well prepared to speak to these topics, especially in the context of audio.
April Meeting Report, with audio recordings of the evening and Kevin's PowerPoint deck.

2011

January 2011
Rewriting a Digital Audio Workstation. Charles VanWinkle, Adobe, took us through the process of creating a cross-platform (Windows and Mac) version of their DAW program Adobe Audition. The meeting was held at Adobe Systems.
February 2011
The February meeting was postponed because of snow.
March 2011
Cables: Fact, Fiction, and Fraud. Steve Lampen of Belden and Kurt Denke of Blue Jeans Cable took us through the fact, fiction, and folly of the audio cable business. The meeting was held at Shoreline Community College.
April 2011
Operating a Public Address System. PNW Section members Dan Mortensen and Rick Chinn did a free-form discussion of operating a sound system for live music. The meeting was held at Edmonds Center for the Arts.
May 2011
Audacity Steve Hastings gave a demo and discussion of Audacity an open source (free) audio editing and mixing program. Elections were also held. The meeting was held at the Art Institute of Seattle.
June 2011
Inside a Cellular Telephone. Scott Mehrens of Motorola took us through the guts of a cellular telephone, with particular attention to the audio process within. The meeting was held at the Telephone Museum in Georgetown.
August 2011
Field trip. The Section co-sponsored a field trip to NWAA Labs, in Satsop WA. Built on the site of an abandoned nuclear power plant, the Lab is an acoustical measuring facility uniquely suited to these enormous buildings. A special treat was a visit to one of the cooling towers, which has unique and interesting acoustical properties. Supersized only begins to describe these buildings.
September 2011
Digital Audio Transport in an Ethernet World. Steve Macatee, Rane Corporation, reviewed Audio-over-Ethernet technologies. The meeting was held at Rane Corporation in Mukilteo.
October 2011a
There were two meetings in October. Sometimes we just get lucky.
Bill Putnam - His Life and Legacy The First October meeting was held at Shoreline Community College. Former employees Bob Bushnell and Jerry Feree described the time they spent early in their careers working for Bill Putnam.
Wifi | Whitespace | Wireless Mikes: Can they coexist? The second October meeting was held at Microsoft Research. Ranveer Chandra and George Nychis explored new technology being developed by Microsoft to allow a Whitespace Device and wireless microphones to coexist. A demonstration of Microsoft's technology followed.
November 2011
Lies, Damn Lies, and Specifications Jonathan Novick, Audio Precision, talked about specsmanship and demonstrated a device that progressively introduced more and more distortion of a specific types into an audio signal. Audience members were asked to judge the threshold of their own audibility of the distortion.
December 2011
New Requirements in the NEC and How they Affect Live Sound Systems Mark Rogers, PNW AES Committee and Consultant for The Greenbusch Group, discussed new requirements in the NEC that affect sound systems in buildings. In particular, systems for emergency evacuation are affected.

2010

January 2010
Dr. Floyd Toole discussed "Upgrading the Audio Industry" as part of our January meeting. Then Dr. Sean Olive discussed a software tool used for "The Subjective Evaluation of Loudspeaker Quality." January Meeting Report.

February 2010
New Wave Modular Synthesizers
George Mattson, James Husted, Kevin O'Neil, Scott rise, Sebastian Jaeger spoke about the re-emergence of modular (patch cord) synthesis, ala the ancient Moog 900 series, or the ARP 2600. (meeting report not available)

March 2010
The Evolution of Analog Guitar Effects
Greg Mauser, Ian Moore & Matt Johnson spoke about the coming of age of analog guitar effects.

April 2010 — There was no meeting in April.

May 2010 Listen to a Large Line-Array
Dan Mortensen

Audio Perception: Why you hear what you hear
JJ Johnston spoke about how perception alters what we hear, or what we think we hear. He devoted time to some of the audiophoolery and chicanery that permeates our industry. (meeting report not online yet)

June 2010 An Overview of Film Scoring in Los Angeles
Shawn Murphy, Emmy award winning film sound mixer talked about how films are scored in Los Angeles and gave examples of the different steps in the process.

September 2010 Tomlinson Holman spoke about the history and future of Surround Sound. September Meeting Report

October 2010 Our own JJ Johnston spoke about his personal involvement with the development of perceptual audio coders and MP3. October Meeting Report

November 2010 We had two meetings in November. On November 8th, John Vanderkooy visited and spoke about the Acoustic Centre. John Vanderkooy Meeting Report

On November 21st, Wes Dooley visited and spoke about the use, care, and feeding of ribbon microphones. Wes Dooley Meeting Report

December 2010 Ivan Tashev, Microsoft Research, spoke about sound capture applications in entertainment and gaming, with a view toward Microsoft's new Kinect gaming device.

2009

January 2009
High Quality Termination and Project Management Fundamentals for Studio Design
Aaron Gates and Steve Turnidge
February 2009
Current Legal Events and the Future of Our Music Industry
Kevin Jablonski Esq.
March 2009
Home Theatre vs Cinema Audio Production: the Technical Aspects
JJ Johnston
April 2009
Anatomy of a Session: The Technical Aspects. Frank Laico talks about his career at Columbia's 30th Street Studio
May 2009
June 2009
John Young, Puget Sound Hearing and Balance described aspects of hearing, hearing conservation, and hearing aids, with special emphasis on his hearing aid prescription for Frank Laico's hearing loss.
August 2009
An unusual summer opportunity arose, and the PNW Section took advantage of Dansound's sound system at Seattle's Woodland Park Zoo to investigate medium format outdoor subwoofer arrays.

2008

This year's meeting coverage is very much a work in progress, so if you come across links that return 404, it means "under construction."

January 2008
JJ Johnston and Serge Smirnov spoke about Room Correction: Perceptual vs Acoustic Ideals. The concepts are part of the Audio Subsystem within Microsoft Windows Vista.
February 2008
Using Arrays of Loudspeakers for Focusing or Diffusing Sound. Mike Seltzer, Jasha Droppo, Ivan Tashev, and JJ Johnston spoke about and demonstrated the use of loudspeaker arrays for creating a very noticeable hot spot within a room and for creating a diffuse source that was not readily localizable.
March 2008
Michael P. Matesky, attorney with Klarquist Sparkman LLP, spoke about copyright law, especially in connection with music and recording.
April 2008
Surround Mixing for Live Sound with David Miles Huber
May 2008
Acoustics 101 for Geeks and Nerds
The PNW Section's own Mark Rogers tackled this gargantuan topic at warp speed.
June 2008
An Evening With Frank Laico
Frank Laico worked for CBS/Columbia as a mixer/engineer between 1940 and 1982. The depth and breadth of his work during that time is both incredible and everlasting.
For now, there are only pictures.
September 2008
Jeffrey Bruton took us on a tour of his newly completed remote truck and discussed the basics of remote recording in the year 2008.
October 2008
JJ Johnston took us on a tour of the insides of a personal music player.
November 2008
Section Chair Steve Turnidge spoke about Mastering for Television, with some real-life experience to keep things interesting.
December 2008
Anatomy of a Session, with Frank Laico

2007

2006

January 2006
Marty O'Donnell and Jay Weinland of Bungie Labs share the details of the audio integration for the Halo 2 game on the Xbox platform. It was a fascinating meeting on many different levels.
February 2006 This meeting was brought to us by Meyer Sound Laboratories. The Meyer team spent the day showing us the ins, outs, and details of their SIM3 source independent measurement system.
March 2006 Ableton Live — Indistinguishable from Magic. Matt Frazier, of M Audio, provided an interesting hands-on demonstration of this capable program.
April 2006 JJ Johnston introduces the concepts of loudness and SPL.
May 2006 Born Digital: Will recordings survive the 21st century? John Spencer, of BMS/Chace discussed the implications of various forms of data management and long term storage. Like any religion, the topic has its believers, disciples, and non-believers (or at least those who are in serious denial).
June 2006 Audio on the PC. Elliot Omiya, of Microsoft, described the guts of the audio subsystem of the Windows Vista operating system.
No meetings during the summer months!
September 2006 Our opening meeting of the 2006-2007 featured Dan Lavry local digital audio guru and nationally recognized high-end converter manufacturer. Dan spoke about conversion in general and why he feels that 96k is far enough.
October 2006 JJ Johnston, from Microsoft discussed how our perception of audio and video are similar and different.
November 2006 Jack Endino, producer/engineer to the stars, spoke to us about recording, techie things, tape machine performance, especially at high speed, and tales of gory (or is it glory? from the trenches.

2005

January 2005 Our January meeting featured James Russell, inventor of optical CD recording, telling us about the origins of CD recording. The meeting report, photos, and MP3s of the meeting are available here.
February 2005 Juergen Wahl brought us his especially informative and innovative multimedia presentation about Microphone Subjective Evaluation and Applications.
March 2005 Ken Greenbaum hosted a panel discussion with co-authors of is book, Audio Anecdotes
April 2005 Mark Rogers and JJ Johnston tackled the settings of Gains and Losses in a sound system.
May 2005 Bill Whitlock talked about balanced interfaces and connecting anything to anything.
June 2005 Our June meeting was an all day discussion about Virtual Synthesizers.
October 2005 Ed McNichol and Clark Schroeder demonstrated three audio applications for the Apple Macintosh computer. The meeting report and photos are here.
November 2005 Al Swanson demonstrated and discussed orchestral recording technique.

2004

September 2004 Our September meeting was a special screening of the documentary film, Tom Dowd and The Language of Music.
October 2004 J. J. Johnston on Hearing, Acoustics, and Soundfields: What can we hear and what can't we hear?
November 2004 Dana Troxel of Rane Corporation discusses the how and why of acoustic feedback and demonstrates Rane's feedback killer module as used in their DragNet™ line of DSP-based audio signal processors.
February 2004 From Hear to Eternity - Sampling, Conversion and the Limits of Hearing. An all-day seminar with James Johnston, Dr. Melissa Harrison, Dr. Richard Cabot, Steven Green, and Bob Moses.
April-May 2004 The Science and Voodoo of Electric Guitars. We held three meetings covering various aspects of guitar pickup electronics, pickup construction, and guitar amplifiers.
June 2004 Dave Gunness of EAW described and demonstrated their new Digitally Steered Line Array speaker.

2003

November 2003 Richard Erwin takes us on a tour of Marion Oliver McCaw Hall at Seattle Center.
September/October 2003 The PNW Section hosts a panel discussion on CD Mastering at Shoreline Community College.
June 2003 Dennis Bohn and Rick Jeffs from Rane Corporation talk about active filters, equalizers, and crossovers.
May 2003 Mike Overlin and John Strawn talk about Yamaha's mLan music oriented LAN.
April 2003 Bob Smith, Medtronic-Physio Control demonstrates the importance of good audio in a non-traditional audio application, a defibrillator.
March 2003 The Surround Sound Seminar, presented by Mike Sokol of Fits and Starts Productions visits our corner of Paradise once more.
February 2003 Mark Rogers revisits our old friend, the Decibel.
January 2003 Concepts and Practices for Evaluation of Rooms and Sound Systems using FFT Analysis. An all day workshop with Daniel Casado, Bruce Main, Mark Rogers, and Blair McNair.

2002

December 2002 There was no meeting in December.
November 2002 Bill Whitlock, Jensen Transformers Inc., tells a capacity crowd about the Top Ten Signal Interconnection Myths.
October 2002 A look at Music for Film from the composer's perspective with noted film music composer Hummie Mann.
September 2002 Taking a cue from the Los Angeles Section, we present An Evening with Greg Mackie.
June 2002. The Soundbridge at Benaroya Hall is a multimedia experience designed to connect listeners with the symphony orchestra.
May 2002. Internet Audio Networking with Bob Moses, Island Digital Media Group. As the dust settles from the dotcom hoopla, one thing is for sure - Internet Audio is here to stay. Some industry pundits predict that online consumption of audio/video media will eventually eclipse brick and mortar commerce. But critics point out that online music sounds bad, and such a tremendous transformation will take years, perhaps decades, to complete. Moreover, downloading music to a PC and listening to it while seated at a desk is not exactly a replacement for listening to a CD in the comfort of the living room. Bob Moses spoke aboutt the lastest advances in the business and technology of Internet audio. He reviewed the trend toward home networks so that audio and video can be digitally transported around a home along with other computer data. We listened to a variety of audio compression formats.
April 2002. Mark Rogers takes us through the ins and outs of the current National Electrical Code, especially with regard to how it affects audio systems wiring and performance.
With photos
March 2002. Opus 4 Studios uses Lexicon LARES to break down the walls of the traditional studio environment to provide an acoustically comfortable recording environment for a variety of musical genres. Steve Barbar of LARES takes us through an unusual application of a remarkable tool.
With photos
February 2002. Trimpin mixes art, music, and computers. We visit his studio for this meeting.
With photos
January 2002. A house of worship sound system design. Rick Smargiassi, Integrated Light and Sound Inc. takes us through a recently completed installation. Daniel Casado, manufacturer's rep for Electro-Voice discusses the Asymetrical Coverage loudspeaker used for this install and Rick takes us through the high points of the Sabine DSP audio processor.
With photos

2001

December 2001. Theatre Sound Design Stephen LeGrand, gives us a behind the scenes look at his sound design for the Seattle Repertory Theatre's current production of "Beard of Avon". We'll also toured the Bagley Wright's sound system and LCS system, led by Ryan Sorenson, sound lead at The Seattle Repertory Theatre, and Bill Droege, former Seattle Rep sound lead.
November 2001. Symetrix presents the SymNet Audio Matrix and Dave Tosti-Lane shows us the newly remodeled PONCHO Concert Hall at Cornish College of the Arts.
Photos are coming.
October 2001. Sony Digital Audio presents the DMX-R1000 Digital Mixing Console and the DRE-S777 Sampling Digital Reverberator at Glenn Sound Studios.
With photos
May 2001. Meyer Sound Labs M3D Line Array at Benaroya Hall.
With photos
March 2001. Lexicon 960L Digital Effects System at Glennsound
With photos
January 2001. Subwoofer Listening and Arraying Workshop at Paramount Northwest.
With photos

2000

November 2000 Rane Factory Tour and DJ Mixer Demo Presented by Steve Macatee and Rick Jeffs
Photos here. NB: The photos are rather large. Ultimately they will be crunched to 30-50k each. Could take awhile to download via modem! No captions yet.
June 2000. MP3 and Internet Audio Presented by Bruce Fries, author.
Photos here
May 2000. Design of the Audio Management Unit for the Boeing 777 Aircraft
Photos here.
April 2000. The Truth About Audio and Other Cables. Presented by Steve Lampen, Belden Wire and Cable.
Photos Available.
February 2000. Tour of the Paul Fritts Organ Builders and the Gottfried and Mary Fuchs Pipe Organ at Pacific Lutheran University.
Photos available.

1999

November 1999. Safeco Field Audio System Tour
Photos from this meeting.
October 1999. DVD Audio and SuperAudio CD Formats starring Jim Heckroth of Crystal Semiconductor.
Photos from this meeting.
September 1999. Photo coverage from the AES 107th convention in the Big Apple.
September 1999. Concert Hall Acoustics with Dr. Cyril Harris at Benaroya Hall.
Photos from this meeting.
June 1999. Annual Business Meeting and Visit to the Vintage Telephone Museum
Photos from this meeting.
May 1999. Location Sound for Film A Panel of Experts Share their Daily Encounters.
Starring Charlie Tomaras and Scot Charles
Photos from this meeting
March 1999. The Spectral/Euphonix R1 Digital Audio Recorder. Starring Mark Doenges and Dana Bourke.
Photos from this meeting.
February 1999. Beyond SCSI: Fibre Channel for Audio/Visual Applications. With Tom Clark, Vixel Corporation.
Photos and a puzzle from this meeting.
January 1999. Multimedia for Microphone Applications
Presented by Jurgen Wahl of Sennheiser/Neumann USA
Photos from this meeting.

1998

December 1998. Audio for Interaction at Microsoft.
Photos from this meeting.
October 1998. Tour of Benaroya Hall and AES San Francisco Convention Recaps
Photos from this meeting and the Convention.
June 1998 Sanctuary Acoustics and Sound Reinforcement for Houses of Worship at First Presbyterian Church of Bellevue. Elections and a business meeting were held at this meeting.
Photos from this meeting.
May 1998 Loudspeaker Line Arrays with Todd Welti. This meeting was co-hosted by the Acoustical Society of America.
There are no pictures from this meeting.
May 1998. New Surround Sound Technology in a New Student Audio Production Facility.
Photos from this meeting.
April 1998. Evolution of Modular Sound Reinforcement Systems for Touring Use.
Hosted by JBL Professional and Electro-Voice Incorporated.
Photos from this meeting.
March 1998. The Pacific Northwest Section celebrates its 20th Anniversary. Roy Pritts helps us celebrate and tells us of the AES' role in audio education.
Photos from this meeting.
February 1998. Tour of Carlson Audio
Photos of this tour and meeting.
January 1998. Large Array Subwoofer Listening Workshop at the Paramount Theatre.
Photos from the subwoofer extravaganza.

1997

November 1997. EASE and EARS electroacoustical modeling software
Presented by Ron Sauro
Video frame captures from this meeting.
November 1997. Streaming Audio and video on the Internet at RealNetworks.
Video frame captures from this meeting.
October 1997. Mackie Digital 8-bus Mixer preview and factory tour.
Photos from this meeting.
June 1997. Tour of KIRO, KIRO-FM, and KNWX radio studios.
Photos from this meeting.
June 1997. Preliminary pictures from the Internet.Audio conference, June 13-15 at Bell Harbor Conference Center, Seattle.
May 1997. The IEEE 1394 Firewire Serial Bus with Bob Moses of PAVO.
Photos from this meeting.
April 1997. The Art and Science of System Troubleshooting. A Panel discussion with Mac Perkins, Cal Perkins, and Rick Chinn
Photos of the three presenters (troublemakers?).
March 1997 Tour of the LCS (Level Control Systems) Sound System at the Seattle Repertory Theatre's Leo Kreielsheimer Theatre.
Photos from this meeting.
March 1997 The Business of Recording in the Pacific Northwest: Past, Present, and Future.
Presented jointly by the AES PNW Section, The Society of Professional Audio Recording Services (SPARS), and the Art Institute of Seattle.
Photos from this meeting.
February 1997 Saint James Cathedral sound system featuring Peavey Mediamatrix.
Presented by Brian Bylenok.
Photos from this meeting.
January 1997. AES/WAPS Large Format speaker workshop.
Co-presented by the PNW AES Section and the Washington Association of Performance Services.
Photos from this meeting/extravaganza.

1996

December 1996. RANE Corp Factory Tour
November 1996. IASYS Intelligent Loudspeaker Analysis with Tom Walker, AudioControl Industrial.
Photos from this meeting.
November 1996. PNW Section's Wrap-Up of the 101st AES Convention
October 1996 Maximum Audio Mileage from Amplifier ICs with Walt Jung, Analog Devices.
Photo from this meeting.
May 1996. Tour of Microsoft's Digital Backlot with Steve Boyce, Audio Production Manager, Interactive Media Division.
Photos accessible from meeting recap page.
April 1996. Tour of the KeyArena Sound System.
Lots-o-Photos from this meeting.
April 1996 Audio on the Internet Forum.
Pictures accessible from the meeting recap page.

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