Audio Engineering Society Standards Committee

December 2001 meeting of SC-04-04

[Last printing 12 December 2001] Report of the SC-04-04 Working Group on Microphone Measurement and Characterization of the SC-04 Subcommittee on Acoustics meeting, held in conjunction with the AES 111th Convention in New York, New York, US, 2001-12-01

Chair D. Josephson convened the meeting. The agenda and the report from the previous meeting were approved as written.

Current development projects

AES42-R Review of AES42-2001 AES standard for acoustics -- Digital interface for microphones

Josephson reported to the WG on the meeting of SC-04-04-D which had taken place the previous evening. The primary action item from that meeting is that a summary be made of the outstanding suggestions for clarifications, editorial changes, and other informative content not requiring a new revision of the standard. R. Rayburn agreed to summarize these topics and post the summary to the reflector.

AES-X62 Psychoacoustics of Microphone Characteristics

No action taken.

AES-X63 Time-Domain Response of Microphones

No action taken.

AES-X85 Detailed Professional Microphone Specifications

J. Brown pointed out that his several suggestions for areas on which to work in AES-X85 had not been presented at the last meeting as intended. There are also suggested revisions to IEC 60268-4 from the Japanese and German national committees.

A question remain about whether the work product of AES-X85 will be an informational and materially influence the work at this point.

There has been progress on standardizing microphone tests and published standards for them. IEC 60268-4 remains the most relevant microphone standard. The group agreed to prepare a comparison of known microphone types measured in accordance with IEC-60268-4 as a starting point. To clarify the basis for comparison, it decided to contact manufacturers to determine their test methods.

AES-X93 Recommendations for Revisions of IEC 61938 Clause 7

Project AES-X93 was discussed briefly, and in view of the completed status of its report, the group will ask the subcommittee to request that the project be suspended to allow continuing review of the implementation by the IEC of the recommended changes. The group agreed to request that the current report be made an AES information document upon passage of which the project will be retired in favor of the review project for the information document.

New projects

Brown and B. Olson discussed their need for a data set format for modeling the directivity of microphones, for use in sound reinforcement and other applications. The intent is to produce a complement to the loudspeaker modeling utilities now available. Olson will prepare the project initiation request for this work. The WG agreed to create a new task group for the project and Brown agreed to chair it.

New Business

The SC-04-04-D task group on the digitally interfaced microphone requires appointment of new leaders..

The next meeting is scheduled to be held in conjunction with the AES 112th Convention in Munich, Germany.


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