Auditory display conference comes to ANU

The world’s leading audio researchers and sound designers will gather at The Australian National University (ANU) from Sunday to hear about the latest technology regarding auditory display.

Held at ANU for the first time, the 22^ndInternational Community for Auditory Display (ICAD) conference will focus on Sonic Information Design, or the use of sounds to represent everyday occurrences and settings in life.

“When you press a button at a traffic light and it beeps as you walk across the street, that’s an auditory display. When you hear a swish as you drag a document to the rubbish bin of your computer, that’s an auditory display,” said Professor David Worrall from Columbia College Chicago and the ANU School of Music.

The conference will consider the latest trends in auditory display for a range of areas including improvements to audio devices for blind people.

“The major issue there is making sounds that people who aren’t musically trained can clearly distinguish; the sounds have to be relatable,” he said.

The conference will also hear from delegates who use sound to represent complex data for situations such as monitoring data for stock markets and even in science scenarios such as monitoring earthquakes.

“Sound can give you an insight into what is going on, often in ways the visual world can’t do,” Dr Worrall said.

According to Dr Worrall, multi-channel and 3D auditory spaces are where the challenges lie for the future of audio.

“To get high quality three dimensional sound and the coordination of the simultaneity of sounds across large distances, is an area sound experts are working on as we speak,” he said.

“For example in this year’s conference, there’s a group from New York who have been working on how to anticipate when a sound will occur so that the signal can be received anywhere in the world and so that everyone can act upon it at the same time.”

More information on the ICAD conference can be found on the ANU School of Music website.