Index

Sound radiates from conventional loudspeakers in a spherical way, dissipating very quickly. Every time the distance is doubled from the source, the sound level drops by a factor of four.

To avoid excessive sound levels in the vicinity of a loudspeaker, it becomes necessary to use an array of loudspeakers to cover. These conventional arrays tend to suffer from a number of sound reproduction artifacts, and due to the relatively high sound levels used they excite the premises natural reverberations, being complex to set up for conformity with the various applicable regulations.

This completely new sound reproduction technology creates uniform, phase-coherent flat sound fields that suffer minimal level losses over distance. In practice, and depending on the system setup and other conditions, the covered distances range from tens to a few h u n d r e d s o f m e t r e s o f u n i f o r m s o u n d. Within the covered distance there is little perceptible sound level variation from point to point.

Audio elements are extremely directional, with little or no perceptible sound out of axis. Perfectly tailored and uniform sound coverage becomes possible. Audio zoning and Listening privacy are inherent to applications of the audio products.

This technology allows the creation of innovative solutions such as the Sound Shower when sound from a ceiling mounted tile will only be heard by those situated directly underneath. By using the particular flexible properties of the sounding elements, the sound beam emanated by some arrangements may have an adjustable angle of aperture, such as a wedge shaped Element intended for coverage of an angle shaped area or to be used as part of a circular or angled diffusion array.

Reverse Use

As the Audio Elements are based on EMFi films, they can be considered as being electret microphones of considerable proportions. In reverse use, the Elements may be employed as passive absorbers for certain audio bands, or as complexly actively driven absorbers for the larger audio spectrum.

In this type of application, it is possible to achieve reductions of unwanted sounds between 10dB SPL and 30dB SPL depending on the conditions, making this is one of the most advanced fields of present electro-acoustics: Active Noise Cancellation