Leveraging APL’s extensive research on human sound localisation in 3D multichannel and binaural reproduction contexts, ASPEN offers highly accurate panning of virtual sound sources within a 3D auditory space. This precision helps address common issues seen in conventional tools, such as front/back confusion and difficulties in localising elevated sound sources. By mitigating these challenges, ASPEN significantly reduces cognitive load for both sound engineers and end users, thus enhancing the overall immersive experience. This ability to deliver precise spatial sound ensures a more natural and engaging auditory environment, improving the realism of the sound placement and the user’s interaction within virtual spaces.

In real life, our perception of sound source location, distance, and spatial characteristics is influenced not only by the sound source itself but also by environmental factors such as early reflections and reverberation. For virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and metaverse applications, it is crucial to provide users with realistic and natural virtual acoustics to ensure a high level of immersion. ASPEN is equipped with our patent-pending Perceptually-Optimised Virtual Acoustics (POVA) algorithms, which enable highly efficient processing and the natural simulation of a wide range of acoustic environments. This approach allows for the creation of immersive soundscapes that mirror the complex interplay of environmental cues found in real-world acoustic settings.

ASPEN addresses the long-standing challenge of poor externalisation, a common issue in traditional binaural audio tools. Externalisation, the ability to perceive sound sources as located outside the head, is a crucial factor for achieving a truly immersive auditory experience in VR/AR applications. By carefully engineering key psychoacoustic parameters, ASPEN delivers an unprecedented level of accuracy in both externalisation and auditory distance rendering, enabling virtual sound sources to feel naturally positioned in the environment. This enhanced spatial accuracy significantly improves the realism and immersion of VR/AR soundscapes, making them more lifelike and engaging for users.

Our research has shown that the sense of presence—feeling truly “there” in a virtual space—depends not only on spatial audio but also on the tonal fidelity of sound sources. Unfortunately, many binaural audio tools introduce unwanted colouration (e.g. thin, unclear, or phasey sounds), which has been one of the main reasons why binaural audio has struggled to convince a wider audience. ASPEN overcomes this by ensuring that any system using it delivers the most plausible, natural sound while maintaining a spacious and immersive spatial audio experience. With ASPEN, creators can confidently produce 3D audio content, knowing that their sounds will reach the audience with the highest fidelity.

ASPEN is specifically designed for 6DoF (Six Degrees of Freedom) applications that involve motion or head tracking, such as VR games, location-based AR, and the metaverse. In these environments, users can walk through virtual or real spaces and interact with holographic audio objects. This level of interaction allows for a highly immersive experience, where users perceive sound sources moving around them in real-time, adapting to both their physical movement and head orientation. This makes ASPEN ideal for applications where spatial audio is crucial for realism and engagement.

ASPEN is a highly scalable technology, designed to flexibly adapt to various operating platforms, including computers, mobile devices, and web servers. This scalability ensures that the system can meet the specific requirements of each platform without sacrificing audio quality. Whether deployed on high-performance desktop systems or more resource-constrained mobile devices, ASPEN maintains consistent performance and minimal quality differences, making it suitable for a wide range of applications across diverse hardware configurations.