LATEST ADDITIONS

From the time movies first emerged as a pastime, filmmakers and theater owners have tried to come up with ways to make the movie experience more and more realistic. The picture (other than size) couldn't change, so they tried other ways. Some, like the Smellorama, didn't work. Others, like multichannel sound, did. Moving from one channel to six or eight channels, most people would think, "I'm surrounded by sound. What else is there?" What all, or at least most, systems lack is the ability to touch you—to literally touch you. Clark Synthesis' line of transducers aims to change that with tactile sound.

I'll wager that, if you were to poll the attendees at January's Consumer Electronics Show as to which was the most intriguing audio demo at the expo this year, a large majority would respond with Tom Holman's 10.2-channel sonic roller-coaster ride over at Alexis Park. Sure, the high-resolution demos were purer, and I'll be damned if the two-channel rigs at that same venue didn't, on the whole, sound better than ever (two-channel ain't dead just yet, gang). Still, when it came down to pure entertainment value, Holman's demo undoubtedly stole the show.

The idea of watermarking high-resolution audio signals has riled audiophiles for months, ever since Verance announced that the controversial tracking signals would be incorporated into DVD-Audio discs. Now videophiles can get in on the action: last week, <A HREF="http://www.digimarc.com">Digimarc</A> announced that it is partnering with Hitachi, Macrovision, NEC, Philips, Pioneer, and Sony to form the Video Watermarking Group (VWM Group) to provide video copy prevention and play control solutions for digital recording devices.