MAKING IMMERSIVE LONDON WITH ARK360⁰

Are you ready for a post-stereo world? For the Immersive London project, spatial experts ARK360° took a host of emerging Londonbased artists on a quest to expand their understanding of immersive sound. The results, as heard on a new compilation, may serve as an example to the rest of us...

“I’m convinced that this technology will replace stereo,” exclaims ARK360° COO Kristopher Winter, when asked of the future of the immersive audio formats that he and his team have been exclusively working in. Alongside CEO Ricky Barber, Winter and a globe-spanning cabal of engineers have been at the forefront of converting many of the world’s biggest tracks into immersive audio formats, specifically Sony’s 360 Reality Audio and Dolby Atmos.

Based at The Church Studios in Crouch End, London, ARK360° is not only working with labels and clients such as Sony, WMG, and UMG, but has recently built a bridge for new and emerging artists to both create, mix and present tracks in this all-encompassing format. The Immersive London project took a group of 30 London-based artists and producers and sought to equip them with the know-how to think in 360°.

“It was the first time we’d done it,” Kristopher explains. “The concept emerged in my head around a year ago. The reason was that we had been converting stereo compositions into immersive audio formats. So, we started some conversations with labels and artists on how to write for this format. I suggested we allow people to just compose with this spherical mindset. Giving them time to create and imagine sounds that moved. Then, we wanted to provide the skills and tools to our participants to do that. That was the most important thing for us: to change how we think about how our tracks are delivered as a final project. This is the first time that artists have created for this format in such a high volume. We ended up with 60 tracks in total.”

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