Hearing History: Bringing to life the sounds of the past through Virtual Reality

想象一下，从过去体验音乐的时刻；丰富的感官体验，结合了蜡烛闪烁的灯光，百年音乐的精湛表演，以及现在已不复存在的表演空间的温暖音响。这就是我们最初的项目“空间、地点、声音和记忆”所要做的。我们与游戏开发者、音乐学家、建筑历史学家和声学家密切合作，开始在虚拟现实中重现早期音乐表演的声音和感觉。我们开始煞费苦心地从零碎的资料和唱片中拼凑出两场音乐会的音乐，然后在一个消声室里记录了历史上的演出，这是一个专门设计的没有自然声音的空间。一旦完成，我们建造了两个虚拟礼堂，通过现场拍摄的详细激光扫描，以数字方式重建圣塞西莉亚大厅和林利思哥宫的教堂。然后，我们将录音和虚拟空间结合在一起，使用声学光线追踪来重现听到历史性表演的感觉。这项工作的关键成果是虚拟模型和软件的生产，用户可以戴上虚拟现实头盔，走进过去。对于我们的后续项目，我们希望利用我们与苏格兰历史环境（HES）和圣塞西莉亚大厅的合作伙伴关系，在圣塞西莉亚大厅、林利斯戈宫和HES的数字创新中心引擎室创建三个专用的公共入口。通过与HES合作，我们的VR软件获得了最大的可能：2017/18林利思哥宫吸引了来自世界各地的87,254名游客。我们计划与该机构密切合作，使用HES既定的关键绩效指标来衡量访客参与度方面的影响。除了探索我们的声学建模软件在文物领域的应用外，我们还希望利用后续项目来探索我们的模型在商业音乐制作环境中消声录音的可行性和经验。我们将与Binchois Consort和古典唱片公司Hyperion合作，通过详细的研究，安排、录制和制作与Linlithgow palace有关的音乐，包括苏格兰著名的Carvor唱诗班中不太知名的作品。在我们的VR制作工作流程的基础上，我们将与Hyperion的录音工程师合作，开发基于消声录音的商业音乐制作管道，在制作和后期制作期间使用虚拟声学模型作为工具，将这些消声录音置于历史声学空间中。这将是第一张完全在VR中录制和制作的古典专辑。我们将开发一个配套的VR应用程序，允许最终用户下载额外的音乐内容和VR模型，以便在不同的历史空间和不同的时间点重新混合和试听录音。就影响而言，我们将收集有关Hyperion以新方式接触和吸引受众并培养新受众的能力的数据，以及通过创建和包装额外的付费内容作为新的收入来源的应用程序的商业可行性。在项目的这一阶段结束时，我们期望得到以下产出：1。3个面向公众的VR装置，位于苏格兰中央地带的高人流量文化遗址；2 .将由Hyperion厂牌发行的新商业专辑，由Binchois Consort演奏Carvor唱诗班的音乐；3 .基于VR工具制作和后期制作的全新商业音乐工作流程和制作流程；一个用户友好的移动应用程序，允许最终用户在不同的空间和不同的时间点混音；与基础研究工作对文化遗址游客参与度的影响相关的数据集，以及对专门从事早期音乐制作的唱片公司的商业运营的影响。

Imagine experiencing a musical moment from the past; a rich, sensory experience that combines the flickering light from candles, the exquisite performance of centuries-old music, and the warm acoustics of a performance space that now no longer exists. That is what our initial project, Space, Place, Sound, and Memory, set out to do. Working closely with game developers, musicologists, architectural historians, and acousticians, we set out to recreate the sounds and sensations of early music performance in virtual reality. We began by painstakingly piecing together two concerts of music from fragmentary sources and records, and then recorded historically-informed performances in an anechoic chamber, a space that is specifically designed to have no natural acoustic. Once complete, we constructed two virtual auditoria, digitally rebuilding St. Cecilia's Hall and the Chapel at Linlithgow Palace from detailed laser scans taken on site. Then, we brought the recordings and virtual spaces together using acoustic ray-tracing to recreate the sensations of hearing a historic performance.The key outcome of that work was the production of virtual models and software which allows users to don VR headsets and step into the past. For our follow-on project, we would like to capitalise on our partnership with Historic Environment Scotland (HES) and St. Cecilia's Hall to create three dedicated public access points, situated at St. Cecilia's Hall, Linlithgow Palace, and the Engine Shed, HES's digital innovation centre. By partnering with HES, we get the greatest possible reach for our VR software: in 2017/18 Linlithgow Palace attracted 87,254 visitors from across the world. We plan to work closely with the organisation to measure impact in terms of visitor engagement using HES's established KPIs.In addition to exploring the application of our acoustic modelling software in the heritage sector, we would like to use the follow-on project to explore the viability of our models and experience of anechoic recording in a commercial music production environment. Working with the Binchois Consort and the classical label Hyperion, we will arrange, record, and produce music linked, through detailed research, to Linlithgow Palalce, including lesser-known pieces from Scotland's famous Carvor Choirbook. Building on our VR production workflow, we will work with Hyperion's recording engineers to develop a commercial music production pipeline based around anechoic recordings, using the virtual acoustic models as a tool during production and post-production to situate those anechoic recordings within a historical acoustic space. This will be the first instance of a classical album recorded and produced entirely within VR.We will develop a companion VR app that allows end-users to download additional musical content and VR models to remix and audition the recordings in different historic spaces and at different points in time. In terms of impact, we will capture data about Hyperion's ability to reach and engage its audiences in new ways and to grow new audiences, and the commercial viability of the app as a new revenue stream through creating and packaging additional paid-for content.By the end of this phase of the project, we expect the following outputs:1. Three public-facing VR installations located at high footfall cultural sites across the Scottish Central Belt;2. A new commercial album, to be released on the Hyperion label, featuring the Binchois Consort performing the music of the Carvor Choirbook;3. New commercial music workflows and production pipelines based around production and post-production using VR tools;4. A user-friendly mobile app that allows end-users to remix audio in different spaces and at different points in time;5. Datasets relating to the impact of the underlying research work on visitor engagement to cultural sites, and on the commercial operation of a record label specialising in early music production.