My favourite kind of project, specific, niche and a bit unusual… 

This is a custom 4-axis CNC microphone positioning system I designed and put together for Audioscenic (UK). The head is a special type of microphone which mimics how the human head distorts sound. 

The system provides 4D placement of the microphones to fractions of a mm in all 3 translation axis and a rotational axis for head orientation. The laser guides help to position to the experiment. I included a Python API to making controling the system fast for Audioscenic’s development team. The project drew on 10+ years of expertise in motion platform design, signal processing and robotics for research applications and was completed in a few weeks. 

Audioscenic are using it to develop Amphi, their spatial audio system which companies like Dell, Acer and Razor, install in laptops, soundbars, and monitors to create a 3D soundfields without needing rear speakers.

They track the position of the listener then use advanced audio techniques like beam-forming and cross-talk cancellation to create an immersive 3D sound-field which surrounds the listener.

Checkout their website for more details about their technologies