How did you first become interested in accessibility?
My passion for immersive audio brought me towards this route. I encountered this aspect of sound production while working on this project. I received various feedback from sound engineers regarding how my spatial mix was ‘too spatial’, with the dialogues happening a bit far away. The point is that these people understood clearly what the dialogues were about and what the characters were saying, so are they just used to having all the dialogues ‘in your face’, like when watching a blockbuster movie?
What surprised you most in your work practice?
How as researchers we try to solve issues with our own point of view. As this was my BA final project, I hadn’t done much research on my own before, and this project showed me how important it is to learn how to look at the big picture. In my case, I could have developed it slightly differently to incorporate other aspects of intelligibility and psychoacoustics.
Are there any restrictions or boundaries you (have to) abide by?
The modern human major interest in vision over sound (obviously).
What do you hope to achieve through your work?
Bringing more awareness regarding sound, its ‘immersiveness’, and how powerful it is, not just for entertainment, but for health and well-being.
Can you tell us a little about you forthcoming projects (related to accessibility)?
I’m currently researching various ways of integrating narrative and stories to create a sort of installation that combines real environments and sonically designed ones. Imagine an Augmented Reality story, but told just with sound.
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The project’s Facebook page can be found here.
Playlist with all the reviews from the audience that tried the experience can be found here.
