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Quite a few of us would have already heard the amazing audio clip, ‘The Virtual Barbershop’. It is probably one of the best showcase of audio recording technology by recreating a real-life situation in a virtual scenario. While visiting a barbershop to get a haircut is common, getting a similar experience through the headphones is something simply amazing.

Haven’t heard ‘The Virtual Barbershop’ before? Get your Headphones, Listen to it Right Away!

Wow! How is this done?

This is a technology by the name, Binaural Recording. Now this is one step ahead of conventional stereo recordings. In stereo, various factors that help us in our natural hearing are not factored in. Binaural gives a feeling of actually being there and resulting in an immersive experience unlike what we have heard over the usual speakers or headphones.

A typical binaural recording unit has two high-fidelity microphones mounted in a dummy head, inset in ear-shaped molds to fully capture all of the audio frequency adjustments that happen naturally as sound wraps around the human head and is “shaped” by the form of the outer and inner ear.

The result is a listening experience that spatially transcends normally recorded stereo, since it accurately reproduces the effect of hearing a sound in person, given the 360° nature of how human ears pick up nuance in the sound waves. Binaural recordings can very convincingly reproduce location of sound behind, ahead, above, or wherever else the sound actually came from during recording.

But there is one catch.

The binaural effects can be reproduced only using headphones. It does not work with mono playback nor does it work while using loudspeaker units.

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