New Audio Option Allows for More Immersive VR Experience in Applications Created Using the InstaVR Platform

(April 24, 2017, Las Vegas, NV) InstaVR, Inc., a virtual reality (VR) authoring, publishing, and analysis company, announced today support for use of spatial audio in VR experiences created using the company’s online VR creation platform.

Spatial audio, an important part of 360 media, presents sounds both inside and outside the view of the VR user, allowing for a truly immersive audio quality. The benefits of spatial audio include better representing the actual experience of real world sound, as well as garnering the attention of the VR viewer and prompting them where to turn their head in the virtual environment. This enhanced audio feature is valuable for a broad array of use cases, particularly storytelling and entertainment VR experiences.

Steven Poe, VR Producer (http://www.stevenpoe.com), utilizes InstaVR’s spatial audio feature in the immersive applications he builds for Mandala Health, a company focused on improving healthcare treatments in pain management, clinical psychology, and meditation self-optimization. According to Poe, “The soundscape is more than 50% of the brain’s transference. We hear sound faster and more accurately than we see.”

He creates Mandala Health’s spatial audio design by mixing quad ambisonic live recording with custom soundtracks, for a digital health product in sync with natural rhythms and Fibonacci animation timelines. “Unfortunately the ability to playback spatial audio has been lagging compared to advancements in 360 video,” noted Poe. “InstaVR solved that by allowing VR Producers to upload spatial audio files once and deliver across all the popular VR viewing platforms.”

With popular 360 camera maker Ricoh announcing at NAB their new 4K cameras with four-channel audio recording, the value of spatial audio becomes even more pronounced in creating a truly immersive environment. InstaVR users can combine the 360 4K video and spatial audio from their Ricoh cameras to produce VR apps of extremely high quality, which can be experienced across the major VR headsets.

“We’re very proud that our clients can now incorporate spatial audio into their VR experiences,” said Daniel Haga, Founder and President of InstaVR. “Our goal has always been to empower clients to create the most immersive, engaging, and awe-inspiring virtual reality,” said Haga. “Supporting spatial audio gives our most savvy clients the opportunity to do just that.”

To learn more about how to incorporate spatial audio into your InstaVR created apps, visit https://www.instavr.co/articles/product/editor/authoring/media/spatial-audio

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About InstaVR, Inc.

Based in San Francisco, InstaVR is a virtual reality focused technology company, providing tools and services to enable professionals to author and publish interactive VR experiences. InstaVR is completely web-based and requires no specialized engineering knowledge. Since launching in early 2016, over 10,000 companies have created thousands of immersive 360-degree apps for iOS, Android, web, Gear VR, Google Cardboard and HTC Vive. For more information and to access the InstaVR platform, visit https://www.instavr.co.

For existing 360 videos, use Facebook to create the necessary audio files for spatial audio.

The new Ricoh Theta 4K camera announced at NAB in Las Vegas will capture spatial audio, enabling Ricoh + InstaVR users to create a more realistic immersive app on the InstaVR platform.