Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (NYSE:DLB) today announced that it is working with Jaunt to enable the next generation of immersive storytelling, known as cinematic virtual reality.
Jaunt will release three virtual reality applications—Live and Let Die by Sir Paul McCartney, as well as clips from monster film Kaiju Fury! and horror thriller Black Mass—that will be available in Dolby Atmos® via the Google Play™ Store in the coming weeks. The Dolby Atmos experience will be available via the Jaunt app on select mobile devices. Demos of these clips will be available at Dolby’s hospitality suite at Mobile World Congress 2015.
Immersive audio is critical to storytelling in virtual reality (VR). It builds a rich layer of information that enhances the sensation of presence and directs people where to look at critical moments in the virtual environment. Dolby Atmos allows content creators to guide viewers through an optimal VR experience with lifelike moving audio that informs and complements the 360-degree visual experience. Viewers of Jaunt’s 360, 3D content can now experience an unparalleled level of realism that offers the greatest sense of “being there.”
Jaunt, a leader in creating and delivering the world’s most immersive VR content, is the first to deliver the Dolby Atmos experience to VR consumers. Content creators will now be able to produce Dolby Atmos content quickly and easily by leveraging the same Dolby® mixing tools and infrastructure used to mix nine of the top 10 grossing films in 2014.
“Dolby Atmos is essential for delivering a realistic and immersive virtual reality experience that puts audiences in the heart of the story,” said John Couling, Senior Vice President, E-Media Business Group, Dolby Laboratories. “Dolby’s passion for storytelling, coupled with great content and Jaunt’s VR capabilities, is a natural fit that will bring consumers an incredible entertainment experience.”
“Dolby has pioneered superb audio experiences in the cinema, home, and mobile devices,” said Jens Christensen, CEO and Founder, Jaunt. “It was a natural fit to incorporate Dolby Atmos into Jaunt’s technology to help consumers experience the best VR has to offer.”
Live and Let Die, from Sir Paul McCartney’s 2014 concert at San Francisco’s historic Candlestick Park, was mixed in Dolby Atmos by Grammy®award-winning producer Giles Martin at the legendary Abbey Road studios in London.
“By using Dolby Atmos to place and move sounds where they need to be, Jaunt and Dolby’s technologies recreate the concert experience and make viewers feel as if they were on stage during the performance,” said Giles Martin, rerecording mixer for the Dolby Atmos mix.
The McCartney concert performance and both films were recorded using Jaunt’s 360-degree stereoscopic 3D cameras and soundfield microphones. The audio was then mixed and encoded using Dolby Atmos tools. Jaunt’s latest applications can now decode and render the full end-to-end Dolby Atmos experience.
