THE #1 AV NEWS PUBLICATION. PERIOD.

Screen Excellence to Unveil New Sonic Concept for Audio Placement

At the ISE 2019, Audio Excellence, the sound system division of UK-based film screen brand Screen Excellence, will unveil a new sonic concept for large TVs and solid screens that creates the illusion that the sound is emanating directly from the center of the hard surfaced screen where in actuality the speakers are placed elsewhere in the room. The solution is so unusual that the company has named it “UFO” (for Unidentified Flying Object) as a tribute to the local RAF Bentwaters, England extraterrestrial incident of 1980.

Audio Excellence’s UFO is in keeping with the professional cinema practice of placing the center, left and right channel speakers on the same horizontal plane and behind the acoustically transparent (A.T.) film screen. This allows dialogue and action be experienced as intended by the movie makers, further contributing to “the suspension of disbelief.”

Recognized as an originator of today’s modern A.T. film screen, Screen Excellence CEO Patrice Congard has also designed and developed audio products that have set industry benchmarks. Embodying his expertise and philosophy of audio technology, including his patented approach to layout logic and signal routing known as “The Congard Code,” in 2016 he brought to market the Audio Excellence home cinema sound systems. These consist of compact yet high-sensitivity, high-SPL on/in-wall loudspeakers, amplifiers and DSP controllers. For the modest to most complex surround sound applications — and the ultimate complement to the A.T. screen — the systems maximize the initial “Wavefront” of sound, delivering more realistic bass with every seat in the room being the sweet spot. The pinnacle of sound and image coherency, the systems have received critical acclaim by CEDIA channel press.

Earlier in his career, working under Dr. Christian Heil at L-Acoustics, Congard played a major role in the development, design and commercial launch of the legendary V-Dosc and ARCS systems which transformed the landscape of loudspeaker design for live sound reinforcement.

“In 1996 I left the sound reinforcement industry to focus on what I perceived as the main issue facing home cinema installations: the conventional solid projection screen was a physical barrier to the proper appreciation of a movie’s sound track,” says Congard. “This has been solved with a new breed of woven acoustically transparent projection screens.”

While Congard prefers to wait for the ISE event to completely reveal the solution to this problem (stand 1-Q110), he said that UFO is compatible with “classic speakers” and that the technology is scalable, so licensees can achieve price points in line with the segment of the market they serve.

Here are more details.

Top