FACTORY SOUND GETS IMMERSIVE Experience Room

Melbourne’s Factory Sound have added yet another reason for gear heads to visit the destination store; a gleaming 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos room powered by Avid’s flagship mixing products. At a busy and bustling launch party in early August, Factory debuted the room with Avid’s Audio Applications Specialist Drew Parsons, who will be spending a fair amount of his work time at the facility.

The beautifully fitted out and acoustically treated demo room sounds fantastic, and is currently running Genelec 8341s and 8330 powered monitor speakers in full Atmos mode. An Avid S6 control surface for Pro Tools is at the central mix position, connected back to a rack that includes both Avid MTRX II and Avid Pro Tools | Carbon audio interfaces. It’s not just for the studio and post people though; an Avid VENUE | S6L live desk, engine, and stagebox occupy the other half of the room, with a pair of d&b audiotechnik E8s as near-field monitors.

“Factory Sound really wanted to bring back the customer experience to retail, and I was looking for a space to have an Atmos system and everything Avid on display,” explains Drew Parsons. “We’re seeing now it’s not just TV and film mixers that are using Dolby Atmos. Apple in particular have been pushing Dolby Atmos Music. A lot of composers and mix engineers are reaching out to us because major labels are requesting Atmos as well as stereo mixes. For example, I just did an EP for Universal in Atmos. It’s about getting on a playlist; I recently spoke to an engineer and producer in Sydney that told me Apple wanted to put his artist’s track on a playlist but wouldn’t do it until they got an Atmos mix. This room is now here for anyone who is thinking about getting into the immersive space.”

Over on the live side of the room, Drew is very happy for engineers about to tour to drop in and build shows. “Supporting live engineers is something we’ve been doing for a long time,” continues Drew. “They are very welcome to bring in their Pro Tools session and build their show files on the S6L.”

Artie Jones, Operations at Factory Sound, helped turn what was a storeroom into the Avid Demo Room in just over a month. “We gutted it right after our EOFY sale in June,” relates Artie. “It’s an exciting space, and we’re centrally located. TV channels 7, 9, and 10 are nearby, the post industry is all through South Melbourne and Port Melbourne, Austereo and Nova are around the corner; there are a lot of audio engineers nearby who are contemplating the jump into Atmos. It’s great having Drew on-site. Just at the launch party, we’ve met lots of people who know Drew and Avid but haven’t been in the shop before, and lots of our existing customers who are getting excited about the possibilities of Atmos. It’s a win-win.”

If you’d like to check out the Avid Demo room, Factory Sound is at 75-85 York St, South Melbourne. factorysound.com