AES Standards News Blog

Marisa Dery has taken over as chair of SC-03-12 and Thomas Lago has agreed to serve as vice-chair.  The group is working on project AES-X253 “Speech Collection Guideline for Speaker Recognition: Audio Collection at a Temporary Location”.  The group is reviewing a draft document and will be making revisions to incorporate feedback they receive.

Join SC-03-12 here

The spring meetings of the AES Standards Working Groups have been scheduled for May, prior to the AES Spring convention.  Since the convention will be held online the standards meetings will also be virtual.  Unlike prior conventions, the meetings have been scheduled for a total of 8 days (12 - 14 May and 17 - 21 May) so that all meetings can take place between 15:00 GMT and 17:30 GMT.  This time window provides the most convenient access for AES members across the widest possible span of time zones.  Each day has only two scheduled meetings.  One of the meeting times will be used for the May Standards Webinar on the work of SC-02-12-M.  The last day, Friday 21 May, will be the plenary session where individual working groups report their progress in summary form.

All standards meetings will be held using Zoom and are open to all interested parties.  Membership in AESSC working groups is open to all individuals.  AES membership is not required.

The meeting schedule and agendas are posted here

The first AES Standards Webinar, presented by SC-04-03-A Task Group co-chairs Merlijn Van Veen and Roger Schwenke on Loudspeaker maximum SPL measurement garnered over 250 attendees.  A recording of the webinar is available for viewing, though registration is required.  See the link  

These webinars will not assume a high level of familiarity with the technical topic being presented and so will be suitable for a wide audience.  Whether you work in the field and want to understand the emerging standard, you want to keep abreast of cutting edge developments in the audio industry or are merely curious about new things, this series should not be missed. 

The second in the series will be at 16:00 GMT on May 17th when Nicolas Sturmel will present the work of SC-02-12-M which is developing a standard for operating AES67 networked audio over wide area networks.

The third in the series will feature Bill Whitlock discussing issues in the analog interface work being done by SC-05-05.  The fourth webinar will be hosted by Anthony Kuzub, chair of SC-05-02, who will present its work on sending analog and AES-3 audio over quad twisted pair cabling.

A recording of the loudspeaker measurement webinar is available for viewing here

The first presentaton in the AES Standards webinar series will take place on March 29 at 12:00 noon, ET, and will feature Merlijn Van Veen and Roger Schwenke, co-chairs of the SC-04-03-A Task Group, discussing measurement of loudspeaker maximum SPL using random noise that simulates music. 

Van Veen and Schwenke will discuss the work of the SC-04-03-A Task Group developing a procedure for loudspeaker test and measurement using a test signal called M‑Noise. It is unique in that its crest factor as a function of frequency mimics that of real music, better simulating what transducers encounter in use than previous methods using pink noise. They will briefly explore the background and impetus for this project and the challenges it may solve. The standard’s procedure will be explained and demonstrated using readily available equipment. Included will be a discussion of challenges that arose during the standard development, but also how it inspired different applications within other standard bodies. The presentation will review the timeline for remaining work and describe how you can get involved.

AES members may register for the Zoom webinar to enjoy live interaction with the presenters, while non-members may watch a live stream of the event on the AES YouTube channel: youtube.com/user/AESorg

Register for the webinar at the link below.

Register for the event here

The AES Standards Committee is launching a webinar series to highlight the various standards under development.  Each webinar will focus on the efforts of an individual Working Group or Task Group.  The presentations will cover the current activity of the group, the origins of the project, the current state of development and the expectations for the completed document.  When possible, presentations will include demonstrations of the technology involved.

Remaining reports of the October AES Standards Working Group meetings are now online.  

SC-02-08 on Audio File Transfer and Exchange
SC-03-06 on Digital Library and Archive Systems
SC-04-03 on Loudspeaker Modeling and Measurement
SC-04-09 on Assessment of Acoustic Annoyance
SC-05-05 on Grounding and EMC practices
SC-07-01 on Audio Metadata

View the reports here

AES69-2020, "AES standard for file exchange – Spatial acoustic data file format", a revised version of AES69-2015 has been published. 

More Information

This standard provides a convention for expressing edit data in text form in a manner that enables simple and accurate computer parsing while retaining human readability. It also describes a method for expressing time-code information in character notation. It supports common professional audio sampling frequencies, video frame rates, and film framing. This document addresses the core need of the AES31 series of standards in providing a simple but extensible system for passing audio material between systems. 

The SMPTE Universal Label identified in Annex F.2 was provided by SMPTE as a Leaf in the metadata dictionary for 'Audio edit decision list (ADL) defined in AES31-3'.  Also defined is a Node in the metadata dictionary for 'File exchange metadata defined in AES standards'. This means that further file-exchange labels can be generated more easily in the future.

Download a copy here

The question of sample-clock quality is a perennial one for digital audio equipment designers, yet most chip makers provide very little information about the jitter performance of their products. Consequently, equipment designers are sometimes caught out by jitter issues. The increasing use of packet-based communications and class-D amplification is throwing these matters into sharper relief. This information document reviews various ways of characterizing and quantifying jitter, and refines several of them for audio purposes. It also attempts to present a common, unambiguous terminology. Its focus includes wideband jitter, baseband jitter, jitter spectra, period jitter, long-term jitter and jitter signatures. Comments are made on jitter transfer through phase-locked loops and on the jitter susceptibility of audio converters.

This revision removes culturally insensitive terms from the text and corrects minor editorial issues.  It is available now in the Standards Store.

Download a copy here

AES17 defines a digital Full Scale and 0 dB FS as the level of a sinewave whose peaks reach the largest positive digital code.  Some incorrectly display full scale sinewaves as -3 dB FS.  The AES17-2020 revision is an effort to eliminate this confusion.

Originally released in 1991, AES17 introduced and defined the measurement of 0 dB FS.  This definition has remained unchanged through revisions of the standard in 1996, 1998 and 2015.  The 2015 revision added notes to clarify the proper calibration of dB FS.  The 2020 revision further expands on these notes.

The 2020 revision will be available for download on 2020/12/11

More Information and to download a copy