Another Dolby contender enters the ring
Anybody even vaguely interested in audio has heard of Dolby Atmos before. Or, at the very least, you’ve seen the Atmos tag pop up before hitting play on Netflix. More specifically, Atmos is Dolby’s proprietary surround sound tech that’s been left unfettered to become the undisputed champ of the scene. Back in November, however, Samsung, in partnership with Google, announced its intent to dethrone Atmos with something it calls Immersive Audio Model and Formats (IAMF).
Details surrounding the Atmos competitor were scarce until recently when Samsung spoke up about its plans for IAMF at CES with Insight Media — confirming that it would be ready to roll out before the year was over. It also noted that it’d be using Google’s powers to get IAMF enrolled into YouTube’s content that will support the tech before crossing over into 2025.
The real question is whether Samsung and Google can stand up to an industry veteran like Dolby when it comes to audio. We reckon it can. The biggest factor that IAMF has going for it is that it doesn’t require any new hardware to reap the benefits. Instead, all it’ll need is a simple software update on a TV or surround system to get it going, though Samsung hasn’t yet mentioned which of its older TVs will get the update.
It helps that IAMF is open-source and royalty-free, which Samsung believes is the only way forward if it wants to overthrow Atmos’ stranglehold and become the new standard across the industry. It… has a point. Listen up, Dolby.
VR treadmills just got a whole lot more interesting, thanks Disney
There’s a whole lot of sitting on the couch where VR is concerned for technology that’s meant to convince the user they’re somewhere else. That’s fine by us — we don’t all have the tethered treadmills or massive rooms necessary to take advantage of virtual reality properly. It’s a major issue that needs fixing before VR can really spread its wings and enter the mainstream. And… Disney might have just done exactly that. Enter the HoloTile Floor — crafted by Lanny Smoot, one of Disney’s ‘Imagineers’.
Almost out of the blue, Disney dropped a demo of one of the most advanced omnidirectional treadmills ever built. That’s the HoloTile, which appears to make use of minute rolling balls underneath the flooring that can detect and match your feet’s movements and adjust accordingly — all without the need for a tether. That’s inventive enough on its own, but the fact the HoloTile can support multiple people at once, all moving independently, makes it that much cooler.
As for where Disney sees this tech heading, VR is at the forefront of their minds, and rightfully so. But it’s got visions of HoloTile Floors being adopted into the theatrical world of stage plays to help dancers pull off new moves without much effort. Unfortunately, it’ll be a while before any of that becomes a reality. Disney only mentions that the tech is a work-in-progress for the time being, meaning it won’t be turning up on any shelves (or floors) soon.
MrBeast on YouTube Prime Video
MrBeast — the YouTuber who pulled off a real-life Squid Games competition better than Netflix and arguably one of the most famous faces on planet Earth — is reportedly looking to step out of the YouTube bubble to pursue a deal that would see him enter the realm of streaming with Amazon’s Prime Video, according to Puck News, with Variety later confirming the story.
The deal hasn’t yet been inked and sits at around the $100-million mark according to Puck’s Matthew Belloni. It would reportedly see MrBeast’s team make use of Prime Video’s expansive budgets to concoct a higher-budget reality competition show of some form, though exact details of what that premise will be are still being kept in the dark.
Belloni also mentions that the deal might see the first episode premiere on YouTube in a bid to convince MrBeast’s 233-million subscribers to sign up for Prime Video to continue watching the series. At the time of writing, neither Prime Video nor MrBeats have commented on the situation, so it’s all worth taking with a grain of salt.
Nvidia wants to give your old games a makeover with, surprise surprise, AI
Still trying to get over the fact that your favourite childhood games don’t have ray-tracing? You can stop now. Nvidia’s gone and released a beta for Nvidia RTX Remix — a tool designed specifically for modders that’ll help give older games a makeover by adding ray-tracing and newer textures to the mix. And because it’s 2024, you’ve probably already got an idea of how it’ll manage to do it.
Despite this being in beta form, Nivida reckons it’s quite capable of remastering a game from start to finish. It’ll only work on DirectX 8 or 9 games, however, and is made up of two key ingredients. On one end, you’ve got the application handling the creation of new lighting scenarios for the game being ‘remastered’, while the other specialises in adding upscaled textures and assets into the mix.
The tool, surprisingly, is free. As in, you can go and download it right now and get to remastering those classics sitting in your Steam library. If you can’t be bothered to see which games can be run through RTX Remix, Nvidia’s done the dirty work for you.