ADM-OSC

An industry initiative to standardization of Object Based Audio (OBA) positioning data in live production ecosystems, by implementing the Audio Definition Model (ADM) over Open Sound Control (OSC).

Project Originators

L-Acoustics, FLUX::SE, Radio-France

Project Contributors

d&b Audiotechnik, DiGiCo, Lawo, Magix, Merging Technologies, Meyer Sound, Steinberg.

Context

Immersive audio is gaining ground in different industries, from music streaming to gaming, from live sound to broadcast. ADM or Audio Definition Model, is becoming a popular standard metadata model in some of these industries, with serialADM used in broadcast or ADM xml files used in the studio.

Motivation and goals

• To facilitate the sharing of audio objects metadata between a live ecosystem and a broadcast or studio ecosystem.
• To define a basic layer of interoperability between Object Editors and Object renderers while not aiming at replacing more complete manufacturer specific protocols or grammars.
• To define a direct translation of the most relevant ADM Object Properties onto a communication protocol widely used in the live industry, OSC.
• Keeping the grammar scope aligned with the ADM properties.
• Share this proposal with the EBU so they can become a relay, publish and support this initiative.
• Extend this small grammar to more ADM properties (beds, etc.) in the future.

Approach

Bijective mapping of the Object subset of ADM avec a standard OSC grammar.

Why OSC ?

• Lightweight network protocol
• Easy to implement
• Human readable
• Supports wildcards and bundles
• Specification: Open Sound Control website
• Available in a plethora of professional audio hardware and software devices

General principles

• Sender
  • Object Editor sending positioning data to one or more receivers.
  • Position data is always normalized
• Receiver
  • Handles the (optional) local scaling of normalized data: x, y, z, distance
  • The receiver can be a DAW, an ADM renderer, an object editor, a bridge (ADM-OSC <-> sADM)

Current status

Initiative presented to the EBU, and currently being implemented by some Broadcast companies as well. Some proofs of concept have been implemented by FLUX:: SE in the SPAT Revolution software, in L-Acoustics L-ISA Controller, in Ovation from Merging Technologies and with Nuendo from Steinberg OSC Live test tool (talker and listener OSC Live test tool) is now available

Current Specification

see repository

Currently supported in:

SPAT Revolution (FLUX::SE), L-ISA Controller (L-Acoustics), Ovation (Merging Technologies), Nuendo (Steinberg).