Certainly, the attribution of the invention of the microphone is not a simple task and depends very much on the definition used. From the Greek words micro (small) and phon (sound) there are several people who can be credited with the invention. From 1827 to the late nineteenth century Charles Wheatstone, Henry Hunnings, Johann Philipp Reis, Emile Berninder, Elisha Gray, Alexander Graham Bell, David Edward Hughes, Thomas Alva Edison … are all strong candidates to the merit and rivals in the technological property rights in those times, but surely the bases to reach the current microphones, as we have known them for the last 70 years, were defined by all of them. The development of the microphone was very important for the evolution of other inventions, like radio and television, and very useful in war times for transmitting and receiving messages. But perhaps most importantly, for all those music lovers the microphone was the key to the popularization of bands and musical groups. The uptake and subsequent playback of songs has allowed all societies to be accompanied by musical culture, attending to its great variety of styles.
Microphones are transducers devices that convert acoustic energy into electrical energy, and have done this differently throughout their history through the different types developed, like the dynamic, the condenser, electret, coal, crystal, ribbon … Big and very well-known brand names have been involved in this development, and are still working on it at the present time, doing research and proposing different ways to capture sound, having their name marked in this great story. RCA, Western Electric, AKG, Neumann, Sennheiser, ST & C, Shure, Electro Voice… are just a few brands that have made great contributions to the development of this invention and have produced groundbreaking, historic, classic and legendary products.
The correct choice of the right microphone for your needs is a very important task and its directivity must be kept in mind as a very important factor to give it the proper use. The directivity defines the sensitivity change in function of the angle of incidence of the sound waves responding to the emission frequencies of the sound sources.
Aratechlabs wants to make its contribution to this great history as the first company that has developed a directivity monitoring system, through Augmented Reality, with a precise, agile and visual system that no one has done so far. This aims to open a new phase in calculation tools for the field of music and audio through computer vision.
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