PerfectSurround has released an update of their Penteo 16 Pro upmixing and downmixing all-in-one plugin, focused on the rapidly expanding 360 audio markets, particularly for gaming and VR/AR/XR.
What is Penteo?
PerfectSurround Penteo range of upmixing plug-in opens up the Penteo upmixing technology to the full range of immersive formats up to 16 channels. This includes 5.1, 7.1, Dolby Atmos up to 9.1.6, Auro 3D up to 13.1, DTSX and up to 3rd order Ambisonics, phaseless downmixer and Binaural output from any supported audio format are included. What is more, it is both an upmix and a downmix plug-in in one interface and enables you to go from different channel counts and formats in the one plug-in.
Penteo’s phaseless process has been designed to generate the perfect upmix without any unwanted sonic artifacts which result in downmixes that always match the source.
Damian Kearns explored each of the three options - Penteo 16 Pro, Penteo 16 Pro+ and Penteo 360 in his article How To Upmix And Downmix With Confidence whilst Mike Thornton, who named Penteo 16 Pro+ his product of 2019, presented a detailed tour around the plugin and demonstrated what it can do in his article Penteo 16 Pro Upmixing And Downmixing Plugin.
Tom Lowe investigated Upmixing To Ambisonics - Nugen Halo Upmix And PerfectSurround Penteo 16 Pro in which he demonstrates how to upmix both stereo and surround examples into 3rd order Ambisonics using Penteo 16 Pro from PerfectSurround and Halo Upmix with the 3D Extension from Nugen Audio with ambience and music examples that you can both listen to and download to compare for yourself how these two upmixing plugins perform when delivering Ambisonic immersive audio files.
Here’s the full lowdown about PerfectSurround’s latest update from the press release…
“Penteo is the first upmixer to directly support Sony’s 3-level 360 Reality Audio formats” said Jeffrey Read, CEO of PerfectSurround Ltd. “Penteo is way more than just an upmixer, Penteo is now a universal format converter that supports a whopping 48 different audio input / output formats for a possible 2,256 channel-pair combinations in our flagship Penteo 16 Pro+.”
First to Upmix Sony 360 Reality Audio Formats
Penteo is the only upmixer to natively support 360RA for direct audio format-to-format conversions.
Penteo’s phaseless DSP has been extended to generate a new bottom layer so that all three levels – upper, ear and bottom levels each have their own faders, modes, specialized controls and 3D Visualizer display.
Because of Penteo’s phaseless process, all of Penteo’s 48 supported audio formats can be converted to 360RA and back, and every upmix will downmix perfectly, 100% ITU back to source.
Perfect Dolby Atmos – 360RA Conversion Large libraries of Dolby Atmos formats exist, so interoperability to / from 360RA formats is vital. But it’s difficult to for sound designers to convert two-level Dolby Atmos to / from 3-level Sony 360 Reality Audio formats.
Penteo has solved this complex and time-consuming process to convert Dolby Atmos formats to / from Sony 360RA formats. It is now a direct audio format-to-format conversion in Penteo 16 Pro+ that delivers as near identical sound-stage mapping as possible.
Five 360RA formats added to Penteo 16 Pro+ as input/output formats - 13.0 (5.0.5 +3B), 9.0.4 +2B, 7.0.4 +2B, 5.0.4 +2B, 5.0.2 +2B.
New Bottom Fader – Penteo extracts the signal components and then the new bottom fader gives precise control over how much signal is shared with the bottom channels.
New Bottom Modes and Shelf – Share, Push, and Slam modes, plus a new bottom shelf filter steer different signals to the bottom level for varied creative effects.
Binaural Output – Output 360RA formats to an immediate, high-quality Binaural.
3-Level Penteo Visualizer – Now displays 3 levels
Five new non-LFE Dolby Atmos formats
Penteo has also added 5 new Atmos formats as both input and output formats. These additions mean that Penteo now supports 19 different Dolby Atmos formats, more than any other upmixer: 9.0.4, 7.0.4, 5.0.5, 5.0.4, 5.0.2 added.
New Sweep Knob for 360 Audio Creative Effects
A popular user feature request has been for Penteo to add a fader to ‘sweep’ a signal from left to right and vice versa like an audio panner does. This is not advisable because Penteo is an upmixer, not a panner. Penteo needs a well-matched signal for a quality upmix to occur.
To solve this problem, Penteo has added a new Left / Right Sweep Knob located under the Center fader, which acts as a -100% Left / -100% Right balance to control left and right biased components.
The Sweep knob can be automated with the upper/bottom faders and the front/surround balance controls to ‘sweep’ the audio in 3-dimensions around the listener.
Sweeping will downgrade the downmix compatibility, so it is not advisable to Sweep if a perfect downmix is desired. To alert the user, Penteo’s Downmix Compatibility Monitor clearly displays the degradation in red. The percentage helps the sound designer to be aware of how severe the compatibility will be.
Penteo Supports 8 DAWs
Ableton Live, which is heavily used in live music events, is now a Penteo supported VST3 DAW. Penteo’s unique 3.1 / 3.1 ‘TRI’ format is optimised for live music. Penteo generates a discrete center channel, together with the rear surrounds, which is ideal for creating intense surround effects at live stage-based events.
All Penteo products support 64-bit AAX, VST3 and AU formats for Mac M1 and Windows 10. Specific DAWs supported: Pro Tools, Logic Pro (up to 7.1.4), Reaper, Pyramix, Nuendo, Cubase Pro, Da Vinci Resolve and Ableton Live.
Pricing & Availability
The updated plugins are available now with special pricing until 2nd December 2022…
Penteo 16Pro+ (Universal format converter with 48 audio formats + Binaural) is on sale for $599 (regular price $699).
Penteo 16 Pro (All surround, Atmos and Immersive formats with 38 audio formats) is now $449 (regular price $499).
Penteo 360 (5.1 upmixer + fast 360 Audio creation with 15 audio formats + Binaural) is now $249 (regular price $299).
Penteo 16 Pro customers can upgrade to Pro+ for $250, and any Penteo customers wishing to upgrade to Pro+ can do so for $400.