Brahma Microphones

A message from Umashankar

I will be in Germany from Sept 1 to Oct 15.
Brahma microphones will continue to take orders and answer questions.
Manufacturing will also continue, as well as testing.
But we will not be shipping till the third week of October because I need to be there for Calibration measurements and processing and final approval.

An affordable and versatile ambisonics solution

Brahma microphones offers a fully integrated ambisonic microphone and recording system  with our  Brahma-in-Zoom design. We also have  low cost  free standing ambisonic microphones, both first order and second order designs.

Each Brahma microphone comes with a booklet to takes you step by step into making and reproducing high quality ambisonic recordings.  Our customers are using Brahma microphones for everything from Virtual Reality to music production and film soundtracks. These microphones are as versatile as your imagination.

Update

A new version of Brahmavolver, the standalone program for A-format to B-format first developed nine years ago, is now available. Support for 24 bit files, FUMA and AmbiX formats, there are many updates. the link is here https://Brahmavolver 2018 for mac and windows

Free voucher for VVencode (75 USD value) with all new orders

All our first order microphones come with a voucher for VV encode, a very powerful VST program for converting A format recordings done with Brahma microphones. It is part of a family of programs for converting to B format and processing the resulting B format signals. There will be soon an exclusive VVencode for Brahma-8 second order microphones. Visit the site  http://www.vvaudio.com/

Current Prices

 

Designed by Umashankar Manthravadi. Handcrafted in Bangalore

We operate on a small scale that allows us to closely monitor quality and keep overheads down to offer you high quality, excellent sounding microphones at a competitive price. Each microphone is built with carefully matched sets of capsules, subjected to several quality tests and precisely calibrated with a set of FilterMatrix files that are unique to each microphone.

Warranties, repairs

No questions asked refund, minus shipping costs, for two months after purchase. Just send the microphone back and we will refund the purchase price.

Free repairs for one year, shipping one way borne by purchaser

Repairs at cost, shipping both ways borne by purchaser after one year.

Free recalibration of microphone after two years (recommended). Buyer to pay shipping both ways.

Calibration of 3rd party microphones (including DIY) for 100 dollars a microphone. Buyer to pay shipping both ways.

I have been building microphones, at first for my own use as a location sound recordist, for more than 30 years now.  Electronics has been a hobby since childhood and when I  started out as a recordist I knew I could build better microphones than I could afford to buy.

I built my first ambisonic microphone about ten years ago. But the real breakthrough came when I  mounted them on a stem on top of the Zoom H2 recorder.

Small, readily available 4 channel recorders and high quality 3d printing enabled me  to make the capsule arrays both more accurate and more rugged and make the whole set up extrememly light-weight and portable. This has made ambisonic recording more accessible and versatile than it was in the past.

After a two year partnership with Embrace Video during which we made and sold some 200 microphones, both Brahma-in-Zoom and standalone, I have now moved to Bangalore, and have  set up  small scale production. The aim is to keep the scale small, so every microphone is hand assembled and tested at every step. Paradoxically, it also helps to keep the costs low. There are very few overheads compared to establishing and running a factory, even a very small one. If demand forces me to expand, I intend doing it in a way I can continue to listen to every microphone that is made.

There are lots of ways you can use your Brahma!  I started with acoustic measurements of ancient archaeological spaces. The measurements I produce can generate detailed acoustic properties of the space. These impulse responses can also be used to recreate the acoustics of the space in your own recordings too.

You can see the work of an important research group, who use an early version of  Brahma microphone in their work. archeoacustica

Soundtracks for virtual reality and augmented reality

Ambisonic microphones were a niche product till about three years ago. But they have become the go to microphones for AR/VR/MR. I get enquiries for these microphones regularly and have sold several to clients in this field, such as Oculus Rift.

Field recording

As well as professional field recordings for creative applications in film and VR, several ethnomusicology scholars have used Brahma-in-Zoom for their audio documentation, finding the ability to record unobtrusively and zoom into  sounds of interest in post production very useful.

Music Recording

I have used ambisonic microphones for music recordings ever since I started making them – about ten years ago. From Manganiar folk musicians in Rajasthan, outdoor outside the Jodhpur Fort, to Sarod and Tabla,  performed in a friend’s living room, to a jazz concert in Delhi, and many recordings of traditional music in Kishangarh, Rajasthan. Brahma-in-Zoom is a versatile way to make unobtrusive recordings with a high fidelity of spacial reproduction. Sarod and Tabla – Brahma-in-Zoom

Many of the requests we have received are for samples of nature recordings. We will try and meet these requests. First we start with a recording of frogs done in south India by Shreyasi Kar, using Brahma-in-Zoom.
Listen to the frogs here  (B-format recording converted to ORTF-ish stereo using VVdecode from VVaudio.) Or  distant calls of sarus – Bharatpur forest

“I have a preproduction version and when used with the proprietary filter set, it sounds fantastic: beautifully resolved and detailed and also very musical. It was a significant part of the sound I captured with Mitchell Stein and Todd Cochran’s recording of Maurice Ravel’s “Blues”.”
Blues
Michael Aarvold
Recording Engineer/Scoring Mixer

Get in touch for orders and enquiries. Whether you have already chosen the Brahma ambisonic microphone you want, or you have questions this website hasn’t answered; we’d love to hear from you.