- ‘Stop aiming at my face when I’m mad’: Jon Rahm takes out frustrations on camera and microphone as PGA Championship struggles continue CNN
- PGA Championship: Jon Rahm rallies to make the cut at Oak Hill, but it may be too late for a real run Yahoo Sports
- Jon Rahm hits on-course mics, tells camera operator ‘Stop aiming at my face when I’m mad.’ Awful Announcing
- Jon Rahm among big names who rallied to make cut at Oak Hill – PGA TOUR PGA TOUR
- Showers produce major drenching at rain-soaked PGA Yahoo Sports
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: microphone
iPhone 14 Pro’s Large Pill-Shaped Cutout Will Display Camera and Microphone Privacy Indicators
The large pill-shaped combination cutout that’s planned for the iPhone 14 Pro models will display privacy indicators for the microphone and the camera, according to a source that spoke to 9to5Mac.
Image via 9to5Mac
Apple is planning to replace the notch on the iPhone 14 Pro models with two separate pill-shaped and hole-punch cutouts that will house the TrueDepth camera system hardware for Face ID, but as we learned today, the cutouts will be combined together using software, appearing as a single long, pill-shaped cutout when the iPhone is in use.
The space between the two cutouts will apparently be used to show the orange and green dots that indicate when the camera or the microphone has been activated by an app. At the current time, these indicators are shown to the right of the notch when the hardware is actively engaged, but putting them front and center on the iPhone’s display will make it more apparent when the camera and the microphone are in use.
Having the green dot front and center when the camera is active will make the experience of using an iPhone similar to using a Mac. On a Mac, when the webcam is in use, there is a green indicator light that cannot be disabled, with the light located right next to the camera.
Apple will apparently let users tap on the green and orange dots to receive more information about what apps are using the iPhone’s hardware. Right now, that data is provided in Control Center, with Apple listing apps that have recently used the camera, microphone, and location.
9to5Mac claims that Apple will also redesign the Camera app, moving most of the controls to the top of the display to provide users with a larger view of the camera preview, but this change is “still not entirely locked in.”
When the privacy indicators are not engaged, the space between the two cutouts on the iPhone 14 Pro models will be blacked out so that it appears as a single cutout. iPhone 14 models will use a standard notch and will therefore likely continue to feature the same hardware indicators that are available on the iPhone 13 models.
The Speed of Sound on Mars Is Kinda Funky, New Evidence Suggests
Using a microphone, a laser, and some crafty mathematics, a team of scientists has measured the speed of sound on Mars, in what is a scientific first and another cool finding made possible by NASA’s Perseverance rover.
There’s lots to love about the Perseverance mission, but one of my favorite aspects of the rover is that it’s capable of recording audio. Early last year, and for the first time ever, we actually got to hear sounds on Mars, both natural and synthetic. Using its SuperCam microphone, the rover recorded blowing Martian winds, clicks from its rock-scanning laser, and crunching sounds made by its rolling wheels.
That Perseverance’s microphone would detect these sounds wasn’t a certainty, given the achingly thin atmosphere on the Red Planet. Sound needs a medium to propagate, and Mars, with a paltry atmospheric pressure of 0.095 pounds per square inch (psi) at ground level, doesn’t offer much to work with. By comparison, Earth’s sea level atmospheric pressure is around 14.7 psi.
But there they were—discernible noises picked up by Percy’s microphone in Jezero crater. With sounds clearly audible on Mars, Baptiste Chide from Los Alamos National Lab in Los Angeles and colleagues were able to measure the speed of sound on Mars. The scientists recently presented their findings at the 53rd Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, held from March 7-11 in Texas.
The team leveraged Perseverance’s SuperCam experiment, which zaps rocks with lasers to study Martian geology and sits at the head of the rover’s mast some 6.9 feet (2.1 meters) above the Martian surface. The team took measurements from 150 laser shots taken at five distinct locations, while also tracking local weather conditions.
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By measuring the time it took the staccato-like clicking sounds to reach the SuperCam microphone, they were able to establish the speed of sound on Mars, to a precision of plus-minus 0.51%. They found that sound on Mars travels at 787 feet per second (240 meters per second), which is significantly slower than the sound of speed on Earth at 1,115 feet per second (340 m/s).
And in an observation that matched prior predictions, the speed of sounds below 240 hertz fell to 754 feet per second (230 m/s). That doesn’t happen on Earth, as sounds within the audible bandwidth (20 Hz to 20 kHz) travel at a constant speed. The “Mars idiosyncrasy,” as the scientists call it, has to do with the “unique properties of the carbon dioxide molecules at low pressure,” which makes the Martian atmosphere the only one in the solar system to experience “a change in speed of sound right in the middle of the audible bandwidth,” as the scientists wrote. The reason for this is that sounds above 240 Hz don’t have time to relax their energy, according to the scientists.
The scientists go on to say that this acoustic effect “may induce a unique listening experience on Mars with an early arrival of high-pitched sounds compared to bass.”
Unique is right! Lots of acoustic information exists below 240 Hz, including the low end of music and the lowermost registers of the human voice (typically for males). Music on Mars would sound completely messed up (particularly with increased distance), with the middle and high frequencies reaching the listener slightly before the low frequency sounds, such as the lower registers of the bass guitar and kick drum. Add another effect of carbon dioxide, the attenuating, or dampening, of higher frequencies, and the acoustic experience gets even weirder.
As a neat aside, the technique used to measure the speed of sound can also be used to measure the local temperature. So in addition to Percy’s Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA) instrument, the team has a new thermometer at its disposal. Looking ahead, Chide and his colleagues will run more tests to measure the speed of sound at different times of the day and during different Martian seasons.
The Speed of Sound on Mars Is Strangely Different, Scientists Reveal
Scientists have confirmed the speed of sound on Mars, using equipment on the Perseverance rover to study the red planet’s atmosphere, which is very different to Earth’s.
What they discovered could have some strange consequences for communication between future Martians.
The findings suggest that trying to talk in Mars’ atmosphere might produce a weird effect, since higher-pitched sound seems to travel faster than bass notes. Not that we’d try, since Mars’ atmosphere is unbreathable, but it’s certainly fun to think about!
From a science perspective, the findings, announced at the 53rd Lunar and Planetary Science Conference by planetary scientist Baptiste Chide of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, reveal high temperature fluctuations at the surface of Mars that warrant further investigation.
The speed of sound is not a universal constant. It can change, depending on the density and temperature of the medium through which it travels; the denser the medium, the faster it goes.
That’s why sound travels about 343 meters (1,125 feet) per second in our atmosphere at 20 degrees Celsius, but also at 1,480 meters per second in water, and at 5,100 meters per second in steel.
Mars’ atmosphere is a lot more tenuous than Earth’s, around 0.020 kg/m3, compared to about 1.2 kg/m3 for Earth. That alone means that sound would propagate differently on the red planet.
But the layer of the atmosphere just above the surface, known as the Planetary Boundary Layer, has added complications: During the day, the warming of the surface generates convective updrafts that create strong turbulence.
Conventional instruments for testing surface thermal gradients are highly accurate, but can suffer from various interference effects. Fortunately, Perseverance has something unique: microphones that can allow us to hear the sounds of Mars, and a laser that can trigger a perfectly timed noise.
The SuperCam microphone was included to record acoustic pressure fluctuations from the rover’s laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument as it ablates rock and soil samples at the Martian surface.
NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)
This came with an excellent benefit, as it turns out. Chide and his team measured the time between the laser firing and the sound reaching the SuperCam microphone at 2.1 meters altitude, to measure the speed of sound at the surface.
“The speed of sound retrieved by this technique is computed over the entire acoustic propagation path, which goes from the ground to the height of the microphone,” the researchers write in their conference paper.
“Therefore, at any given wavelength it is convoluted by the variations of temperature and wind speed and direction along this path.”
The results back up predictions made using what we know of the Martian atmosphere, confirming that sounds propagate through the atmosphere near the surface at roughly 240 meters per second.
However, the quirk of Mars’ shifting soundscape is something completely out of the blue, with conditions on Mars leading to a quirk not seen anywhere else.
“Due to the unique properties of the carbon dioxide molecules at low pressure, Mars is the only terrestrial-planet atmosphere in the Solar System experiencing a change in speed of sound right in the middle of the audible bandwidth (20 Hertz to 20,000 Hertz),” the researchers write.
At frequencies above 240 Hertz, the collision-activated vibrational modes of carbon dioxide molecules do not have enough time to relax, or return to their original state. The result of this is that sound travels more than 10 meters per second faster at higher frequencies than it does at low ones.
This could lead to what the researchers call a “unique listening experience” on Mars, with higher-pitched sounds arriving sooner to the listener than lower ones.
Given that any human astronauts traveling to Mars anytime soon will need to be wearing pressurized spacesuits with comms equipment, or living in pressurized habitat modules, this is unlikely to pose an immediate problem – but it could be a fun concept for science-fiction writers to tinker with.
Because the speed of sound changes due to temperature fluctuations, the team was also able to use the microphone to measure large and rapid temperature changes on the Martian surface that other sensors had not been able to detect. This data can help fill in some of the blanks on Mars’ rapidly changing planetary boundary layer.
The team plans to continue using SuperCam microphone data to observe how things like daily and seasonal variations might affect the speed of sound on Mars. They also plan to compare acoustic temperature readings to readings from other instruments to try to figure out the large fluctuations.
You can read the conference paper on the conference website.
Zoom users find glitch with Apple new operating system the program keeps the microphone recording
The coronavirus pandemic forced offices to close and meetings to move online that has created a new phenomenon known as ‘Zoom fatigue’.
Named after the popular video chat platform, the term is used to describe the exhaustion that comes with participating in video conferences, whether it be on Zoom, Google Meet or another application.
A researcher from Stanford University has investigated this idea to determine reasons that could cause people to become exhausted while they are simply sitting in front of a computer.
Professor Jeremy Bailenson determined excessive amounts of eye contact, a drop in mobility, video chats increase cognitive load and constantly seeing yourself lead to ‘Zoom fatigue’.
However, the expert has also provided solutions for each to help employees revive themselves while spending hours video chatting at least five days a week.
A researcher from Stanford University recently investigate this idea to determine reasons that could cause people to become exhausted while they are simply sitting in front of a computer
Bailenson stressed that his goal is not to vilify any particular videoconferencing platform – he appreciates and uses tools like Zoom regularly.
But he wants to highlight how current implementations of videoconferencing technologies are exhausting and to suggest interface changes, many of which are simple to implement.
‘Videoconferencing is a good thing for remote communication, but just think about the medium – just because you can use video doesn’t mean you have to,’ Bailenson said.
The first reason was identified to be ‘excessive amounts of close-up eye contact is highly intense’.
Video conferencing requires users to keep their eyes glued to screens for hours each day, which can be tiring.
During in-person meetings, the audience typically looks only at the individual speaking, but when events are held online we tend to look at everyone in the chat room and it seems as if everyone is staring at you.
‘Social anxiety of public speaking is one of the biggest phobias that exists in our population,’ Bailenson said.
‘When you’re standing up there and everybody’s staring at you, that’s a stressful experience.’
He continues to explain that when someone’s face gets close to ours in real life, our brains process the action as an intense situation that leads to either mating or conflict.
‘What’s happening, in effect, when you’re using Zoom for many, many hours is you’re in this hyper-aroused state,’ Bailenson said.
To combat intense, up-close eye contact he suggests reducing the size of the video chat window.
The second cause for Zoom fatigue is seeing yourself on the screen.
‘In the real world, if somebody was following you around with a mirror constantly – so that while you were talking to people, making decisions, giving feedback, getting feedback – you were seeing yourself in a mirror, that would just be crazy. No one would ever consider that,’ Bailenson added.
Bailenson cited studies showing that when you see a reflection of yourself, you are more critical of yourself.
Many of us are now seeing ourselves on video chats for many hours every day.
‘It’s taxing on us. It’s stressful. And there’s lots of research showing that there are negative emotional consequences to seeing yourself in a mirror,’ he said.
To avoid staring at yourself, users can activate the ‘hide self-view’ button by right clicking on their own photo – everyone else can see you, but you cannot.
Since employees no longer have to walk to a conference room during meetings, many have experienced a decrease in mobility.
Bailenson has identified this as a trigger for Zoom fatigue and recommends setting up the camera farther away from the screen to allow yourself room to pace or walk around as if you would in a real world event.
And the final reason is ‘cognitive load is much higher in video chats’.
Bailenson notes that in regular face-to-face interaction, nonverbal communication is quite natural and each of us naturally makes and interprets gestures and nonverbal cues subconsciously. But in video chats, we have to work harder to send and receive signals.
However, he suggests have an ‘audio only’ break by turning off the camera so you do not have to decipher nonverbal activity ‘so that for a few minutes you are not smothered with gestures that are perceptually realistic but socially meaningless.’