The Verse from @Hookeaudio is coming! what do we know so far?

By DrewWeber, 3 October, 2015

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Apple Hardware and Compatible Accessories

The Verse, which is truly Groundbreaking technology from Hooke audio, is slated to ship winter of this year. Though most of the technical details may still be locked away inside the super-secret Hooke labs, what do we know for sure about the product?

First and foremost, we know the product is revolutionary for today’s mobile recording technology industry . Verse, is a pair of Wireless Bluetooth headphones that incorporate a pair of binaural microphones for recording what you hear spatially in 3D or binaural audio. A binaural recording played back over headphones can trick the brain into thinking you hear audio positioned around you instead of just at the left or right. It is a truly incredible experience that one must hear to believe. I find listening to recordings that the listener has him/herself recorded to be an even more amazing experience, because it takes you back, literally .

no wires, no hassle, it's Bluetooth.
Binaural recording has been around for years, hundreds of years in fact, but audio capture over Bluetooth is a brand new Enovation, one that the Hooke team has crafted themselves. While Audio playback that we currently know over Bluetooth is lossy and compressed, the Verse will stream audio in uncompressed 48KHZ back to it's app running on an iOS or Android Smartphone, that can be tucked away in a pocket or belt clip.

One device! listen and capture!
A little unknown factoid about me... When I leave the house, you may think I'm a dork... I may counteract this when asked, and tell you I'm a geek, and audiophile. I wear a fanny pack filled to the brim with wires, recorders, iOS interfaces, and microphones. Audio is a form of photography for me as a blind person, I love it, I live it! With the Hooke Verse coming this winter though, several things may be leaving my pack, (making me less of a dork? one could hope.)

It is possible, picture it... I am riding on the bus, cranking out some of my favorite tunes, quickly hit an app on my IPhone and be recording in a split second with no hassle or knowledge to anyone else around me. that is innovation, and that is yet another dream, that I've had for a long time! that is now real, (Holy crap we're in 2015?)
If the playback audio is as good as Hooke’s capture, wow! We are going to be in for a treat. It’s always thrilling to me, to listen to audio on the same speakers or headphones that the audio ingeneer used and think, this is exactly how they hear it. We can do that with Verse.

So now that we've discovered what the Verse is, let's do a little Google digging and dream about the what if's and when's.
When might the Verse ship? I found this tweet exchange on Twitter from August.
Twitter User: "how much it costs and from where can I get one for myself?"
Hookeaudio: "Right now it's available for $139 through our site. That will jump to $189 when we launch in a few months".

A few months? August September October? November? We very well could be seeing Verse ship outs very soon! In a Tweet from Hookeaudio on Thursday night, the text reads, "Every day is a big step forward. Get ready, Hooke Verse and #Mobile #3daudio is coming". There is a link, which points to an image, which I can't see, but, we know soon is in our Verse future!

The Hooke team is a team of several dedicated and very knowledgeable people that have a passion for a product and are making it happen. Of course a Kickstarter campaign helped them along the way, but think of all that has to be overcome when developing a totally new product! I've got a lot of respect for their work, and when you listen to recordings from the Verse, the work shows!
I've heard from the Hooke team that they are continuing to perfect the design to get the best out of Verse's audio capture and from what I continue to hear, I believe them. Noise floor has gotten significantly quieter, Freq response is eerily natural! (no pun intended).
This fact I can't be sure on, but compared to in-ear models that I use, it seems like the user waring the Verse, when he/she speaks it sounds much more natural vs muffled.

The verse, is versatile!
Here's what you can do, with Verse.
Listen to speech, (Voiceover iOS accessibility)
Listen to music,
hands free calling,
Binaural recording!

Just a little of the techy development that is going into both the Android and iOS Hooke apps
found at upwork.com
"
We are looking for engineers familiar with the following stack:

Objective C
Java
Json
Ruby
Ruby on Rails
Postgres
Amazon AWS
Heroku
YouTube API
Google Maps API
Diaspora

Firmware development a plus / Kalimba / DSP experience a plus plus

We have a tight schedule and a kick ass team in place. We need to get an Android MVP up and running quickly and go from there.

Enthusiasm and passion about music a plus.

You must like and use Github - active Github alias are a must.
"

From what we know so far, from the super-secret Hooke labs, how does the Hooke and companion App work?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0O8WkZ-HYQ
Will the apps be accessible for the blind?
We know so far that the iOS app will be. I have not asked or heard about Android accessibility.
I've heard, (iOS), when VO is enabled, get audio cues from Verse that battery is low, get vibration cues from Hooke app that Input audio is clipping.

What formats will the Hooke app allow for capture in?
Video to Youtube, Wav, and mp3,
from this article:
Why Are We Still Using Field Recorders? http://bit.ly/1iUs7hU

Today on the #3daudio #blog http://t.co/x0YiH4tA6h

also streaming audio/video (maybe?)

The verse and other apps:
Up to now, I haven't mentioned that to use Verse, it seems you must use the Hooke app on your smartphone. Talks of a Bluetooth receiver for Hooke's capture into nonBluetooth equip devices has been talked about, but I'm not getting the feeling it's in final development as of this time. I have asked about a Hooke capture API for iOS for developers, and Hooke has come back and told me it will be in place (at time of launch), so start putting a bug into the ears of your favorite apps developers!

Are you hooked yet?
:)
Visit www.hookeaudio.com for preorders and all official Verse Info!

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Comments

By KE7ZUM on Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - 15:47

I can't wait. I preordered mine in June of this year and I look forward to using this piece of technology. Imagine, my phone in my purse and my hooke audio in my ear Yeah!

By Falco on Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - 15:47

Hi,

I also pre-orderd mine a few months ago....

The best thing is it will be possible to keep using voice-over While recording....

By david s on Wednesday, October 7, 2015 - 15:47

Hello,

I’m curious. What’s the difference between this and a pair of made for iPhone hearing aids.. Besides the price.

Thanks,

Thanks for reading and for the question. A hearing aid though amplifying volume of existing audio, will not allow you to capture that audio and play it back later. As far as the Verse being used to assist one with hearing loss, though the Verse does act as a monitor, assisting with hearing loss may be a possibility, this is not the products objective goal.