Fooling People with Simulated Sounds

In a scene that contains sound and pictures, can you tell if they both come from the same source? Many movie sound effects originated as actual sounds (filmmakers still use one classic movie splash from a recording of real sounds made in the 1940s) or sounds that some human sound technician creates (think "A Prairie Home Companion"). This article examines work at MIT to get computers to listen to an actual sound, synthesize it, and adjust it to match particular visual cues. The simulated sounds fool many people. But much work remains. The system still can't mimic a fast drum roll or construct all sounds from a complicated environment.

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