dearVR MIX Turns Headphones Into Mix Room

Dear Reality (which is part of the Sennheiser group) has released dearVR MIX, claiming that it turns any professional studio headphones into “an ideal stereo mixing environment”, placing the user in the sweet spot of carefully designed mix rooms – all through spatial audio technology.

Using the dearVR MIX AAX/VST3/AU plugin and the built-in Spatial Headphone Compensation (SHC) feature, the manufacturer states that audio producers, artists and content creators can ensure that their stereo productions translate reliably to any sound system – regardless of production type or music genre.

According to Dear Reality, whether the user is in the studio or on the road, dearVR MIX lets them assess positions, stereo width, reverb, and low-end frequencies with total reliability.

“When developing dearVR MIX, it was all about creating ultimate virtual acoustic environments for headphone mixing,” says Christian Sander, CEO of Dear Reality.

“All the experience we have gained in the field of spatial audio comes together in one stellar plugin. dearVR MIX puts this technology in the hands of everyone.”

The plugin offers three reference mix rooms with four selectable mono and stereo loudspeaker positions. Each mix room can be adapted to the user’s taste by controlling the amount of diffusion and setting the perfect balance between overall colouration and localisation based on the patented Clarity algorithm from Sennheiser AMBEO.

dearVR MIX is optimised to allow users to easily and accurately monitor their production in six non-studio acoustic environments, such as a car or a club – all without leaving the workstation.

Together with dearVR MIX, Dear Reality is also introducing its SHC feature to all dearVR virtual monitoring plugins. The technology adapts the 44 most used professional studio headphones to the virtual mixing room, enabling a model-independent and stable simulation of a perfect acoustic environment.

“By carefully compensating for the sound characteristics of individual headphones, dearVR MIX ensures the best binaural playback experience with the highest degree of out-of-head localisation,” said Sander.

Each model has been carefully optimised by Dear Reality and expert mastering engineers to create a target frequency curve that matches the room virtualisation.

dearVR MIX is available for USD 99.00 (plus VAT where required), and until November 30, 2021, there is a special introductory price of USD 79.00 (plus VAT where required).

Founded in 2014 by Achim Fell and Sander, Dear Reality is located in Düsseldorf, Germany and has been part of the Sennheiser group since 2019.