"what I was hearing was better than what my ears could hear"!!!

mr Bloom and the Rode marketing department have done themselves proud.

even if you had 16 mics with very narrow pickup patterns played back across 16 similarly places speakers the phasing problems could/would be horrendous.

a Decca Tree, a double MS setup or a single Soundfield mic do it far more elegantly.

funny though!

I get the issue about cloth noise, etc... that's why I suggested a spherical arrangement. In such an arrangement you could mitigate many of those types of issues with signal processing. As for the noise protectors - one big dead cat would do the job.

The advantage I see to this kind of thing (or, maybe later models) is that you could put the microphone on a pole, just above the frame, and be able to not worry about where you point it too much. Plus, you could get ambient sound and noise cancelling - all in one device. Also, you could decide directional characteristics in post.

Admittedly, I have no idea whether they support any such features or not. Nevertheless - I see the value in embarking on such designs - as bizarre as they might look.

When it's loud around, normally the mics must be positioned very close to each of the sound sources (objects of the recording). When it's silent and gain must be high, it gets difficult to avoid secondary noises (cloth etc)- so the positioning it's also difficult. If it is outside, one will need here 32 wind noise protectors.

Speaking from the practical side, I really fail to see the point for inventioning this device.

I think it's a very interesting idea from a technical standpoint even though it looks strange. Microphone elements are fairly cheap - so why not use a bunch of them?

The logical extension of this design would be to have a baseball sized microphone with large and small electret elements arranged in a spherical configuration. With suitable signal processing you could have a noise cancelling microphone capable of any number of patterns as well as ambient surround capabilities - all virtual and even simultaneously available - you would never have to "point" the microphone, just configure it! You could even do it in post - and that's a very interesting possibility.

I'm not sure I get the iPhone part, though - and the separate capsules seems clumsy.

Regarding the practical use, I think this is redundant invention. I wonder what Rode company expects here, who should be target consumer group?

Fools like you :-)

Too early