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| AIAIAI TMA-1 |
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| Interview | ||||||
| Jörg: The earlier AIAIAI products appear more 'pop' than the TMA-1. What is the main difference in your approach towards the TMA-1? Jacob: Well yes, our previous projects have been a bit 'pop' you might say, but still very serious about the level of detail and quality. We've always paid enormous amount of attention to details, since that's important for the design and staying true to what AIAIAI is all about: being thorough in all that we engage in. But what's also important is being playful, which in our previous products have given this somewhat 'pop' appearance. That being said we've definitely taken the TMA-1 to a new level in that we've brought in a lot more people in developing it. Not only engineers and designers, but also the people in the forefront of using such a tool: the DJs. In that respect I guess you can say we've turned down a bit of the playfulness and turned up on the thoroughness. This lead-user driven approach has been quite interesting, but also very time consuming. And instead of having DJs ask for all sorts of features, we've experience a need to get back to basics, towards a stripped, no-bull-shit product. TMA-1 is a reference to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. At what point in the development did this link materialize? Jacob: We were in the developmental phase and had a first draft of this rugged, matte-black thing. We discussed different things, but suddenly someone referred to this thing. We read up on it and found that TMA-1 (Tycho Magnetic Anomaly-1) refers to the apparent magnetic irregularity at the Tycho crater on the Moon's surface which was found by American astronauts. A black Monolith buried 40 feet under the lunar surface causes the anomaly. The monoliths are extremely long-lived and reliable machines and resist destructive testing beyond the theoretical limits of material strength. We found this to be a fitting name for a sturdy, all black DJ headphone. The TMA-1 is aimed at professionals - DJs. When you first discussed the project what were some of the reactions from this crowd? Tomas: Our aim of tha TMA-1 is actually not only the DJs. Our idea idea has been to test and develop with professionals, to get a better result for all - professionals and the normal |
kid, who just wants to be a DJ. One aspect to this is: If a headphone doesn't break after the harsh treatment of a DJ (like myself), then it wont break if just another kid (like myself) is using it regularly... And the feedback has been great. Not only on the product as we went along, but also the process itself. Being involved is just seems new to them. Usually they'll just be asked to play with a certain branded headphone for monetary reasons. This is different. How did you plan on satisfying the different tastes and/or requirements? Tomas: For sure everybody is somewhat different. Some have a larger head others need extra loud sound because they can't hear anything. And againg others like heavy bass. It has obviously been hard to satisfy everybody, but in general it has been our goal to incorporate all our test-DJs feedback and get it wrapped up into something that made sense to most of them – obviously there's a limit to the level of sound we can put in these things. As such, we have learned a lot about sealing of outside sounds, frequency adjustments, even pressure from the headband, etc. Jacob: I remember being at Fabric with Seth and Matthew, both Ghostly artists, one time, trying to get a feel of the monitors and the hectic environment behind the decks in such a club. At that point the TMA-1 was a bit too low and didn't seal well enough, which meant that it was almost impossible to hear the sound of the headphones. We were simply blown away by the monitors pointing right into our faces. This became sort of an empathic way of getting to know what the DJs were really talking about, when they kept saying the sound was too low. We had to work around it a bit, trying to make a pad solution that would seal much better. But on the other hand we've had DJs who don't play these extreme environments. The two interchangeable pads kind of did the trick for us that. And the good thing here is that we will surely have people buying into the product liking the foam pad for the fact that it makes it safer to bike around town as a normal person... myself included... |
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