AES Europe 2026

Virtual Microphone Array techniques are being investigated
by the authors to support room acoustics optimisation in
live sound environments. In our recent AES paper, “Room
Acoustics Optimisation Using Virtual Microphone Arrays”, a
notable outcome was that a compact four-microphone
tetrahedral array performed strongly relative to its low
sensor count. Recent virtual sensing; Remote Microphone
Technique research treats microphone placement as an
explicit design variable. It reports improved remote
estimation performance when microphone layouts are
deliberately chosen for the task, rather than adopted as
fixed, standard configurations.
This submission builds on our prior VMA work by focusing on
the four-microphone case, where geometry choices are
especially constrained. We compare a tetrahedral baseline
with an ensemble of stochastically generated spherical
layouts at the same array aperture using Monte Carlo
simulation. We apply a consistent evaluation protocol
across multiple listening-region offsets; standard
beamforming estimators to isolate variability due to
geometry alone. The central proposition is that, for
low-count VMAs, geometry is a first-order design parameter.
Tetrahedral remains a credible baseline, but lightweight
stochastic exploration can reveal alternative layouts that
are competitive;, in some cases, superior without
increasing channel count.