Auralisation of moving sound sources using HRTFs

Author(s)

Gustavo Henrique Montesião de Sousa

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Instituto de Matemática e Estatística (IME/SBI)
• Defense date: 2010-04-29

Examining board members

Marcelo Gomes de Queiroz; Miguel Arjona Ramirez; Francisco Jose Fraga da Silva

• Advisor: Marcelo Gomes de Queiroz

Abstract

The goal of this work is the development of tools that allow simulating through headphones the psychoacoustic effect of sound sources moving in space, by the auralisation of the original monophonic signals. Although binaural auralisation can be implemented using variations in delays (called ITD interaural time difference) and in intensities (called ILD interaural level difference) among channels, better psychoacoustic results can be achieved using digital filters known as HRTFs (head related transfer functions). A HRTF inserts in the monophonic signal information that allow the auditory system to perceive this signal to be as if coming from a specific direction, which is unique for each single HRTF. Thus, to position a static sound source at a specific direction, filtering the original signal with the HRTF from the desired direction would be enough. Nevertheless, if it is desired that the sound source moves in a continuous trajectory, an infinitely large amount of filters would be necessary. Since they are usually obtained by measurements, such an arbitrarily large amount of them is not available. In this case, HRTF interpolation techniques that generate intermediary filters must be used. This work presents three new HRTF interpolation techniques in order to auralise moving sound sources: the triangular interpolation, a linear interpolation technique based on the VBAP amplitude panning technique; the discrete movements method, an extremely efficient technique that exploits the auditory systems limitations in perceiving very small changes in direction; and the spectral interpolation, that alters continuously the structures of the HRTFs to generate interpolated filters. Implementations of these techniques are discussed and numerical tests are also presented. (AU)