Multi-channel Audio Noise Attenuation via Panning Analysis
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Solution Overview
Problem
Wind noise interference in audio signals captured by microphones, which can mask desired audio and reduce audio quality, is not effectively addressed by existing technologies.
Innovation Solution
A method that identifies wind noise in multi-channel audio signals by analyzing panning information and frequency bands, and applies filtering to attenuate noise in specific frequency bands, improving audio quality without requiring additional hardware.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If wind noise is captured by the microphone along with desired audio, then the microphone captures all sounds including noise, but the presence of wind noise masks the desired audio and reduces audio quality
Solution Approach 1:
The audio signal is divided into multiple frequency bands, allowing selective processing of different frequency components. Wind noise is identified and attenuated in specific frequency bands where it predominates, while preserving other frequency components containing desired audio content.
Solution Approach 2:
Different processing is applied to different parts of the audio signal based on local characteristics. The system calculates panning information for each frequency band and applies attenuation selectively to bands where wind noise is detected, rather than uniformly processing the entire signal.
2Reliability
If multiple microphones are used to capture audio, then audio capture capability is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system replaces complex mechanical solutions (such as multiple physical microphones or hardware-based noise cancellation) with a software-based digital signal processing approach. By analyzing panning information in the frequency domain, the system achieves noise attenuation using computational methods rather than additional hardware.
3Ease of operation
If wind noise attenuation is applied to improve listenability, then audio quality improves, but processing complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system processes the audio signal in overlapping segments rather than continuously, applying noise attenuation periodically to each segment. This approach balances processing complexity with audio quality improvement by breaking down the continuous processing task into manageable discrete operations.
Data Source
AI summary
This specification describes technologies relating to editing digital audio data. In general, one aspect of the subject matter described in this specification can be embodied in methods that include the actions of receiving an audio signal including audio data in multiple channels; identifying noise in the audio signal including identifying panning information for the audio data in the signal at each of multiple frequency bands; and attenuating the audio data at one or more frequency bands to generate an edited audio signal when the panning exceeds a specified threshold for each of the one or more frequency bands. Other embodiments of this aspect include corresponding systems, apparatus, and computer program products.