Binaural Room Impulse Response Filter Segmentation

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Solution Overview

Problem

Current audio rendering technologies face challenges in providing flexible and adaptive encoding and decoding of audio data to accommodate various speaker configurations and acoustic conditions, limiting the ability to deliver high-fidelity surround sound experiences across different setups.

Innovation Solution

The implementation of binaural room impulse response (BRIR) filters and spherical harmonic coefficients (SHC) for rendering audio, which allows for efficient rendering of audio signals by segmenting BRIR filters and applying them in the spherical harmonics domain, reducing computational complexity and enhancing sound localization.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Measurement precision

If binaural room impulse response filters are applied to each channel of multichannel audio, then sound fidelity and spatial accuracy are improved, but computational complexity increases significantly

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvesound fidelityVSAvoidcomputational complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The multichannel audio signal is divided into multiple individual channels, and the BRIR filtering operation is segmented and applied independently to each channel. This allows the complex 3D audio rendering to be broken down into manageable per-channel operations, reducing overall computational complexity while maintaining sound fidelity

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The patent applies BRIR filtering selectively to enhance spatial audio rendering where needed, rather than applying full complex processing to all audio data uniformly. This partial application of filtering achieves convincing surround sound effects while avoiding unnecessary computational overhead in areas where full processing is not required

Inventive Principle:
Principle #16Partial or excessive action

2Adaptability or versatility

If adaptive weighting and combining of audio channels is implemented, then adaptability to different speaker configurations is improved, but device complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveadaptability to speaker configurationsVSAvoidprocessing complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Adaptability or versatilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The system dynamically adjusts weighting factors for different audio channels based on the detected speaker configuration and acoustic conditions. This dynamic adaptation allows the audio rendering to automatically optimize for different setups (stereo, surround, virtual reality) without requiring manual reconfiguration, achieving versatility through adaptive processing

Inventive Principle:
Principle #15Dynamics

Solution Approach 2:

The patent incorporates feedback mechanisms that analyze the output audio signal and acoustic conditions to adjust the weighting and combining of channels in real-time. This feedback-driven adaptation enables the system to maintain optimal performance across varying speaker configurations and acoustic environments

Inventive Principle:
Principle #23Feedback

Data Source

PatentEP3005734B1Filtering with binaural room impulse responses with content analysis and weighting
Publication Date: 2019.06.19 QUALCOMM INC
  • EP3005734B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP3005734B1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP3005734B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

A device comprising one or more processors is configured to apply adaptively determined weights to a plurality of channels of the audio signal to generate a plurality of adaptively weighted channels of the audio signal. The processors are further configured to combine at least two of the plurality of adaptively weighted channels of the audio signal to generate a combined signal. The processors are further configured to apply a binaural room impulse response filter to the combined signal to generate a binaural audio signal.