Voice Interaction Audio Playback with Speech-Band Ducking
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Solution Overview
Problem
Ambient noise interferes with voice interactions in environments where digital audio is playing, making it difficult for voice services and human conversations to comprehend voice inputs and responses, leading to a poor signal-to-noise ratio.
Innovation Solution
An audio playback system that dynamically adjusts audio settings by ducking music frequencies within speech bands, compressing audio to bring low-amplitude details above the noise floor, and applying equalization to improve the signal-to-noise ratio for speech, using microphones and sensors to detect speech presence and ambient noise levels.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Illumination intensity
If music is played at high volume in a given environment, then music playback quality is improved, but speech intelligibility deteriorates due to increased ambient noise interfering with voice inputs and responses
Solution Approach 1:
The system dynamically adjusts audio settings by detecting speech presence and ambient noise levels, then real-time modifying playback parameters including ducking music frequencies within speech bands, compressing audio to bring low-amplitude details above the noise floor, and applying equalization to improve speech intelligibility while maintaining music playback quality
Solution Approach 2:
The system applies different audio processing treatments to different frequency bands, specifically ducking music frequencies within speech bands (300-3400 Hz) while preserving other frequency ranges, and applying targeted equalization to speech-relevant frequencies to enhance speech intelligibility without uniformly degrading music quality
2Object-affected harmful factors
If audio compression is applied to bring low-amplitude details above the noise floor, then speech intelligibility is improved, but audio fidelity may be compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The system changes audio parameters dynamically based on detected speech presence and noise levels, applying compression selectively to bring low-amplitude speech details above the noise floor while using equalization to boost speech frequencies, thereby improving speech intelligibility while attempting to preserve overall audio fidelity through targeted rather than universal processing
Data Source
AI summary
Example techniques relate to voice interaction in an environment with a media playback system that is playing back audio content. In an example implementation, while playing back first audio in a given environment at a given loudness: a playback device (a) detects that an event is anticipated in the given environment, the event involving playback of second audio and (b) determines a loudness of background noise in the given environment, the background noise comprising ambient noise in the given environment. The playback device ducks the first audio in proportion to a difference between the given loudness of the first audio and the determined loudness of the background noise and plays back the ducked first audio concurrently with the second audio.