Improving the Perceived Sound Field Continuity Using Convolution of Impulse Sequences for Virtual Acoustics

听众对声场连续性的感知对于在虚拟声学现实中实现高质量沉浸式体验的目标至关重要。声场中的任何不连续性都可能变得明显，并且可能导致收听者的注意力从与虚拟世界的意识相关联的体验转移。听觉感知与其他形式的不匹配将导致每个参与者的沉浸潜力进一步降低。在最近的发现资助期间，研究团队为虚拟声学库（LVA）开发了一个复杂的搜索引擎，以管理包括在216个声学空间中测量的10，000多个多通道房间脉冲响应（RIR）的数据。使用包含在LVA中的声学数据渲染空间为收听者创建沉浸在与物理空间的实际声学共存的模拟房间中的印象。从精心测量的建筑空间中“借用”高质量声学的能力为在音乐和语音通信中使用声学虚拟现实开辟了前所未有的前景，但仍然存在相当大的技术要求和挑战。 在封闭空间的自然混响场中，听众的沉浸式声学印象是由于来自所有可能方向的大量反射：多个次级源一起近似于无限辐射器。在虚拟环境中，挑战在于当由有限数量的离散扬声器生成连续扩展的无缝声场时，实现对连续扩展的无缝声场的感知。我们的目标是使扬声器尽可能不被听众察觉，并用相对较少的扬声器通道来模拟大量的虚拟源。该研究计划的目标是使用信号处理和电声技术创建透明，自然发声的声学虚拟现实。虚拟声学拓宽了建筑空间的功能，因为新的系统响应可以在按下按钮时改变现有的声学条件。通过这项研究，我们的目标是最大限度地提高渲染声场的自然性错觉，防止用户检测到增强扬声器的存在。这是完善虚拟现实听觉质量的下一个关键步骤。虚拟声学的沉浸式设计将用于自动驾驶汽车、深空旅行、音乐表演、家庭、录音室和医疗设施，以提高健康质量。

The listener's perception of sound field continuity is fundamental to the goal of achieving a high-quality immersive experience in virtual acoustic reality. Any discontinuity in the sound field is likely to become noticeable and may cause the listener's attention to shift away from the experience associated with the awareness of the virtual world. A mismatch of the aural perception with other modalities will cause a further decrease in the immersive potential for every participant. In the recent discovery grant period the research team developed a sophisticated search engine for the Library of Virtual Acoustics (LVA) to manage data that include over 10,000 multichannel room-impulse-responses (RIRs) measured in 216 acoustic spaces. Rendering spaces using the acoustic data contained in the LVA creates for the listener an impression of being immersed in a simulated room that coexists within the actual acoustics of the physical space. The ability to "borrow" high-quality acoustics from carefully measured architectural spaces opens unprecedented perspectives for the use of acoustic virtual reality in the communication of music and speech, but still comes with considerable technological requirements and challenges. In the natural reverberant field of an enclosed space, a listener's immersive acoustic impression is due to a large number of reflections arriving from all possible directions: multiple secondary sources together approximating an infinite radiator. In a virtual environment, the challenge is to achieve the perception of a continuously expanding seamless sound field, when it is generated by a limited number of discrete loudspeakers. Our goal is to make the loudspeakers as undetectable to the listeners as possible, and to imitate a very large number of virtual sources with a relatively small number of loudspeaker channels. The goal of this research program is to create transparent, natural sounding acoustic virtual reality using signal processing and electroacoustics. Virtual acoustics widens the functionality of an architectural space as new system responses may alter the existing acoustic conditions at the push of a button. With this research we aim to maximize the illusion of naturalness in rendered sound fields, preventing users from detecting the presence of enhancing loudspeakers. It is the next critical step in perfecting the aural quality of virtual reality. Immersive design of virtual acoustics will be employed in autonomous vehicles, deep space travel, music performance, homes, recording studios, and medical facilities, to enhance quality of wellbeing.