Spatial audio
Immersive audio rendering system for 3D multimedia content
The spatial audio rendering method based on Wave Field Synthesis (WFS) is particularly useful for applications where multiple listeners experience a true spatial soundscape while being free to move without losing spatial sound properties. The approach can be considered as a general solution to the static listening restriction imposed by conventional methods, e.g. 5.1 channel audio, which rely on an accurate sound reproduction at a sweet spot only. While covering the majority of the listening area, the developed approach has created a variety of virtual audio objects at target positions with very high accuracy.
Personal audio spaces
A unique spatial audio rendering method enhanced by active sound control (ASC) and Wave Field Synthesis (WFS) has been developed to create focused personal auditory spaces. Unlike many other conventional ASC methods, the developed approach can selectively attenuate only the unwanted intrusion noise while leaving the desirable sounds including conversation across the neighbouring domains unaffected. The application works in such a way that the audio of one user is available at the targeted local domain only, but attenuated significantly at other locations (e.g., a listener in Zone A will not be able to hear the sounds from Zones B and C). The results provide a clear guideline to the implementation of the method in applications for creating personal audio spaces, such as the passenger compartments in public transport.
Object based spatial audio application
Object-based spatial audio is a concept of delivering audio, which operates by capturing, processing and rendering individual sound objects to appear in the auditory scene, instead of audio channels that correspond to all sound coming from specific directions. It is used in virtual reality applications; such as video games, in which the user can interact with the synthesised scene. In the system combining the WFS with the object-based audio, the auditory scene is created by physically generating the total sound field within a given listening area corresponding to the captured scene.