Patent Grant
12106763
The present invention is directed to audio signal processing and particularly to efficient coding schemes of directional audio coding parameters such as DirAC metadata.
The present invention aims to propose a low bit-rate coding solution for coding spatial metadata from a 3D audio scene analysis done by Directional Audio Coding (DirAC), a perceptually motivated technique for spatial audio processing.
Transmitting an audio scene in three dimensions entails handling multiple channels which usually engenders a large amount of data to transmit. Directional Audio Coding (DirAC) technique [1] is an efficient approach for analyzing the audio scene and representing it parametrically. DirAC uses a perceptually motivated representation of the sound field based on direction of arrival (DOA) and diffuseness measured per frequency band. It is built upon the assumption that at one time instant and for one critical band, the spatial resolution of the auditory system is limited to decoding one cue for direction and another for inter-aural coherence. The spatial sound is then reproduced in frequency domain by cross-fading two streams: a non-directional diffuse stream and a directional non-diffuse stream.
The present invention discloses a 3D audio coding method based on the DirAC sound representation and reproduction for achieving transmission of immersive audio content at low bit-rates.
DirAC is a perceptually motivated spatial sound reproduction. It is assumed that at one time instant and for one critical band, the spatial resolution of the auditory system is limited to decoding one cue for direction and another for inter-aural coherence.
Based on these assumptions, DirAC represents the spatial sound in one frequency band by cross-fading two streams: a non-directional diffuse stream and a directional non-diffuse stream. The DirAC processing is performed in two phases: the analysis and the synthesis as pictured in
In the DirAC analysis stage, a first-order coincident microphone in B-format is considered as input and the diffuseness and direction of arrival of the sound is analyzed in frequency domain.
In the DirAC synthesis stage, sound is divided into two streams, the non-diffuse stream and the diffuse stream. The non-diffuse stream is reproduced as point sources using amplitude panning, which can be done by using vector base amplitude panning (VBAP) [2]. The diffuse stream is responsible for the sensation of envelopment and is produced by conveying to the loudspeakers mutually decorrelated signals.
The DirAC parameters, also called spatial metadata or DirAC metadata in the following, consist of tuples of diffuseness and direction. Direction can be represented in spherical coordinates by two angles, the azimuth and the elevation, while the diffuseness is a scalar factor between 0 and 1.
In the DirAC synthesis illustrated at
The resulting signals are used for generating, on the one hand, a diffuse stream 427 that comprises a decorrelation stage and, additionally, a non-diffuse stream 428 is generated as well. Both the streams are added in adder 429 for the corresponding sub-band and in block 431, an addition with other sub-bands, i.e., a frequency-to-time conversion is performed. Thus, block 431 can also be considered to be a synthesis filter bank. Similar processing operations are done for the other channels from a certain loudspeaker setup, where, for a different channel, the setting of the virtual microphones in block 421 will be different.
In the DirAC analysis stage, a first-order coincident microphone in B-format is considered as input and the diffuseness and direction of arrival of the sound is analyzed in frequency domain.
In the DirAC synthesis stage, sound is divided into two streams, the non-diffuse stream and the diffuse stream. The non-diffuse stream is reproduced as point sources using amplitude panning, which can be done by using vector base amplitude panning (VBAP) [2]. The diffuse stream is responsible for the sensation of envelopment and is produced by conveying to the loudspeakers mutually decorrelated signals.
The DirAC parameters, also called spatial metadata or DirAC metadata in the following, consist of tuples of diffuseness and direction. Direction can be represented in spherical coordinates by two angles, the azimuth and the elevation, while the diffuseness is a scalar factor between 0 and 1.
If a STFT is considered as the time-frequency transform with a time resolution of 20 ms, which is usually recommended in several papers, and with an overlap of 50% between adjacent analysis windows, DirAC analysis will produce, for an input sampled at 48 kHz, 288000 values per second, which corresponds if angles are quantized on 8 bits to a total bit-rate of about 2.3 Mbit/s. The amount of data is not suitable for achieving low bit-rate spatial audio coding, and an efficient coding scheme of the DirAC metadata is therefore needed.
Previous works regarding the reduction of metadata were mainly focused on teleconference scenarios, where the capability of DirAC was greatly reduced for allowing a minimal data-rate of its parameters [4]. Indeed, it is proposed to limit the directional analysis to the azimuth in the horizontal plane for reproducing only a 2D audio scene. Moreover, diffuseness and azimuth are only transmitted up to 7 kHz, limiting the communication to wideband speech. Finally, the diffuseness is coarsely quantized on one or two bits, turning sometimes only on or off the diffuse stream in the synthesis stage, which is not generic enough when considering multiple audio sources and more than single speech over background noise. In [4], the azimuth was quantized on 3 bits and it was assumed that the source, in that case the speaker, has a very static position. Therefore, parameters are only transmitted with a 50 ms update frequency. Based on these many strong assumptions, the demand for bits can be reduced to about 3 kbit/s.
According to an embodiment, an apparatus for encoding directional audio coding parameters having diffuseness parameters and direction parameters may have: a parameter quantizer for quantizing the diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters; a parameter encoder for encoding quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and an output interface for generating an encoded parameter representation having information on encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters.
According to another embodiment, a method of encoding directional audio coding parameters having diffuseness parameters and direction parameters may have the steps of: quantizing the diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters; encoding quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and generating an encoded parameter representation having information on encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters.
According to another embodiment, a decoder for decoding an encoded audio signal having encoded directional audio coding parameters having encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters, may have: an input interface for receiving the encoded audio signal and for separating, from the encoded audio signal, the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters; a parameter decoder for decoding the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters to obtain quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and a parameter dequantizer for determining, from the quantized diffuseness parameters and the quantized direction parameters, dequantized diffuseness parameters and dequantized direction parameters.
According to another embodiment, a method for decoding an encoded audio signal having encoded directional audio coding parameters having encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters, may have the steps of: receiving the encoded audio signal and for separating, from the encoded audio signal, the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters; decoding the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters to obtain quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and determining, from the quantized diffuseness parameters and the quantized direction parameters, dequantized diffuseness parameters and dequantized direction parameters.
Still another embodiment may have a non-transitory digital storage medium having stored thereon a computer program for performing a method of encoding directional audio coding parameters having diffuseness parameters and direction parameters, having the steps of: quantizing the diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters; encoding quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and generating an encoded parameter representation having information on encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters, when said computer program is run by a computer.
Another embodiment may have a non-transitory digital storage medium having stored thereon a computer program for performing a method of decoding an encoded audio signal having encoded directional audio coding parameters having encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters, having the steps of: receiving the encoded audio signal and for separating, from the encoded audio signal, the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters; decoding the encoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded direction parameters to obtain quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters; and determining, from the quantized diffuseness parameters and the quantized direction parameters, dequantized diffuseness parameters and dequantized direction parameters, when said computer program is run by a computer.
In accordance with one aspect, the present invention is based on the finding that an enhanced quality on the one hand and, at the same time, a reduced bitrate for encoding the spatial audio coding parameters on the other hand is obtained when the diffuseness parameters on the one hand and the direction parameters on the other hand are provided with different resolutions and the different parameters with different resolutions are quantized and encoded to obtain the encoded directional audio coding parameters.
In an embodiment, the time or frequency resolution for the diffuseness parameters is lower than the time or frequency resolution of the directional parameters. In a further embodiment, a grouping not only over frequency but also over time is performed. The original diffuseness/directional audio coding parameters are calculated with a high resolution, for example, for high resolution time/frequency bins, and a grouping and advantageously a grouping with averaging is performed for calculating a resulting diffuseness parameter with a low time or frequency resolution and for calculating a resulting directional parameter with a medium time or frequency resolution, i.e., with a time or frequency resolution being in between of the time or frequency resolution for the diffuseness parameter and the original high resolution, with which the original raw parameters have been calculated.
In embodiments, the first and second time resolutions are different and the first and second frequency resolutions are the same or vice versa, i.e., that the first and second frequency resolutions are different but the first and second time resolutions are the same. In a further embodiment, both the first and second time resolutions are different and the first and second frequency resolutions are different as well. Hence, the first time or frequency resolution can also be considered a first time-frequency resolution and the second time or frequency resolution can also be considered a second time-frequency resolution.
In a further embodiment, grouping of the diffuseness parameters is done with a weighted addition, where the weighting factors for the weighted addition are determined based on the power of the audio signal so that time/frequency bins having a higher power or, generally, a higher amplitude-related measure for the audio signal have a higher influence on the result than a diffuseness parameter for a time/frequency bin, in which the signal to be analyzed has a lower power or lower energy-related measure.
It is additionally of advantage to perform a two-fold weighted averaging for the calculation of the grouped directional parameters. This two-fold weighted averaging is done in such a way that directional parameters from time/frequency bins have a higher influence on the final result, when the power of the original signal was quite high in this time/frequency bin. At the same time the diffuseness value for the corresponding bin is also taken into account so that, in the end, a directional parameter from a time/frequency bin having associated a high diffuseness has a lower impact on the final result compared to a directional parameter having a low diffuseness, when the power was the same in both time/frequency bins.
It is of advantage to perform a processing of the parameters in frames, where each frame is organized in a certain number of bands, where each band comprises at least two original frequency bins, in which the parameters have been calculated. The bandwidth of the bands, i.e., the number of original frequency bins increases with an increasing band number so that higher frequency bands are broader than lower frequency bands. It has been found that, in embodiments, the number of diffuseness parameters per band and frame is equal to one while the number of directional parameters per frame and band is two or even greater than two such as four, for example. It has been found that the same frequency resolution, but a different time resolution, for the diffuseness and directional parameters is useful, i.e., the number of bands for the diffuseness parameters and the directional parameters in a frame are equal to each other. These grouped parameters are then quantized and encoded by a quantizer and encoder processor.
In accordance with a second aspect of the present invention, the object of providing an improved processing concept for the spatial audio coding parameters is achieved by a parameter quantizer for quantizing the diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters and the subsequently connected parameter encoder for encoding the quantized diffuseness parameters and the quantized direction parameters and the corresponding output interface for generating the encoded parameter representation comprising information on encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters. Thus, by quantization and subsequent entropy coding, a significant data rate reduction is obtained.
The diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters input into the encoder can be high resolution diffuseness/direction parameters or grouped or non-grouped low resolution directional audio coding parameters. One feature of an advantageous parameter quantizer is that the quantization precision for quantizing direction parameters is derived from the diffuseness value of the diffuseness parameter associated with the same time/frequency region. Thus, in one feature of the second aspect, the direction parameters that are associated with diffuseness parameters having a high diffuseness are quantized less precisely compared to direction parameters being associated with time/frequency regions having a diffuseness parameter indicating a low diffuseness.
The diffuseness parameters themselves can be entropy encoded in a raw coding mode, or can be encoded in a single value encoding mode when the diffuseness parameters for the bands of a frame have the same value throughout the frame. In other embodiments, the diffuseness values can be encoded in a two consecutive values only procedure.
Another feature of the second aspect is that the direction parameters are converted into an azimuth/elevation representation. In this feature, the elevation value is used to determine the alphabet for the quantization and encoding of the azimuth value. Advantageously, the azimuth alphabet has the greatest amount of different values when the elevation indicates a zero angle or generally an equator angle on the unit sphere. The smallest amount of values in the azimuth alphabet is when the elevation indicates the north or south pole of the unit sphere. Hence, the alphabet value decreases with an increasing absolute value of the elevation angle counted from the equator.
This elevation value is quantized with a quantization precision determined from the corresponding diffuseness value, and, the quantization alphabet on the one hand and the quantization precision on the other hand determine the quantization and typically entropy coding of the corresponding azimuth values.
Thus, an efficient and parameter-adapted processing is performed that removes as much irrelevance as possible and, at the same time, applies a high resolution or high precision to regions where it is worth to do so while in other regions such as the north pole or south pole of the unit sphere, the precision is not so high, compared to the equator of the unit sphere.
The decoder-side operating in accordance with the first aspect performs whatever kind of decoding and performs a corresponding de-grouping with the encoded or decoded diffuseness parameters and the encoded or decoded direction parameters. Thus, a parameter resolution conversion is performed to enhance the resolution from the encoded or decoded directional audio coding parameter to a resolution that is finally used by an audio renderer to perform rendering of an audio scene. In the course of this resolution conversion, a different resolution conversion is performed for the diffuseness parameters on the one hand and the direction parameters on the other hand.
The diffuseness parameters typically are encoded with a low resolution and, therefore one diffuseness parameter has to be multiplied or copied several times to obtain a high resolution representation. On the other hand, a corresponding directional parameter has to be copied less often or multiplied less often compared to a diffuseness parameter, since the resolution of the directional parameters is already greater than the resolution of the diffuseness parameters in the encoded audio signal.
In an embodiment, the copied or multiplied directional audio coding parameters are applied as they are or are processed such as smoothed or low pass filtered in order to avoid artifacts caused by parameters strongly changing over frequency and/or time. However, since in an embodiment, the application of the resolution-converted parametric data is performed in the spectral domain, the corresponding frequency-time conversion of the rendered audio signal from the frequency domain into the time domain performs an inherent averaging due to an advantageously applied overlap and add procedure that is a feature typically included in synthesis filter banks.
On the decoder-side in accordance with the second aspect, the specific procedures performed on the encoder side with respect to entropy coding on the one hand and quantization on the other hand are undone. It is of advantage to determine the dequantization precision on the decoder side from the typically quantized or dequantized diffuseness parameter associated with the corresponding direction parameter.
It is of advantage to determine the alphabet for the elevation parameter from the corresponding diffuseness value and its related dequantization precision. It is also of advantage for the second aspect to perform the determination of dequantization alphabet for the azimuth parameter based on the value of the quantized or advantageously dequantized elevation parameter.
In accordance with the second aspect, a raw coding mode on the one hand or an entropy coding mode on the other hand is performed on the encoder side and the mode resulting in a lower number of bits is selected within the encoder and signaled to the decoder via some side information. Typically, the raw encoding mode is performed for directional parameters having associated therewith high diffuseness values while the entropy coding mode is tried for directional parameters having associated therewith lower diffuseness values. In the entropy coding mode with raw coding, the azimuth and elevation values are merged into a sphere index and the sphere index is then encoded using a binary code or a punctured code and, on the decoder-side this entropy coding is undone accordingly.
In the entropy coding mode with modeling, an average elevation and azimuth value are calculated for the frame, and residual values with respect to these average values are actually calculated. Thus, a kind of prediction is performed and the prediction residual values, i.e., the distance for elevation and azimuth are entropy encoded. For this purpose, it is of advantage to perform an extended Golomb-Rice procedure relying on a Golomb-Rice parameter that is determined on the encoder side and encoded, in addition to the advantageously signed distances and the average values. On the decoder-side as soon as entropy coding with modeling, i.e., this decoding mode, is signaled and determined by the side information evaluation in the decoder, the decoding with the extended Golomb-Rice procedure is done using the encoded averages, the encoded advantageously signed distances and the corresponding Golomb-Rice parameters for elevation and azimuth.
Embodiments of the present invention are subsequently discussed with respect to the accompanying drawings, in which:
The present invention generalizes the compression of the DirAC metadata to any kind of scenario. The present invention is applied in a spatial coding system illustrated in
The encoder analyses usually the spatial audio scene in B-format. Alternatively, DirAC analysis can be adjusted to analyze different audio formats like audio objects or multichannel signals or the combination of any spatial audio formats. The DirAC analysis extracts a parametric representation from the input audio scene. A direction of arrival (DOA) and a diffuseness measured per time-frequency unit form the parameters. The DirAC analysis is followed by a spatial metadata encoder, which quantizes and encodes the DirAC parameters to obtain a low bit-rate parametric representation. The latter module is the subject of this invention.
Along with the parameters, a down-mix signal derived from the different sources or audio input signals is coded for transmission by a conventional audio core-coder. In the embodiment, an EVS audio coder is of advantage for coding the down-mix signal, but the invention is not limited to this core-coder and can be applied to any audio core-coder. The down-mix signal consists of different channels, called transport channels: the signal can be, e.g., the four coefficient signals composing a B-format signal, a stereo pair or a monophonic down-mix depending of the targeted bit-rate. The coded spatial parameters and the coded audio bitstream are multiplexed before being transmitted over the communication channel.
In the decoder, the transport channels are decoded by the core-decoder, while the DirAC metadata is first decoded before being conveyed with the decoded transport channels to the DirAC synthesis. The DirAC synthesis uses the decoded metadata for controlling the reproduction of the direct sound stream and its mixture with the diffuse sound stream. The reproduced sound field can be reproduced on an arbitrary loudspeaker layout or can be generated in Ambisonics format (HOA/FOA) with an arbitrary order.
An audio encoder for encoding an audio signal such as the B-format input signal is illustrated in
The decoded transport signal is input into a DirAC synthesizer 400 together with the decoded directional audio coding parameters. In the embodiment illustrated in
Generally, the output synthesizer operates by calculating, for each time-frequency bin as determined by the analysis filter bank 430, a direct audio signal on the one hand and a diffuse audio signal on the other hand. The direct audio signal is calculated based on the direction parameters and the relation between the direct audio signal and the diffuse audio signal in the final audio signal for this time/frequency bin, determined based on the diffuseness parameter so that a time/frequency bin having a high diffuseness parameter results in an output signal that has a high amount of the diffuse signal and a low amount of the direct signal while, a time/frequency bin having a low diffuseness results in an output signal having a high amount of the direct signal and a low amount of the diffuse signal.
Alternatively, the implementation is illustrated in
The diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters are calculated so that the second time or frequency resolution is different from the first time or frequency resolution and the first time resolution is lower than the second time resolution or the second frequency resolution is greater than the first frequency resolution or, again alternatively, the first time resolution is lower than the second time resolution and the first frequency resolution is equal to the second frequency resolution.
Typically, the diffuseness parameters and the direction parameters are calculated for a set of frequency bands, where a band having a lower center frequency is narrower than a band having a higher center frequency. As already discussed with respect to
The parameter calculator is then configured to group and average the initial diffuseness parameters so that the third time or frequency resolution is higher than the first time or frequency resolution, i.e., a resolution reduction is performed. The parameter calculator is also configured to group and average the initial direction parameters so that the fourth time or frequency resolution is higher than the second time or frequency resolution, i.e., a resolution reduction is performed. Advantageously, the third time of frequency resolution is a constant time resolution so that each initial diffuseness parameter is associated with a time slot or a frequency bin having the same size. The fourth time or frequency resolution is also a constant frequency resolution so that each initial direction parameter is associated with a time slot or a frequency bin having the same size.
The parameter calculator is configured to average over a first plurality of diffuseness parameters associated with a first plurality of time slots. The parameter calculator 100 is also configured to average over a second plurality of diffuseness parameters associated with the second plurality of frequency bins, and the parameter calculator is also configured to average over a third plurality of direction parameters associated with a third plurality of time slots or the parameter calculator is also configured to average over a fourth plurality of direction parameters associated with the four plurality of frequency bins.
As will be discussed with respect to
When comparing
Thus, in this embodiment, where only a single diffuseness parameter consists per band, all direction parameters in one band have the same quantization/dequantization precision. As will be outlined later on, the alphabet for quantizing and encoding an azimuth parameter depends on the value of the original/quantized/dequantized elevation parameter. Thus, although each direction parameter for each band has the same quantization/dequantization parameter, each azimuth parameter for each grouped bin or time/frequency region of
The resulting bitstream generated by the quantizer and encoder processor 200 illustrated at 250 in
Subsequently, the further implementation is discussed in detail.
Time-Frequency Decomposition
In DirAC both analysis and synthesis are performed in frequency domain. The time-frequency analysis and synthesis can be performed using various block transforms, like short-term Fourier Transform (STFT), or filterbanks, like complex-modulated Quadrature Mirror Filterbank (QMF). In the advantageous embodiment, we aim to share the framing between the DirAC processing and the core encoder. Since the core encoder may be based on the 3GPP EVS codec, a framing of 20 ms is desired. Moreover, important criteria such as time and frequency resolutions and robustness for aliasing are relevant for very active time-frequency processing in DirAC. Since the system is designed for communications, the algorithmic delay is another import aspect.
For all these reasons, the Complex modulated low-delay filterbank (CLDFB) is the advantageous choice. The CLDFB has a time resolution of 1.25 ms and divides the 20 ms frame into 16 timeslots. The frequency resolution is 400 Hz, which means that the input signal is decomposed into (fs/2)/400 frequency bands. The filter bank operation is described in a general form by the following formula:
where XCR and XCI are the real and the imaginary sub-band values, respectively, t is the sub-band time index with 0≤t≤15 and k is the sub-band index with 0≤k≤LC−1. The analysis prototype wc is an asymmetric low-pass filter with an adaptive length depending on sHP. The length of wc is given by Lw
For instance, CLDFB will decompose a signal sampled at 48 kHz into 60×16=960 time-frequency tiles per frame. The delay after analysis and synthesis can be adjusted by selecting different prototype filters. It was found that a delay of 5 ms (analysis and synthesis) was a good compromise between delivered quality and engendered delay. For each time-frequency tile, a diffuseness and direction is computed.
DirAC Parameter Estimation
In each frequency band, the direction of arrival of sound together with the diffuseness of the sound are estimated. From the time-frequency analysis of the input B-format components wi(n), xi(n), yi(n), zi(n), pressure and velocity vectors can be determined as:
Pi(n,k)=Wi(n,k)
Ui(n,k)=Xi(n,k)ex+Yi(n,k)ey+Zi(n,k)ez
where i is the index of the input, n and k the time and frequency indices of the time-frequency tile, and ex, ey, ez represent the Cartesian unit vectors. P(n,k) and U(n,k) are used to compute the DirAC parameters, namely DOA and diffuseness through the computation of the intensity vector:
I(n,k)=½{P(n,k)·
where
where E{.} denotes the temporal averaging operator, c the speed of sound and E(k, n) the sound field energy given by:
The diffuseness of the sound field is defined as the ratio between sound intensity and energy density, having values between 0 and 1.
The direction of arrival (DOA) is expressed by means of the unit vector direction (n, k), defined as
The direction of arrival is determined by an energetic analysis of the B-format input and can be defined as opposite direction of the intensity vector. The direction is defined in Cartesian coordinates but can be easily transformed in spherical coordinates defined by a unity radius, the azimuth angle and the elevation angle.
In total, if the parameter values are directly converted into bits, for each time-frequency tile, 3 values have to be coded: azimuth angle, elevation angle, and diffuseness. The metadata consists then in the example of CLDFB of 2880 values per frame, i.e. 144000 values per second. This huge amount of data needs to be drastically reduced for achieving low bit-rate coding.
Grouping and Averaging of DirAC Metadata
For reducing the number of parameters, the parameters computed in each time-frequency tile are first grouped and averaged along frequency parameter bands and over several time slots. The grouping is decoupled between the diffuseness and direction, which is an important aspect of the invention. Indeed, the decoupling exploits the fact that diffuseness retains a longer term characteristic of the sound field than direction, which is a more reactive spatial cue.
The parameter bands constitute a non-uniform and non-overlapping decomposition of the frequency bands following roughly an integer number of times the Equivalent Rectangular Bandwidth (ERB) scale. By default, a 9 times ERB scale is adopted for a total of 5 parameter bands for an audio bandwidth of 16 kHz.
The diffuseness is computed as:
where power (n, k)α is the energy of the input signal measured in the time-frequency tile of indices (t,k) and raised to the power of α, and diffuses (n, k) is the diffuseness of the input signal measured in the time-frequency tile of indices (n,k), and where banddiff[ ] defines the limit of the parameter bands in terms of frequency band indices, and slotdiff[ ] defines the limit of grouping over time in time slots indices. For example, tables can be defined for 5 parameters bands and 1 time group as:
The direction vector in Cartesian coordinates is computed as:
where power (n, k)α is the energy of the input signal measured in the time-frequency tile of indices (t,k) and raised to the power of α, diffuseness (n,k) is the diffuseness of the input signal measured in the time-frequency tile of indices (n,k), and direction (n,k) is the direction measured in the time-frequency tile of indices (n,k) in three-dimensional Cartesian coordinates, and where banddv[ ] defines the limit of the parameter bands in terms of frequency band indices, and slotdv[ ] defines the limit of grouping over time in time slots indices. For example, tables can be defined for 5 parameters bands and 4 time groups as:
The parameter α allows for compressing or expanding the power-based weights in the weighting sum performed for averaging the parameters. In the advantageous mode, α=1.
Generally this value can be a real non-negative number, since an exponent smaller than 1 could be also useful. For example 0.5 (square root) will still give more weight to higher amplitude-related signals, but more moderately when compared to an exponent of 1 or greater than 1.
After grouping and averaging, the resulting directional vector dv[g, b] is no longer a unit vector in general. Normalization is therefore used:
Subsequently, an embodiment of the second aspect of the present invention is discussed.
Hence, the parameter quantizer 210 and the subsequently connected parameter encoder 220 for encoding quantized diffuseness parameters and quantized direction parameters are included together with the output interface for generating an encoded parameter representation comprising information on encoded diffuseness parameters and encoded direction parameters within the block 200 of
Advantageously, the parameter quantizer 210 of
As discussed before with respect to
For the purpose of processing the azimuth value, the azimuth alphabet is determined 236 from the elevation information for the corresponding (grouped) time/frequency bin. Elevation information may be the quantized elevation value, the original elevation value or the quantized and again dequantized elevation value where the latter value, i.e., the quantized and again dequantized elevation value is of advantage in order to have the same situation on the encoder side and at the decoder side. In block 237, the azimuth parameter is quantized with the alphabet for this time/frequency bin. While one can have the same quantization precision of a band as discussed before with respect to
DirAC Metadata Coding
For each frame, the DirAC spatial parameters are computed on a grid consisting of nbands bands across frequency and, for each frequency band b, the num_slots time slots are grouped into a number of equally sized nblocks (b) time groups. A diffuseness parameter is sent for each frequency band, and a direction parameter for each time group of each frequency band.
For example, if nbands=5 and nblocks (b)=4, with num_slots=16, this will result in 5 diffuseness parameters and 20 direction parameters per frame, which will be further quantized and entropy coded.
Quantization of Diffuseness Parameters
Each diffuseness parameter diff(b) is quantized to one of the diff_alph discrete levels, using a non-uniform quantizer producing the diffuseness index diff_idx(b). For example, the quantizer may be derived from the ICC quantization table used in the MPS standard, for which the thresholds and reconstruction levels are computed by the generate_diffuseness_quantizer function.
Advantageously, only the non-negative values from the ICC quantization table are used, as icc=[1.0, 0.937, 0.84118, 0.60092, 0.36764, 0.0], containing only 6 levels of the original 8. Because an ICC of 0.0 corresponds to a diffuseness of 1.0, and an ICC of 1.0 corresponds to a diffuseness of 0.0, a set of y coordinates are created as y=1.0−icc, with a corresponding set of x coordinates as x=[0.0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, 1.0]. A shape-preserving piecewise cubic interpolation method, known as Piecewise Cubic Hermite Interpolating Polynomial (PCHIP), is used to derive a curve passing through the set of points defined by x and y. The number of steps of the diffuseness quantizer is diff_alph, which in the proposed implementation is 8, but it has no relation to the total number of levels of the ICC quantization table, which is also 8.
A new set of diff_alph equally spaced coordinates x_interpolated from 0.0 to 1.0 (or close to, but smaller than 1.0, when the case of pure diffuseness of 1.0 is avoided because of sound rendering considerations) are generated, and the corresponding y values on the curve are used as the reconstruction values, those reconstruction values being non-linearly spaced. Points half-way between consecutive x_interpolated values are also generated, and the corresponding y values of the curve are used as threshold values to decide which values map to a particular diffuseness index and therefore reconstruction value. For the proposed implementation, the generated reconstruction and threshold values (rounded to 5 digits), computed by the generate_diffuseness_quantizer function are:
reconstructions=[0.0, 0.03955, 0.08960, 0.15894, 0.30835, 0.47388, 0.63232, 0.85010]
thresholds=[0.0, 0.01904, 0.06299, 0.11938, 0.22119, 0.39917, 0.54761, 0.73461, 2.0]
A placeholder out-of-range large threshold value (2.0) is added at the end of thresholds to make searching it simpler. For exemplification, if diff(b)=0.33, for a particular band b, then thresholds[4]<=diff(b)<thresholds[5], therefore diff_idx(b)=4, and the corresponding reconstruction value is reconstructions[4]=0.30835.
The above procedure is just one possible choice of a non-linear quantizer for the diffuseness values.
Entropy Coding of Diffuseness Parameters
The EncodeQuasiUniform (value, alphabet_sz) function is used to encode value with quasi-uniform probability using a punctured code. For value ∈{0, . . . , alphabet_sz−1}, a number of the smallest ones are encoded using [log2alpbabet_sz] bits, and the rest using [log2alpbabet_sz]+1 bits. If alphabet_sz is a power of two, binary coding results.
Depending on their values, the quantized diffuseness indexes can be entropy coded using one of the three available methods: raw coding, one value only, and two consecutive values only. The first bit (diff_use_raw_coding) indicates whether the raw coding method is used. For raw coding, each diffuseness index value is encoded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function.
If all index values are equal, the one value only method is used. A second bit (diff_have_unique_value) is used to indicate this method, then the unique value is encoded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. If all index values consist only of two consecutive values, the two consecutive values only method is used, indicated by the above second bit. The smaller of the two consecutive values is encoded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function, taking into account that its alphabet size is reduced to diff_alph−1. Then, for each value, the difference between it and the minimum value is encoded using one bit.
An advantageous EncodeQuasiUniform (value, alphabet_sz) function implements what is called a punctured code. It can be defined in pseudo-code as:
If alphabet_sz is a power of 2, then alphabet_sz=2 {circumflex over ( )}bits, and thresh=2 {circumflex over ( )}bits, therefore the else branch is never used, and binary coding results. Otherwise, the first thresh smallest values are encoded using a binary code having bits bits, and the rest, starting with value=thresh, are encoded using a binary code having bits+1 bits. The first binary code encoded using bits+1 bits has the value value+thresh=thresh+thresh=thresh*2, therefore the decoder can figure out, by reading only the first bits bits and comparing its value with thresh, if it needs to read one more additional bit. The decoding function, DecodeQuasiUniform (alphabet_sz) can be defined in pseudo-code as:
Conversion of Direction Parameters to Polar Coordinates
Each 3-dimensional direction vector dv, which is normalized, such that dv[0]2+dv[1]2+dv[2]2=1, is converted to a polar representation consisting of an elevation angle el∈[−90,90] and an azimuth angle az∈[0,360], using the function DirectionVector2AzimuthElevation. The reverse direction conversion, from polar coordinates to a normalized direction vector, is achieved using the function AzimuthElevation2DirectionVector.
Quantization of Direction Parameters
A direction, represented as an elevation and azimuth pair, is further quantized. For each quantized diffuseness index level, a used angular precision is selected from the angle_spacing configuration vector as deg_req=angle_spacing (diff_idx(b)) and used to generate a set of quasi-uniformly distributed quantization points on the unit sphere.
The angle spacing value deg_req may not be computed from the diffuseness diff(b), but from the diffuseness index diff_idx(b). Therefore, there are diff_alph possible deg_req values, one for each possible diffuseness index. At the decoder side, the original diffuseness diff(b) is not available, only the diffuseness index diff_idx(b), which can be used for selecting the same angle spacing value like in the encoder. In the proposed implementation, the angle spacing table is:
angle_spacing_table=[5.0, 5.0, 7.5, 10.0, 18.0, 30.0, 45.0, 90.0]
The quasi-uniformly distributed points on the unit sphere are generated in such a way to satisfy several important desirable properties. The points should be distributed symmetrically with respect to the X, Y, and Z axes. The quantization of a given direction to the closest point and mapping to an integer index should be a constant time operation. Finally, computing the corresponding point on the sphere from the integer index and dequantization to a direction should be a constant or logarithmic time operation with respect to the total number of points on the sphere.
There are two types of symmetry with respect to an axis for points on a horizontal plane: with two points present where the orthogonal axis intersects the unit sphere on the current plane, and without any points present. As an example for an arbitrary horizontal plane, there are three possible cases. If the number of points is a multiple of 4, like 8, there is symmetry with respect to the X (left-right) axis and two points present at 90 and 270 degrees on the Y axis, and symmetry with respect to the Y (front-back) axis and two points present at 0 and 180 degrees on the X axis. If the number of points is only a multiple of 2, like 6, there is symmetry with respect to the X axis but no points at 90 and 270 degrees on the Y axis, and symmetry with respect to the Y axis and two points present at 0 and 180 degrees on the X axis. Finally, when the number of points is an arbitrary integer, like 5, there is symmetry with respect to the X axis but no points at 90 and 270 degrees on the Y axis, and no symmetry with respect to the Y axis.
In the embodiment, having points at 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees on all horizontal planes (corresponding to all quantized elevations) was considered useful from a psychoacoustic perspective, implying that the number of points on each horizontal plane is a multiple of 4. However, depending on the particular application, the condition on the number of points on each horizontal plane can be relaxed to be only a multiple of 2, or an arbitrary integer.
Additionally, in the embodiment, for each elevation an “origin” azimuth point exists at the 0 degrees privileged direction (towards front). This property can be relaxed by selecting a precomputed quantization offset angle for each elevation separately, with the azimuth points distributed relative to it instead of the 0 degrees direction. It can be easily implemented by adding the offset before quantization, and subtracting it after dequantization.
The used angular precision is deg_req and should be a divisor of 90 degrees. Otherwise, it is recomputed before actual usage as deg_req=90÷┌90÷deg_req┐. For example, the list of possible values is {90, 45, 30, 22.5, 18, 15, 12.86, 11.25, 10, . . . , 5, . . . }. The elevation angle el is uniformly quantized, with step size deg_req, producing el_idx=round(el÷deg_req)+n_points, one of the el_alph=2·n_points+1 quantization indexes, where n_points=┌90÷deg_req┐. This index corresponds to a dequantized elevation of q_el=(el_idx−n_points)·deg_req. Equivalently, based only on alphabet size, el_idx=round (((el+90)÷180)·(el_alph−1)) for quantization and q_el=(el_idx+(el_alph−1))·180-90 for dequantization.
At equator, the azimuth angle az is uniformly quantized, with step size deg_req, producing az_idx, one of the 4·n_points quantization indexes. For other elevations, the horizontal angle spacing as seen from the center of the unit sphere, which corresponds to the chord length between two consecutive points, can be approximated by the arc length on the horizontal circle situated at the q_el elevation. Therefore, the number of points corresponding to 90 degrees on this horizontal circle is reduced, relative to the equator circle, proportionally with its radius, so that the arc length between two consecutive points remains approximately the same everywhere. At the poles, the total number of points becomes one.
There are az_alph=max(4·round(radius_len·n_points),1) quantization indexes, corresponding to the q_el elevation, where radius_len=cos(q_el). The corresponding quantization index is az_idx=round((az÷360)·az_alph), where a resulting value of az_alph is replaced with 0. This index corresponds to a dequantized azimuth of q_az=az_idx·(360÷az_alph). As a note, excluding the poles where az_alph=1, the smallest values near the poles are az_alph=4 for deg_req=90 and deg_req=45, and az_alph=8 for all the rest.
If the condition on the number of points on each horizontal plane is relaxed to be only a multiple of 2, the azimuth alphabet becomes az_alph=max(2·round(radius_len·(2·n_points)), 1), because there are 2·n_points corresponding to 180 degrees on the equatorial plane. If the condition on the number of points is relaxed to be an arbitrary integer, the azimuth alphabet becomes az_alph=max(round(radius_len·(4·n_points)),1), because there are 4·n_points corresponding to 360 degrees on the equatorial plane. In both cases, on the equatorial plane the number of points is a multiple of 4, because radius_len=1 and n_points is an integer.
The quantization and dequantization process described above is achieved using the QuantizeAzimuthElevation and DequantizeAzimuthElevation functions, respectively.
Advantageously, the round(x) function rounds x to the closest integer, usually implemented in fixed-point as round(x)=floor(x+0.5). The rounding for ties, which are values exactly half-way between integers, like 1.5, can be done in several ways. The above definition rounds ties towards+infinity (1.5 gets rounded to 2, 2.5 gets rounded to 3). Floating-point implementations usually have a native rounding to integer function, rounding ties to even integers (1.5 gets rounded to 2, 2.5 gets rounded to 2).
Subsequently, an implementation of the parameter encoder 220 of
In the case where the different encoding modes, i.e., the raw coding mode and the entropy coding mode (with modeling) are used, the result is chosen by an encoder controller that selects the mode that results in a smaller number of bits for encoding the quantized indexes. This is indicated at 245a, 245b and 245c.
On the other hand, one could only use the raw coding mode for all frames and bands or only the entropy coding mode with modeling for all bands or any other coding mode for coding the indexes such as a Huffman coding mode or an arithmetic coding mode with or without context adaption.
Depending on the result of the chosen procedure in blocks 245a, 245b and 245c, the side information is set for the whole frame as illustrated in blocks 246a, 246b or is set only for the corresponding bands, i.e., the low diffuseness bands in block 246c. Alternatively the side information can also be set for the whole frame in the case of item 246c. In this case, the determination of the high diffuseness bands can be done in the decoder alone so that even though the side information is set for the whole frame, the decoder nevertheless determines that there is a mixed diffuseness frame and that the direction parameters for the bands having a high diffuseness value in this mixed diffuseness frame are encoded with the raw encoding mode although the side information for the frame indicates the entropy encoding mode with modeling.
In an embodiment, diff_alph=8. Then, the ec_max threshold value was chosen to be 5, by means of minimizing the average compressed size on a large test corpus. This threshold value ec_max is used in the following mode, depending on the range of values for the diffuseness indexes of the current frame:
As illustrated in
Subsequently,
The LSP part is also encoded with a (punctured) binary code illustrated at 287. Thus, on lines 288 and 289, the encoded bits for the most significant part MSP and the encoded bits for the least significant part LSP are obtained which together represent the corresponding encoded reduced signed distances either for elevation or for azimuth.
Entropy Coding of Direction Parameters
When coding a quantized direction, the elevation index el_idx is coded first, before the azimuth index az_idx. If the current configuration takes into account only the horizontal equatorial plane, then nothing is coded for the elevation and it is considered zero everywhere.
Before coding, signed values are mapped to unsigned values by using a generic reordering transformation, which interleaves the positive and negative numbers into unsigned numbers as u_val=2·|s_val|−(s_val<0), implemented by the ReorderGeneric function. The expression (condition) evaluates to 1 if condition is true, and evaluates to 0 if condition is false.
Because a number of the smaller unsigned values are coded more efficiently, with one bit less, using the EncodeQuasiUniform function, both the elevation and azimuth indexes, which are already unsigned, are converted to signed so that a signed index value of zero corresponds to an elevation or azimuth angle of zero, and only afterwards the ReorderGeneric function is applied. By first converting to signed, the zero value is situated in the middle of the signed interval of possible values, and after applying the ReorderGeneric function the resulting unsigned reordered elevation index value is el_idx_r=ReorderGeneric(el_idx−└el_alph÷2┘), and the resulting unsigned reordered azimuth index value is az_idx_r=ReorderGeneric(az_idx−az_alph·(az_idx≥az_alph÷2)).
For raw coding, without modeling, the two unsigned reordered indexes are merged into a single unsigned sphere index sphere_idx=sphere_offsets(deg_req, el_idx_r)+az_idx_r, where the sphere_offsets function computes the sum of all azimuth alphabets az_alph corresponding to the unsigned reordered elevation indexes smaller than el_idx_r. For example, when deg_req=90, where el_idx_r=0 (elevation 0 degrees) has az_alph=4, el_idx_r=1 (elevation−90 degrees) has az_alph=1, and el_idx_r=2 (elevation 90 degrees) has az_alph=1, sphere_offsets(90,2) would take the value 4+1. If the current configuration takes into account only the horizontal equatorial plane, then el_idx_r is 0 and the unsigned sphere index simplifies to sphere_idx=az_idx_r. In general, the total number of points on the sphere, or sphere point count, is sphere_alph=sphere_offsets(deg_req, el_alph+1).
The unsigned sphere index shpere_idx is coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. For entropy coding, with modeling, the quantized directions are grouped into two categories. The first contains the quantized directions for diffuseness indexes diff_idx(b); ec_max which are entropy coded, and the second contains the quantized directions for diffuseness indexes diff_idx(b)>ec_max which are raw coded, where ec_max is a threshold optimally chosen depending on diff_alph. This approach implicitly excludes from entropy coding the frequency bands with high diffuseness, when frequency bands with low to medium diffuseness are also present in a frame, to avoid mixing statistics of the residuals. For a mixed diffuseness frame, raw coding is used for the frequency bands with high diffuseness. However, if all frequency bands have high diffuseness, diff_idx(b)>ec_max, the threshold is set in advance to ec_max=diff_alph in order to enable entropy coding for all frequency bands.
For the first category of quantized directions, which are entropy coded, the corresponding elevation indexes el_idx, elevation alphabets el_alph, azimuth indexes az_idx, and azimuth alphabets az_alph are collected into separate vectors for further processing.
An average direction vector is derived, by converting each quantized direction which is entropy coded back to a direction vector, computing either the mean, median, or mode of the direction vectors including renormalization, and converting the average direction vector into average elevation el_avg and azimuth az_avg. These two values are quantized using the best angular precision deg_req used by the quantized directions which are entropy coded, denoted by deg_req_avg, which is usually the used angular precision corresponding to the smallest diffuseness index min(diff_idx(b)), for b E {0, . . . , nbands−1} and diff_idx(b)≤ec_max.
Using the corresponding n_points_avg value derived from deg_req_avg, el_avg is quantized normally producing el_avg_idx and el_avg_alph, however, az_avg is quantized using the precision at the equator, producing az_avg_idx and az_avg_alph=4·n_points_avg.
For each direction to be entropy coded, the dequantized average elevation q_el_avg and azimuth q_az_avg are projected using the precision of that direction, to obtain predicted elevation and azimuth indexes. For an elevation index el_idx, its precision, which can be derived from el_alph, is used to compute the projected average elevation index el_avg_idx_p. For the corresponding azimuth index az_idx, its precision on the horizontal circle situated at the q_el elevation, which can be derived from az_alph, is used to compute the projected average azimuth index az_avg_idx_p.
The projection to obtain predicted elevation and azimuth indexes can be computed in several equivalent ways. For elevation,
which can be easily simplified to
To facilitate bit-exact operation, the previous formula can be rewritten using integer only math, including division, as el_avg_idx_p=(2·el_avg_idx·(el_alph−1)+(el_avg_alph−1)) div (2·(el_avg_alph−1)). For azimuth,
which can be easily simplified to
To facilitate bit-exact operation, the previous formula can be rewritten using integer only math, including division, as az_avg_idx_p=((2·az_avg_idx·az_alph+az_avg_alph) div (2·az_avg_alph)) mod az_alph. At the poles, where az_alph=1, we have az_idx=0 and set az_avg_idx_p=0 directly.
The signed distance el_idx_dist is computed as the difference between each elevation index el_idx and its corresponding el_avg_idx_p. Additionally, because the difference produces values in the interval {−el_alph+1, . . . , el_alph−1}, they are reduced to the interval {−└el_alph÷2┘, . . . , └el_alph÷2┘} by adding el_alph for values which are too small and subtracting el_alph for values which are too large, like in modular arithmetic. If this reduced distance relative to el_avg_idx_p is interpreted using wrap-around, it can produce all values from to the unsigned alphabet containing el_alph values. Similarly, the signed distance az_idx_dist is computed as the difference between each azimuth index az_idx and its corresponding az_avg_idx_p. The difference operation produces values in the interval {−az_alph+1, . . . , az_alph−1}, which are reduced to the interval {−az_alph÷2, . . . , az_alph÷2−1} by adding az_alph for values which are too small and subtracting az_alph for values which are too large. When az_alph=1, the azimuth index is az_idx=0 and nothing needs to be coded.
Depending on their values, the quantized elevation and azimuth indexes can be coded using one of the two available methods: raw coding or entropy coding. The first bit (dir_use_raw_coding) indicates whether the raw coding method is used. For raw coding, the merged sphere_index single unsigned sphere indexes are directly coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function.
Entropy coding is composed of several parts. All the quantized elevation and azimuth indexes corresponding to diffuseness indexes diff_idx(b)>ec_max are coded like for raw coding. Then, for the others, the elevation part is entropy coded first, followed by the azimuth part.
The elevation part consists of three components: the average elevation index, a Golomb-Rice parameter, and the reduced signed elevation distances. The average elevation index el_avg_idx is converted to signed, so that the zero value is in the middle of the signed interval of possible values, the ReorderGeneric function is applied, and the result is coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. The Golomb-Rice parameter, having an alphabet size depending on the maximum of the alphabet sizes of the elevation indexes, is coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. Finally, for each reduced signed elevation distance el_idx_dist, the ReorderGeneric function is applied to produce el_idx_dist_r, and the result is coded using the Extended Golomb-Rice method with the parameter indicated above.
For example, if the best angular precision deg_req_min used is 5 degrees, then the maximum of the elevation alphabet sizes el_alph will be el_alph_max=2 ┌90÷deg_req_min┐+1=37. In this case, the Golomb-Rice parameter values (denoted as p in the description of the Golomb-Rice method below) are limited to the interval {0, 1, 2, 3, 4}. In general, the largest potentially useful value of the Golomb-Rice parameter is ┌log2 el_alph_max┐−1, which produces binary codewords of a length equal or slightly longer than those produced by raw coding using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. The optimal value of the Golomb-Rice parameter el_gr_param is chosen by efficiently computing without coding, for each value in the interval above, the total size in bits for all the el_idx_dist_r values to be coded using the Extended Golomb-Rice method, and choosing the one which provides the smallest bit size.
The azimuth part also consists of three components: the average azimuth index, a Golomb-Rice parameter, and the reduced signed azimuth distances. The average azimuth index az_avg_idx is converted to signed, so that the zero value is in the middle of the signed interval of the possible values, the ReorderGeneric function is applied, and the result is coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. The Golomb-Rice parameter, having an alphabet size depending on the maximum of the alphabet sizes of the azimuth indexes, is coded using the EncodeQuasiUniform function. Finally, for each reduced signed azimuth distance az_idx_dist, the ReorderGeneric function is applied to produce az_idx_dist_r, and the result is coded using the Extended Golomb-Rice method with the parameter indicated above.
For example, if the best angular precision deg_req_min used is 5 degrees, then the maximum of the azimuth alphabet sizes az_alph will be az_alph_max=4 ┌90÷deg_req_min┐=72. In this case, the Golomb-Rice parameter values (denoted as p in the description of the Golomb-Rice method below) are limited to the interval {0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}. The optimal value of the Golomb-Rice parameter az_gr_param is chosen by efficiently computing, for each value in the interval above, the total size in bits for all the az_idx_dist_r values to be coded using the Extended Golomb-Rice method, and choosing the one which provides the smallest bit size.
An important property to take into account for efficient entropy coding is that each reordered reduced elevation distance el_idx_dist_r may have a different alphabet size, which is exactly the el_alph of the original elevation index value el_idx, and depends on the corresponding diffuseness index diff_idx(b). Also, each reordered reduced azimuth distance az_idx_dist_r may have a different alphabet size, which is exactly the az_alph of the original azimuth index value az_idx, and depends both on the corresponding q_el of its horizontal circle and the diffuseness index diff_idx(b).
The existing Golomb-Rice entropy coding method, with an integer parameter p≥0, is used to code an unsigned integer u. First, u is split into the least significant part with p bits, u_lsp=u mod 2p, and the most significant part u_msp=└u÷2p┘. The most significant part is coded in unary, using u_msp one bits and a terminating zero bit, and the least significant part is coded in binary.
Because arbitrarily large integers can be coded, some coding efficiency may be lost when the actual values to be coded have a known and relatively small alphabet size. Another disadvantage is the possibility of decoding an out-of-range or invalid value, or of reading a very large number of one bits, in case of a transmission error or a purposely created invalid bitstream.
The Extended Golomb-Rice method combines three improvements over the existing Golomb-Rice method, for coding a vector of values, each with a known and potentially different alphabet size u_alph. First, the alphabet size of the most significant part can be computed as u_msp_alph=┌u_alph÷2P┐. If the maximum possible value of the most significant part is coded, u_msp_alph−1, the terminating zero bit can be eliminated, because this condition can be implicitly detected at the decoder side, the modification being the existing Limited Golomb-Rice method. Additionally, for the same case when u_msp=u_msp_alph−1, the alphabet size of the least significant part u_lsp, which can be computed as u_alph−(u_msb_alph−1)·2p, may be smaller than 2p, allowing to use the EncodeQuasiUniform function instead of binary coding with p bits. This is also useful when a particular value u has an alphabet u_alph smaller than 2p. Finally, when u_msp_alph≤3 the Limited Golomb-Rice method produces codes having only one length, of p or p+1 bits, or codes having only two lengths, of p+1 and p+2 bits. The EncodeQuasiUniform function is optimal for up to two lengths, therefore it is used instead.
The threshold of 3 is a special advantageous value, because when u_msp_alph=3 the codewords of the Limited Golomb-Rice for the most significant part are 0, 10, 11; therefore, the total lengths of the code are 1+p, 2+p, and 2+p, where p is the number of bits for the least significant part; because a punctured code is optimal for up to two lengths, it is used instead, replacing both the most and least significant parts.
Furthermore, it is to be outlined that the function EncodeQuasiUniform is exactly a punctured code, which implicitly becomes a binary code when the alphabet size is a power of two. Generally, a punctured code is optimal and uniquely determined given an alphabet size; it produces codes of one or two lengths only; for 3 or more consecutive code lengths, the possible codes are not quasi-uniform anymore and there are different choices for the number of possible codes of each length.
This invention is not limited to the exact description above. Alternatively, the invention can be easily extended in the form of an inter-frame predictive coding scheme, where for each parameter band an average direction vector is computed using previous direction vectors across time, from the current frame and also optionally from previous frames, rather than computing a single average direction vector for the entire current frame and quantizing and coding it as side information. This solution will have the advantage of being more efficient in coding but also less robust against possible packet loss.
In
In
The decoded direction and diffuseness parameters typically have a third or fourth time or frequency resolution when they are provided to the audio renderer 420, where the third or fourth resolution is greater than the resolution that is inherent to these parameters when they are output by the parameter processor 300.
The parameter resolution converter 710 is configured to perform a different parameter resolution conversion with the decoded diffuseness parameters and the decoded direction parameters, since the time or frequency resolutions inherent to the decoded diffuseness parameters and the decoded direction parameters is different from each other, and, typically, the decoded diffuseness parameters have a lower time or frequency resolution compared to the decoded direction parameters. As discussed before with respect to
The result of the audio renderer 420 operating in the third or fourth high time or frequency resolution is then forwarded to a spectrum/time converter 440 that then generates the time domain multichannel audio signal 450 as has already been discussed before with respect to
The resolution converter 710 is configured to generate, from a diffuseness parameter associated with the first time or frequency resolution, a number of at least four diffuseness parameters, where two of these diffuseness parameters are for time/frequency bins being adjacent in time and the other two of those at least four diffuseness parameters are for time/frequency bins adjacent to each other in the frequency.
Since the time or frequency resolution for the diffuseness parameters is lower than for the direction parameters, the parameter resolution converter is configured to generate, for a decoded diffuseness parameter a multitude of converted diffuseness parameters and for a decoded direction parameter a second multitude of converted direction parameters, where the second multitude is higher than the first multitude.
The dequantized parameters output by block 840 can be input into an optional parameter resolution converter as discussed before with respect to
The bitstream portions for the direction parameters are illustrated in
The present invention in accordance with the second aspect may combine those two features, but the two features, i.e., the one of
When decoding with modeling was indicated by the mode bit 806, then the averages for the azimuth/elevation data in the band/frame is decoded as indicated by block 866. In block 868, distances for the azimuth/elevation information in the band are decoded and, in block 870, the corresponding quantized elevation and azimuth parameters are calculated using typically an addition operation.
Independent on whether the raw decoding mode or the decoding mode with modeling has been applied, the decoded azimuth/elevation indexes are dequantized 872 as also illustrated at 840 in
Subsequently, reference is also made to
Subsequently, Benefits and Advantages of Embodiments are summarized:
The first aspect of the present invention is directed to processing diffuseness parameters and direction parameters with first and second time or frequency resolutions and a subsequent quantization and encoding of such values. This first aspect additionally refers to grouping of parameters with different time/frequency resolutions. A further aspect is related to performing an amplitude-measure related weighting within the grouping and a further additional aspect relates to a weighting for the averaging and grouping of direction parameters using corresponding diffuseness parameters as a basis for the corresponding weights. The above aspects are also described and elaborated in the first claim set.
The second aspect of the present invention that is subsequently elaborated more in the enclosed set of examples is directed to performing quantization and coding. This aspect can be performed without features outlined in the first aspect or can be used together with the corresponding features elaborated in the first aspect.
Thus, all the different aspects as elaborated in the claims and the set of examples and as elaborated in the different dependent claims of the claims and the examples can be used independent from each other or can be used together and it is of particular advantage for a very advantageous embodiment that all aspects of the set of claims are used together with all aspects of the set of examples.
The set of examples comprises the following examples:
An inventively encoded audio signal comprising a parameter representation can be stored on a digital storage medium or a non-transitory storage medium or can be transmitted on a transmission medium such as a wireless transmission medium or a wired transmission medium such as the Internet.
Although some aspects have been described in the context of an apparatus, it is clear that these aspects also represent a description of the corresponding method, where a block or device corresponds to a method step or a feature of a method step. Analogously, aspects described in the context of a method step also represent a description of a corresponding block or item or feature of a corresponding apparatus.
Depending on certain implementation requirements, embodiments of the invention can be implemented in hardware or in software. The implementation can be performed using a digital storage medium, for example a floppy disk, a DVD, a CD, a ROM, a PROM, an EPROM, an EEPROM or a FLASH memory, having electronically readable control signals stored thereon, which cooperate (or are capable of cooperating) with a programmable computer system such that the respective method is performed.
Some embodiments according to the invention comprise a data carrier having electronically readable control signals, which are capable of cooperating with a programmable computer system, such that one of the methods described herein is performed.
Generally, embodiments of the present invention can be implemented as a computer program product with a program code, the program code being operative for performing one of the methods when the computer program product runs on a computer. The program code may for example be stored on a machine readable carrier.
Other embodiments comprise the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein, stored on a machine readable carrier or a non-transitory storage medium.
In other words, an embodiment of the inventive method is, therefore, a computer program having a program code for performing one of the methods described herein, when the computer program runs on a computer.
A further embodiment of the inventive methods is, therefore, a data carrier (or a digital storage medium, or a computer-readable medium) comprising, recorded thereon, the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein.
A further embodiment of the inventive method is, therefore, a data stream or a sequence of signals representing the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein. The data stream or the sequence of signals may for example be configured to be transferred via a data communication connection, for example via the Internet.
A further embodiment comprises a processing means, for example a computer, or a programmable logic device, configured to or adapted to perform one of the methods described herein.
A further embodiment comprises a computer having installed thereon the computer program for performing one of the methods described herein.
In some embodiments, a programmable logic device (for example a field programmable gate array) may be used to perform some or all of the functionalities of the methods described herein. In some embodiments, a field programmable gate array may cooperate with a microprocessor in order to perform one of the methods described herein. Generally, the methods may be performed by any hardware apparatus.
While this invention has been described in terms of several embodiments, there are alterations, permutations, and equivalents which will be apparent to others skilled in the art and which fall within the scope of this invention. It should also be noted that there are many alternative ways of implementing the methods and compositions of the present invention. It is therefore intended that the following appended claims be interpreted as including all such alterations, permutations, and equivalents as fall within the true spirit and scope of the present invention.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 17202393 | Nov 2017 | EP | regional |
This application is Divisional of U.S. application Ser. No. 16/867,856, filed May 6, 2020, now U.S. Pat. No. 11,367,454, which is a continuation of International Application No. PCT/EP2018/081623, filed Nov. 16, 2018, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety, and additionally claims priority from European Application No. 17202393.9, filed Nov. 17, 2017, which is also incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
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| Parent | 16867856 | May 2020 | US |
| Child | 17571970 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
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| Parent | PCT/EP2018/081623 | Nov 2018 | WO |
| Child | 16867856 | US |
