Early reflections pose a major challenge for parametric virtual acoustics systems. Reflections within a spatial impulse response (IR) must be compactly encoded to allow interactive rendering within limited resources. Encoding individual echoes is far too expensive, while the exponentially-decaying-noise model only befits late reverberation. We propose a novel statistical formulation for compactly encoding salient early reflection properties with six interpretable, orthogonal parameters capturing the loudness, echo density, temporal mean & spread, and directional mean & spread of energy arrival within the IR. Further, we propose a robust approach for additive separation of the impulse response into a coherent (specular) and incoherent (diffuse) component, rather than partitioning at a mixing time. We discuss initial results on a variety of measured IRs in indoor and outdoor spaces suggesting that salient acoustical variations across scenes are captured by the proposed parameters.
(See document for exact affiliation information.)
Click to purchase paper as a non-member or login as an AES member. If your company or school subscribes to the E-Library then switch to the institutional version. If you are not an AES member Join the AES. If you need to check your member status, login to the Member Portal.
