Acoustic signal processing apparatus, acoustic signal processing method and computer readable medium

• US 20080089531A1
• Filed: 09/21/2007
• Published: 04/17/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 09/25/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba (Toshiba Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba (Toshiba Corporation)
• Inventors: Suzuki, Kaoru, Koga, Toshiyuki
• Granted Patent: US 8,218,786 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 381/92
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 2430/20 Processing of the output signals of the acoustic transducers of an array for obtaining a desired directivity characteristic H04R2203/12 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 3/005 for combining the signals of two or more microphones specially adapted for hearing aids H04R25/407

Abstract

Hough transform is performed on the point groups forming two dimensional data to generate a plurality of loci respectively corresponding to each of the point groups in a Hough voting space. When adding a voting value to a position in the Hough voting space through which the plurality of loci passes, addition is performed by varying the voting value based on a level difference between first and second signals respectively indicated by the two pieces of frequency decomposition information.

Claims

1. An acoustic signal processing apparatus comprising:

an acoustic signal inputting unit configured to input a plurality of acoustic signals obtained by a plurality of microphones arranged at different positions;

a frequency decomposing unit configured to respectively decompose each acoustic signal into a plurality of frequency components, and for each frequency component, generate frequency decomposition information for which a signal level and a phase have been associated;

a phase difference computing unit configured to compute a phase difference between two predetermined pieces of the frequency decomposition information, for each corresponding frequency component;

a two-dimensional data converting unit configured to convert into two dimensional data made up of point groups arranged on a two-dimensional coordinate system having a frequency component function as a first axis and a phase difference function as a second axis;

a voting unit configured to perform Hough transform on the point groups, generate a plurality of loci respectively corresponding to each of the point groups in a Hough voting space, and when adding a voting value to a position in the Hough voting space through which the plurality of loci passes, perform addition by varying the voting value based on a level difference between first and second signal levels respectively indicated by the two pieces of frequency decomposition information; and

a shape detecting unit configured to retrieve a position where the voting value becomes maximum to detect, from the two-dimensional data, a shape which corresponds to the retrieved position, which indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and the phase difference, and which is used to estimate a sound source direction of each of the acoustic signals.

2. The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the shape detecting unit varies resolution used when detecting the shape that indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and the phase difference so that a resolution used when detecting an angle of the sound source direction is approximately the same across a range in which an angle of the sound source direction is detectable.

3. The apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a shape collating unit configured to deem the two pieces of frequency decomposition information compared by the phase difference computing unit to be a single unit and use detected shape for each unit to generate a plurality of sound source candidate information regarding candidates of sound sources, and associate the plurality of generated sound source candidate information.

4. The apparatus according to claim 3, further comprising:

a sound source information generating unit configured to generate sound source information based on the plurality of associated sound source candidate information, and an outputting unit configured to output the sound source information.

5. An acoustic signal processing method comprising:

inputting a plurality of acoustic signals obtained by a plurality of microphones arranged at different positions;

decomposing each acoustic signal into a plurality of frequency components, and for each frequency component, generating frequency decomposition information for which a signal level and a phase have been associated, for each of the acoustic signals;

computing a phase difference between two predetermined pieces of the frequency decomposition information, for each corresponding frequency component;

convert into two dimensional data made up of point groups arranged on a two-dimensional coordinate system having a frequency component function as a first axis and a phase difference function as a second axis;

performing Hough transform on the point groups, generating a plurality of loci respectively corresponding to each of the point groups in a Hough voting space, and when adding a voting value to a position in the Hough voting space through which the plurality of loci passes, performing addition by varying the voting value based on a level difference between first and second signal levels respectively indicated by the two pieces of frequency decomposition information; and

retrieving a position where the voting value becomes maximum to detect, from the two-dimensional data, a shape which corresponds to the retrieved position, which indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and the phase difference, and which is used to estimate a sound source direction of each of the acoustic signals.

6. The method according to claim 5, wherein the retrieving a position includes varying a resolution used when detecting the shape that indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and the phase difference so that a resolution used when detecting an angle of the sound source direction is approximately the same across a range in which an angle of the sound source direction is detectable.

7. The method according to claim 5, further comprising deeming the two pieces of frequency decomposition information to be compared to be a single unit and using detected shape for each unit to generate a plurality of sound source candidate information regarding candidates of sound sources, and associating the plurality of generated sound source candidate information.

8. The method according to claim 7, further comprising:

generating sound source information based on the plurality of associated sound source candidate information, and

outputting the sound source information.

9. A computer readable medium storing an acoustic signal processing program for causing a computer to execute instructions to perform steps of:

inputting a plurality of acoustic signals obtained by a plurality of microphones arranged at different positions;

decomposing each acoustic signal into a plurality of frequency components, and for each frequency component, generating frequency decomposition information for which a signal level and a phase have been associated for each of the acoustic signals;

compute a phase difference between two predetermined pieces of the frequency decomposition information, for each corresponding frequency component;

convert into two dimensional data made up of point groups arranged on a two-dimensional coordinate system having a frequency component function as a first axis and a phase difference function as a second axis;

performing Hough transform on the point groups, generating a plurality of loci respectively corresponding to each of the point groups in a Hough voting space, and when adding a voting value to a position in the Hough voting space through which the plurality of loci passes, performing addition by varying the voting value based on a level difference between first and second signal levels respectively indicated by the two pieces of frequency decomposition information; and

retrieving a position where the voting value becomes maximum to detect, from the two-dimensional data, a shape which corresponds to the retrieved position, which indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and, the phase difference, and which is used to estimate a sound source direction of each of the acoustic signals.

10. The medium according to claim 9, wherein the retrieving a position includes varying a resolution used when detecting the shape that indicates a proportional relationship between the frequency component and the phase difference so that a resolution used when detecting an angle of the sound source direction is approximately the same across a range in which an angle of the sound source direction is detectable.

11. The medium according to claim 9, storing the acoustic signal processing program further for causing the computer to execute to perform the step of deeming the two pieces of frequency decomposition information to be compared to be a single unit and using detected shape for each unit to generate a plurality of sound source candidate information regarding candidates of sound sources, and associating the plurality of generated sound source candidate information.

12. The medium according to claim 11, storing the acoustic signal processing program further for causing the computer to execute to perform the steps of:

generating sound source information based on the plurality of associated sound source candidate information, and

outputting the sound source information.