Method and apparatus for determining and indicating direction and type of sound

• US 20090052687A1
• Filed: 08/21/2007
• Published: 02/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/21/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Adam L. Schwartz
• Original Assignee: Adam L. Schwartz
• Inventors: Schwartz, Adam L.
• Granted Patent: US 8,111,583 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 381/92
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 3/005 for combining the signals of two or more microphones specially adapted for hearing aids H04R25/407

Abstract

A method and apparatus for determining the direction of a sound source is disclosed. The method includes determining time differences of arrival of the sound at N locations and using the differences to determine the angular direction of the source. The apparatus indicates the angle of arrival and additionally indicates the type of the sound source.

Claims

1. A method of source direction determination a remote sound source, comprising:

a. receiving at a plurality of locations sound generated from the remote sound source;

b. determining time differences of arrival by determining differences in time between the sound received at each pair of the plurality of locations;

c. associating with each of the time differences of arrival between each pair of the plurality of locations a half-plane from which the sound originated;

d. determining the source direction by an intersection of the half-planes.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein associating with each of the time differences of arrival a half-plane from which the sound originated comprises:

a. assigning a positive sign to each time differences which is greater than zero and a negative sign to each time difference which is less than zero;

b. assigning the half-plane according to the signs.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the sound is received by two microphones and the remote sound source direction is localized to one of two half-planes relative to the locations.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the sound is received at more than two locations and the remote sound source direction is localized to one of a plurality of sectors, the plurality comprising at most twice a number of sectors as the number of locations, and the sectors being defined by the intersection of the half-planes.

5. The method of claim 4 in which each of the plurality of locations is spaced substantially equally around a circle.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising displaying a direction of the remote sound source on a visual display.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein determining the time difference of arrival comprises:

a. filtering the sound received at each of the plurality of locations;

b. computing cross-correlation of the filtered sounds.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

a. filtering the sound received at each of the plurality of locations, each filter corresponding to one of a set of sound types;

b. monitoring output of each of the plurality of filters;

c. selecting at least one of the set of sound types based on the monitored outputs;

d. displaying an indication of selected at least one of the set of sound types.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

a. estimating an ambient noise level;

b. wherein determining the time differences of arrival is initiated when a signal level exceeds the ambient noise level by a margin.

10. A method of indicating a direction of a sound source relative to an automobile, comprising:

a. receiving, at a plurality of microphones attached to the automobile, sound originating from the sound source;

b. determining the direction of the sound source from signals received at the plurality of microphones;

c. providing a visual indication of the direction of the sound source to a driver of the automobile.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein determining the direction of the sound source comprises:

a. computing time differences of arrival of the signals received at the plurality of microphones;

b. associating with the time differences of arrival between each pair of the plurality of locations a half-plane separating the pair, with boundary perpendicular to the direction connecting the pair, from which the sound originated;

c. localizing the sound source to a region of space relative to the automobile based on an intersection of half-planes.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the microphones are substantially equally spaced around a circle.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein computing the time differences of arrival comprises:

a. filtering the signals received by each microphone;

b. computing cross-correlation of the filtered signals.

14. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

a. filtering the sound received at each of the plurality of locations, each filter corresponding to one of a set of sound types;

b. monitoring output of each of the plurality of filters;

c. selecting at least one of the set of sound types based on the monitored outputs;

d. displaying an indication of selected at least one of the set of sound types.

15. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

a. estimating an ambient noise level;

b. wherein determining the direction of the sound is initiated when a signal level exceeds the ambient noise level by a margin.

16. The method of claim 10 in which the plurality of microphones consists of directional microphones pointing outwards and wherein the direction of the sound source is determined by which microphone receives the largest signal.

17. A system for determining a direction of a sound source relative to a automobile, comprising:

a. a plurality of separately located microphones attached to the automobile for receiving sound from the sound source;

b. a processor for receiving electronic representations of the received sound from each of the plurality of microphones, and determining time differences of arrival of the received sound between each of the microphones, and determining the direction of the sound source from the time differences of arrival;

c. a display controllable by the processor to provide an indication of the direction of the sound source.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the processor determines the time differences of arrival by applying filtering to the electronic representation of the sound and then computing the cross-correlation of the filtered signals.

19. The system of claim 17 wherein the processor monitors the ambient noise level and initiates determining of the direction of the sound source when the received sound substantially exceeds the ambient noise level.

20. The system of claim 17 wherein the type of sound is identified from one of a set of sounds and the type of sound is indicated on the display.