Sound collection apparatus, sound collection method, recording medium recording sound collection program, and dictation method

• US 10,783,903 B2
• Filed: 05/02/2018
• Issued: 09/22/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 05/08/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: OM Digital Solutions Corporation
• Original Assignee: Olympus Corporation
• Inventors: Tanaka, Kazutaka, Nonaka, Osamu, Osa, Kazuhiko
• Primary Examiner(s): Yen, Eric
• Application Number:
  US15/969,020
• Publication Number:
  US 20180322896A1
• Time in Patent Office: 874 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/20 Speech recognition techniques specially adapted for robustness in adverse environments, e.g. in noise, of stress induced speech G10L21/02 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/26 Speech to text systems G10L15/08 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2021/02163 Only one microphone
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2021/02165 Two microphones, one receiving mainly the noise signal and the other one mainly the speech signal
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2021/02166 Microphone arrays; Beamforming
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/02 Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation reducing echo effects in line transmission systems H04B3/20; echo suppression in hands-free telephones H04M9/08
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/0208 Noise filtering
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/0232 Processing in the frequency domain
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/84 for discriminating voice from noise
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 1/406 microphones
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 3/005 for combining the signals of two or more microphones specially adapted for hearing aids H04R25/407

Abstract

A sound collection apparatus includes: a sound collection unit including a microphone configured to collect sound; a noise determination unit configured to determine noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit; and a presentation unit configured to perform presentation based on a determination result by the noise determination unit. With this configuration, presentation is performed to indicate environmental noise at sound collection for dictation, which leads to improved efficiency of dictation work.

Claims

1. A sound collection apparatus comprising:

a sound collection unit configured to collect sound, the sound collection unit comprises;

a plurality of microphones, and

a directionality control circuit configured to control directionality of the sound collection unit through the plurality of microphones;

a noise determination unit configured to determine noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit and to determine distribution of the noise in dictation by changing the directionality of the sound collection unit through the directionality control circuit;

a presentation device configured to perform presentation based on a determination result by the noise determination unit;

a noise information recorder configured to record information of the noise distribution determined by the noise determination unit;

a posture determination sensor configured to determine a posture of the sound collection unit; and

a processor configured to cause the directionality control circuit to control the directionality of the sound collection unit so that a noise level at sound collection is decreased based on a determination result by the posture determination sensor and the information of the noise distribution.

2. A sound collection apparatus comprising:

a sound collection unit including a microphone configured to collect sound;

a noise determination unit configured to determine noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit;

a presentation device configured to perform presentation based on a determination result by the noise determination unit;

a noise reduction circuit configured to execute noise reduction processing of removing a noise component from the voice collected by the sound collection unit; and

a communication device configured to externally transmit the voice collected by the sound collection unit and sound obtained through the noise reduction processing by the noise reduction circuit.

3. A sound collection apparatus comprising:

a sound collection unit configured to collect sound, the sound collection unit comprises;

a plurality of microphones, and

a directionality control circuit configured to control directionality of the sound collection unit through the plurality of microphones;

a noise determination unit configured to determine noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit and to determine distribution of the noise in dictation by changing the directionality of the sound collection unit through the directionality control circuit;

a presentation device configured to perform presentation based on a determination result by the noise determination unit;

a noise information recorder configured to record information of the noise distribution determined by the noise determination unit;

a noise reduction circuit configured to execute noise reduction processing of removing a noise component from the voice collected by the sound collection unit; and

a communication device configured to externally transmit the voice collected by the sound collection unit, the voice obtained through the noise reduction processing by the noise reduction circuit, and information of noise in a duration of sound collection by the sound collection unit.

4. A sound collection method comprising:

a procedure of collecting sound by a sound collection unit including a plurality of microphones;

a procedure of determining noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit performed while a sound collection range of the sound collection unit is set to be a first range by a directionality control circuit configured to control directionality of the sound collection unit;

a presentation procedure of performing presentation based on a determination result of the noise; and

a procedure of performing the sound collection for the dictation while the sound collection range of the sound collection unit is set to be a second range smaller than the first range by the directionality control circuit.

5. A sound collection method comprising:

a procedure of collecting sound by a sound collection unit including a plurality of microphones;

a procedure of determining noise in dictation based on voice collected by the sound collection unit performed while a sound collection range of the sound collection unit is set to be a first range by a directionality control circuit configured to control directionality of the sound collection unit;

a presentation procedure of performing presentation based on a determination result of the noise;

a procedure of determining, when the noise in dictation is larger than a predetermined level, distribution of the noise in dictation by changing a sound collection direction while the sound collection range of the sound collection unit is set to be a second range smaller than the first range by the directionality control circuit;

a procedure of recording information of the noise distribution; and

a procedure of performing sound collection by causing the directionality control circuit to control a sound collection direction of the sound collection unit so that a level of noise at the sound collection unit becomes smaller than a predetermined level based on a determination result of a posture of the sound collection unit and the information of the noise distribution.

6. A dictation method comprising:

a procedure of reading, from a recorder recording first sound collected by a sound collection unit, second sound acquired by performing noise reduction processing on the collected first sound, and information of noise in a duration of sound collection by the sound collection unit, and generating a document by performing first dictation processing through voice recognition of the read second sound;

a procedure of generating, when the document cannot be generated by the first dictation processing, a document by reading the second sound and the noise information and performing second dictation processing through voice recognition of third sound acquired by adding noise based on the noise information to the read second sound; and

a procedure of generating, when the document cannot be generated by the second dictation processing, a document by performing third dictation processing through voice recognition of fourth sound acquired by performing noise reduction processing on the first sound.