JP2007232492A - Method and apparatus for measuring transfer characteristic - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enable a transfer characteristic such as an impulse response or the like to be measured such that its S/N ratio is improved. <P>SOLUTION: A measurement sound is generated by a loudspeaker 13 which is arranged in a measurement space 12, in response to a TSP signal. The generation interval of the TSP signal is controlled by a measurement signal generation interval control section 16 so as to be increased by a predetermined period. A microphone 14 starts recording a measured sound, in synchronization with outputting of an instruction for generating the TSP signal. A measured signal recording section 19 acquires an output waveform of the microphone 14. The output waveform represents a recorded sound result of the measured sound being generated and is influenced by the transfer characteristic of the measurement space 12. A convolution computing section 20 generates an impulse response by applying a convolution to the output waveform which is acquired by the microphone 14, by using a TSP inverse filter. The TSP signal is output multiple times at controlled intervals, and impulse responses corresponding to these outputs are subjected to a synchronous adding operation. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a transfer characteristic measuring method and apparatus, and more particularly to a transfer characteristic measuring method and apparatus capable of improving the S / N ratio.

  In an acoustic piano, the damper that holds the strings is removed from the strings with a damper pedal, and not only the strings that are actually played but also all other strings are vibrated by resonance. In an electronic musical instrument such as an electronic piano or an electronic organ, a function of simulating a string resonance sound by operating the damper pedal may be required. In order to simulate this string resonance sound, for example, a normal musical sound is input to a reverberation adding circuit called reverb, and a reverberation sound based on the output of the reverberation adding circuit is generated when the damper pedal is depressed. .

  In the generation of reverberant sound, it is desirable to perform digital processing of a signal in consideration of reflection and interference that vary depending on the arrangement of the strings of the acoustic piano and the shape of the space actually played. Therefore, an impulse response is measured and the measurement result is used.

  When measuring the impulse response of an acoustic space such as a hall, if the background noise is large, a sufficient S / N ratio may not be obtained with a single measurement. Therefore, a method is used in which measurement signals (for example, impulses) are generated a plurality of times at equal intervals, and the responses are added in synchronization at each signal generation interval and averaged. Processing by this method is called synchronous addition processing, and only reproducible measurement signals are added and amplified, and randomly generated noise components are attenuated by addition, resulting in an S / N ratio. Can be improved.

Impulse response results are widely used not only for electronic pianos but also for audio equipment. For example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2000-097763 describes an impulse response collection method suitable for the surround effect of performing synchronous addition processing. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 10-210592 discloses a howling detector for detecting howling caused by sound sneaking from a speaker to a microphone, based on the time from the start of measurement of an impulse response of an acoustic system to the decay of a predetermined value. What detects the presence or absence of occurrence is described.
JP 2000-097663 A JP-A-10-210592

  The synchronous addition process is effective in reducing uncorrelated background noise. However, since the measurement signals are generated at equal intervals, it is not possible to reduce a steady signal that is a signal generation interval in which the generation cycle of the measurement signal is exactly an integral multiple. For example, periodic noise generated by an air conditioner or measurement equipment may not be reduced. As a result, there has been a problem that a sufficient S / N ratio cannot be secured, or that the periodic noise is mistakenly regarded as a part of the measurement signal.

  In view of the above problems, an object of the present invention is to provide a transfer characteristic measuring method and apparatus capable of reducing not only background noise but also periodic noise and improving the S / N ratio such as impulse response. And

  In order to solve the above problems and achieve the object, the present invention collects a measurement sound that is sounded a plurality of times in a space in which a sound field is formed, and collects a collected sound signal representing the measurement sound as the measurement sound. In the transfer characteristic measurement method, the results of the addition and averaging are recorded as the sound field transfer characteristics, and the measured sound is generated at a sound generation interval that is changed by a predetermined time. The point has the first feature.

  In addition, the present invention has a second feature in that the sounding interval of the measurement sound is changed in a direction to increase by a predetermined time.

  Further, the present invention has a third feature in that the measurement sound is generated by an impulse signal.

  Furthermore, the present invention has a fourth feature in that the scheduled time corresponding to the change in the sounding interval is set to be shorter than one cycle of the upper limit frequency in the preset attenuation target frequency band.

  Still further, in the present invention, the number of sounding times of the measurement sound is set so that a product of a scheduled time corresponding to a change in the sounding interval is longer than one cycle of a lower limit frequency in a preset attenuation target frequency band. There is a fifth feature.

  In the present invention having the first to fifth characteristics, a measurement sound generated by an impulse signal or the like is sounded in a sound field at a sound generation interval that changes in a direction of increasing or decreasing by a predetermined time, and a sound collection signal of the measurement sound Is added and averaged in synchronization with the sound production interval to obtain the transfer characteristics. In this way, by using sound generation intervals that are shifted by a predetermined time instead of equal intervals, not only background noise that is not periodic, but also noise that has a constant period, such as motors and pumps, is reduced. The S / N ratio of the collected sound signal is improved, and the transfer characteristic with high accuracy can be measured.

  In the present invention having the third feature, an impulse response to the impulse signal can be acquired as a transfer characteristic.

  In the present invention having the fourth feature, noise having a wavelength longer than an increment of a plurality of measurement sound generation intervals can be attenuated.

  In the present invention having the fifth feature, the sum of the increments of the plurality of measurement sound generation intervals, that is, the shift amount of the measurement sound generation interval from the start to the end of the measurement is made longer than one period of the noise frequency. The noise can be attenuated by synchronous addition.

  Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a hardware configuration of the impulse response measuring apparatus according to the embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, a CPU 1 controls each part shown in the figure via a system bus 2. The system bus 2 includes an address bus, a data bus, and a control signal line. The ROM 3 has a program memory 3a for storing programs used in the CPU 1 and a data memory 3b for storing various data including at least measurement sound data. The RAM 4 temporarily stores various data generated in the control by the CPU 1. An operation panel 5 including switches for setting various states including the operation switch 5a is provided, and information set from the operation panel 5 is supplied to the CPU 1.

  The sound collection system 6 is a system that measures an impulse response in a measurement space such as a hall. The impulse response collected by the sound collection system 6 is converted into digital data by the A / D converter 7. This digital data is input to and stored in the waveform sound collection / reproduction unit 8.

  The waveform memory 9 stores measurement sound waveform data. The waveform sound collection / reproduction unit 8 reads the measurement sound waveform from the waveform memory 9 and generates a measurement signal. The generated measurement signal is converted into an analog signal via the D / A converter 10 and supplied to the sound system 11. The sound system 11 is composed of an amplifier, a speaker, and the like, and causes the output signal of the D / A converter 10 to sound externally.

  Next, the main function of the impulse response measuring apparatus will be described. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing main functions of the impulse response measuring apparatus. In FIG. 1, the sound collection system 6 is composed of a microphone 14 disposed in a sound field or measurement space 12. The microphone 14 is attached to a dummy head, for example. The measurement signal generator 15 generates an impulse signal input to the speaker 13. In the present embodiment, a time stretched pulse (TSP signal) is used as the impulse signal. The TSP signal is a pulse in which impulse energy is dispersed along the time axis.

  The measurement signal generation interval, that is, the TSP signal generation interval, is controlled by the measurement signal generation interval control unit 16 so as to change every scheduled time. Here, an example in which the TSP signal is controlled to increase will be described. The measurement signal generation instruction unit 17 inputs a TSP signal generation instruction to the measurement signal generation unit 15 at the TSP signal generation interval controlled by the measurement signal generation interval control unit 16. The measurement signal generator 15 receives the TSP signal generation instruction and generates a TSP signal. The speaker 13 generates sound based on the TSP signal generated by the measurement signal generator 15, that is, measurement sound.

  In synchronization with the measurement signal generation instruction unit 17 outputting the TSP signal generation instruction, the recording instruction unit 18 generates a measurement sound recording instruction. A microphone 14 is connected to the measured signal recording unit 19, and the output waveform of the microphone 14 is captured in response to a recording instruction from the recording instruction unit 18. This output waveform is the sound collection result of the sounded measurement sound, and includes the influence of the transfer characteristics of the measurement space 12.

  The convolution operation unit 20 convolves the inverse TSP signal (TSP inverse filter) input from the inverse TSP signal generation unit 21 with the output waveform captured from the microphone 14. An impulse response is obtained by this convolution operation. The TSP signal is output a number of times at intervals determined by the measurement signal generation interval control unit 16, and the impulse response is stored in the buffer 22. The impulse responses stored in the buffer 22 are input to the synchronous addition calculation unit 23, added in synchronization at the TSP signal generation interval, and further averaged.

  When TSP signals are generated at equal intervals and the collected sound results are synchronously added, background noise can be reduced, but periodic noise may not be reduced. Therefore, in this embodiment, the TSP signal generation interval to which an increment is added every generation is set so that the generation interval of the TSP signal is not equal. Thus, when the TSP signal is generated at a shifted interval, the synchronously added impulse response does not include noise that is not attenuated at all.

  FIG. 3 is a flowchart of the impulse response measurement process. The impulse response measuring apparatus will be described with reference to FIG. In FIG. 3, in step S <b> 1, an initial value (basic interval) L of the TSP signal generation interval is set in the measurement signal generation interval control unit 16. In step S2, an increment I added to the basic interval L is set. In step S3, the buffer 22 is cleared and initialized. In step S4, “1” is set to the variable N.

  In step S5, in response to a recording instruction from the recording instruction unit 18, the acquisition of waveform data, which is a response signal (TSP response) of the measurement sound output from the microphone 14, is started. In step S <b> 6, the measurement signal generation unit 15 generates a TSP signal according to an instruction from the measurement signal generation instruction unit 17. In step S7, the capturing of the output waveform data of the microphone 14 as the signal under measurement is terminated.

  In step S8, it is determined whether or not the scheduled waveform data has been captured, that is, whether or not the TSP responses for the predetermined number of times have been measured. If step S8 is negative, the process proceeds to step S9 to calculate the waiting time T. The waiting time T is the time until the next TSP signal generation, that is, the TSP signal generation interval. The waiting time T is calculated by the following equation (1). T = L + I &times; (N-1) (Formula 1). In step S10, the generation of the TSP signal is waited until the time T elapses.

  After the elapse of time T, the process proceeds to step S11, and the number of measurements N is incremented. In step S12, an impulse response is calculated by convolving a TSP inverse filter with the acquired TSP response. In step S13, the impulse response (waveform data) is added to the impulse response captured so far by the synchronous addition processing unit.

  If the measurement of the TSP signal is performed a predetermined number of times, step S8 becomes affirmative and the process proceeds to step S14. In step S14, the waveform data subjected to the addition calculation process in step S13 is divided by the number of times N and averaged. In step S15, the division result of the waveform data is output.

  A method for determining the TSP signal generation interval will be described. In order to attenuate noise by synchronous addition, the sum of increments of a plurality of TSP signal generation intervals, that is, the shift amount of the TSP signal generation interval from the start to the end of measurement, is required for one period of the noise frequency. If the sampling frequency fs is 48 kilohertz (kHz), noise of 20 hertz (Hz) corresponds to 2400 points.

  Noise at frequencies where the increment I corresponds to an integer multiple of the period is not attenuated at all. Therefore, in order to attenuate all frequency components of noise, the increment I is preferably set to one point. However, in order to attenuate 20 Hz noise with the increment I as one point, the number of TSP signal generations must be 2400, which is not practical.

  Therefore, the increment I is set by limiting the frequency of noise to be attenuated, and in this embodiment, the frequency range of noise to be attenuated is 20 Hz to 3 kHz. If the sampling frequency fs = 48 kHz, the period of 3 kHz is 16 points. Therefore, if the increment I is 16 points, noise of 3 kHz is not attenuated, but noise of lower frequencies can be attenuated. When a signal of 2400 points at 20 Hz is covered by an increment of 16 points, 2400/16 = 150 is calculated, and the number of ITSP signal generation times is 150 times. Note that the basic interval L was set to be 2 seconds in total of the TSP signal length and the silent portion.

  When a TSP signal was generated under the conditions set as described above, and the collected results were synchronously added and FFT of the silent portion was performed, the noise component was reduced by 10 to 20 decibels (dB). However, noise components having frequencies such as 3 kHz, 6 kHz, and 9 kHz that are multiples of 3 kHz could not be reduced, but this is the result as set.

  FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of an experimental result verifying the attenuation effect of the noise component by the impulse response measuring apparatus according to the present embodiment. In this experiment, a sine wave of a predetermined frequency was superimposed on the TSP signal waveform with a small amplitude, and this was added synchronously to measure the RMS (rms value) of the silent part to examine how much the sine wave was reduced. . In FIG. 4, the horizontal axis represents frequency, and the vertical axis represents RMS. The superimposed sine wave was changed between 40 Hz and 12 kHz. In FIG. 4, it can be seen that the sine wave is attenuated in the region where the frequency of the superimposed sine wave is low. As the frequency of the sine wave increases, the degree of attenuation tends to decrease. Also in this example, the sine wave is not attenuated at all at frequencies of multiples of 3 kHz, such as 3 kHz, 6 kHz, and 12 kHz.

  FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram showing a noise component attenuation effect by a conventional method in which the TSP signal generation interval is not changed. As shown in this figure, in the conventional method, it can be seen that there are many frequencies at which the sine wave is not attenuated over the entire band of the measurement range.

  From the comparison between FIG. 4 and FIG. 5, it can be seen that the impulse response measuring apparatus of this embodiment is effective in reducing periodic noise.

  In addition, this invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiment, A various deformation | transformation is possible. For example, the TSP signal generation interval may not be changed in the direction in which the increment I is added to the basic interval L, but may be changed in a direction to decrease from the basic interval L by a predetermined time.

  Further, instead of calculating and changing the TSP signal generation interval in real time, waveform data including a large number of TSP signals having gradually changing intervals is formed in advance, and based on this waveform data. Sound may be generated from a speaker.

It is a block diagram which shows the principal part function of the impulse response measuring device which concerns on one Embodiment of this invention. It is a block diagram which shows the hardware constitutions of the impulse response measuring apparatus which concerns on one Embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows operation | movement of an impulse response measuring apparatus. It is a schematic diagram of the experimental result which verified the attenuation | damping effect of the noise component by the impulse response measuring apparatus by this embodiment. It is a schematic diagram which shows the attenuation effect of the noise component by the conventional method.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... CPU, 6 ... Sound collection system, 8 ... Waveform sound collection / reproduction part, 12 ... Measurement space, 15 ... Measurement signal generation part, 16 ... Measurement signal generation interval control part, 23 ... Synchronous addition calculating part

Claims (10)

Collecting the measurement sound that is sounded multiple times in the space where the sound field is formed, adding and averaging the collected sound signals representing the measurement sound in synchronization with the sound generation interval of the measurement sound, and averaging the addition In the transfer characteristic measuring method for recording the result as the transfer characteristic of the sound field,
The transfer characteristic measuring method, wherein the measurement sound is sounded at a sounding interval changed by a predetermined time.   The transfer characteristic measuring method according to claim 1, wherein the sound generation interval of the measurement sound is changed in a direction of increasing by a predetermined time.   3. The transfer characteristic measuring method according to claim 1, wherein the measurement sound is generated by an impulse signal.   The scheduled time corresponding to the change in the sounding interval is set to be shorter than one cycle of the upper limit frequency in a preset attenuation target frequency band. Transfer characteristic measurement method.   The number of sounding times of the measurement sound is set such that a product of the scheduled time corresponding to the change in the sounding interval is longer than one cycle of the lower limit frequency in a preset attenuation target frequency band. The transfer characteristic measuring method according to claim 1. In a transfer characteristic measuring device including a measurement sound generating unit that generates a measurement sound in a space where a sound field is formed, and a sound collection unit of the generated measurement sound,
A measurement sound generation instruction means for giving an instruction to the measurement sound sound generation means to sound the measurement sound a plurality of times at a predetermined sound generation interval;
A measurement sound generation interval control means for controlling the sound generation interval to change by a predetermined time; and
An arithmetic means for adding and averaging a plurality of collected sound signals collected by the sound collecting means in synchronization with the sound generation interval;
A transfer characteristic measuring apparatus comprising: storage means for recording the result calculated by the calculating means as the transfer characteristic of the sound field.   7. The transfer characteristic measuring apparatus according to claim 6, wherein the measurement sound generation interval control means is configured to control the sound generation interval to change in an increasing direction by a predetermined time.   The transfer characteristic measuring apparatus according to claim 6 or 7, wherein the measurement sound is generated by an impulse signal.   The scheduled time corresponding to the change in the sounding interval is set to be shorter than one cycle of the upper limit frequency in a preset attenuation target frequency band. Transfer characteristic measuring device.   The number of sounding times of the measurement sound is set such that a product of the scheduled time corresponding to the change in the sounding interval is longer than one cycle of the lower limit frequency in a preset attenuation target frequency band. The transfer characteristic measuring device according to any one of claims 6 to 9.

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