Classifications

• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/038—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation using band spreading techniques
  • G10L21/0388—Details of processing therefor
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L19/00—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis
  • G10L19/02—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis using spectral analysis, e.g. transform vocoders or subband vocoders
  • G10L19/0204—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis using spectral analysis, e.g. transform vocoders or subband vocoders using subband decomposition
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L19/00—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis
  • G10L19/02—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis using spectral analysis, e.g. transform vocoders or subband vocoders
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L19/00—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis
  • G10L19/012—Comfort noise or silence coding
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L19/00—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis
  • G10L19/02—Speech or audio signals analysis-synthesis techniques for redundancy reduction, e.g. in vocoders; Coding or decoding of speech or audio signals, using source filter models or psychoacoustic analysis using spectral analysis, e.g. transform vocoders or subband vocoders
  • G10L19/028—Noise substitution, i.e. substituting non-tonal spectral components by noisy source
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/0208—Noise filtering
  • G10L21/0216—Noise filtering characterised by the method used for estimating noise
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/0208—Noise filtering
  • G10L21/0216—Noise filtering characterised by the method used for estimating noise
  • G10L21/0232—Processing in the frequency domain
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/0316—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation by changing the amplitude
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/0316—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation by changing the amplitude
  • G10L21/0364—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation by changing the amplitude for improving intelligibility
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L21/00—Speech or voice signal processing techniques to produce another audible or non-audible signal, e.g. visual or tactile, in order to modify its quality or its intelligibility
  • G10L21/02—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation
  • G10L21/038—Speech enhancement, e.g. noise reduction or echo cancellation using band spreading techniques
• • G—PHYSICS
  • G10—MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS; ACOUSTICS
  • G10L—SPEECH ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES OR SPEECH SYNTHESIS; SPEECH RECOGNITION; SPEECH OR VOICE PROCESSING TECHNIQUES; SPEECH OR AUDIO CODING OR DECODING
  • G10L25/00—Speech or voice analysis techniques not restricted to a single one of groups G10L15/00 - G10L21/00
  • G10L25/03—Speech or voice analysis techniques not restricted to a single one of groups G10L15/00 - G10L21/00 characterised by the type of extracted parameters
  • G10L25/21—Speech or voice analysis techniques not restricted to a single one of groups G10L15/00 - G10L21/00 characterised by the type of extracted parameters the extracted parameters being power information

Definitions

• the suggested technology relates to the encoding and decoding of audio signals, and especially to supporting Bandwidth Extension (BWE) of harmonic audio signals.
• BWE Bandwidth Extension
• Transform based coding is the most commonly used scheme in audio compression/transmission systems of today.
• the major steps in such a scheme is to first convert a short block of the signal waveform into the frequency domain by a suitable transform, e.g., DFT (Discrete Fourier transform), DCT (Discrete Cosine Transform), or MDCT (Modified Discrete Cosine Transform).
• DFT Discrete Fourier transform
• DCT Discrete Cosine Transform
• MDCT Modified Discrete Cosine Transform
• the waveform to be encoded is transformed to the frequency domain.
• One commonly used transform used for this purpose is the so-called Modified Discrete Cosine Transform (MDCT).
• MDCT Modified Discrete Cosine Transform
• the thus obtained frequency domain transform vector is split into spectrum envelope (slowly varying energy) and spectrum residual.
• the spectrum residual is obtained by normalizing the obtained frequency domain vector with said spectrum envelope.
• the spectrum envelope is quantized, and quantization indices are transmitted to the decoder.
• the quantized spectrum envelope is used as an input to a bit distribution algorithm, and bits for encoding of the residual vectors are distributed based on the characteristics of the spectrum envelope.
• residual vectors residual vectors or "sub-vectors”
• Some residual vectors do not receive any bits and have to be noise-filled or bandwidth-extended.
• the coding of residual vectors is a two step procedure; first, the amplitudes of the vector elements are coded, and next the sign (which should not be confused with "phase", which is associated with e.g. Fourier transforms) of the non-zero elements is encoded. Quantization indices for the residual's amplitude and sign are transmitted to the decoder, where residual and spectrum envelope are combined, and finally transformed back to time domain.
• One way of improving the quality of an audio signal, which is to be conveyed using a low or moderate bitrate, is to focus the available bits to accurately represent the lower frequencies in the audio signal. Then, BWE techniques may be used to model the higher frequencies based on the lower frequencies, which only requires a low number of bits.
• the background for these techniques is that the sensitivity of the human auditory system is frequency dependent. In particular, the human auditory system, i.e. our hearing, is less accurate for higher frequencies.
• a method is suggested in a transform audio decoder.
• the method being for supporting bandwidth extension, BWE, of a harmonic audio signal.
• the suggested method may comprise reception of a plurality of gain values associated with a frequency band b and a number of adjacent frequency bands of band b..
• the suggested method further comprises
• the method comprisesdetermining of whether a reconstructed corresponding band b' of a bandwidth extended frequency region comprises a spectral peak. Further, if the band comprises at least one spectral peak, the method comprises setting the gain value G b associated with band b' to a first valuebased on the received plurality of gain values. If the band does not comprise any spectral peak, the method comprises setting the gain value G b associated with band b' to a second value based on the received plurality of gain values. Thus, the bringing of gain values into agreement with peak positions in the bandwidth extended part of the spectrum is enabled.
• the method may comprise receiving a parameter or coefficient a reflecting a relation between the peak energy and the noise-floor energy of at least a section of the high frequency part of an original signal.
• the method may further comprise mixing transform coefficients of a corresponding reconstructed high frequency section with noise, based on the received coefficient a.
• a transform audio decoder for supporting bandwidth extension, BWE, of a harmonic audio signal.
• the transform audio codec may comprise functional units adapted to perform the actions described above.
• a transform audio encoder, or codec is suggested, comprising functional units adapted to derive and provide one or more parameters enabling the noise mixing described herein, when provided to a transform audio decoder.
• a user terminal is suggested, which comprises a transform audio codec according to the second aspect.
• the user terminal may be a device such as a mobile terminal, a tablet, a computer, a smart phone, or the like.
• Figure 1 shows a harmonic audio spectrum, i.e. the spectrum of an harmonic audio signal. This type of spectrum is typical for e.g., single instrument sounds, vocal sounds, etc.
• Figure 2 shows a bandwidth extended harmonic audio spectrum.
• Figure 3a shows the BWE spectrum (also shown in figure 2) scaled with corresponding BWE band gains G b , as received by the decoder.
• the BWE part of the spectrum is severely distorted.
• Figure 3b shows the BWE spectrum scaled with modified BWE band gains TM d , as suggested herein.
• the BWE part of the spectrum gets the desired shape.
• Figures 4a and 4b are flow charts illustrating the actions in a procedure in a transform audio decoder, according to exemplifying embodiments.
• Figure 5 is a block diagram illustrating a transform audio decoder, according to an exemplifying embodiment.
• Figure 6 is a flow chart illustrating actions in a procedure in a transform audio encoder, according to an exemplifying embodiment.
• Figure 7 is a block diagram illustrating a transform audio encoder, according to an exemplifying embodiment.
• Figure 8 is a block diagram illustrating an arrangement in a transform audio decoder, according to an exemplifying embodiment.
• the herein described solution relates to a novel method to control the band gains in a bandwidth extended region based on information about the positions of the peaks. Further, the herein suggested BWE algorithm may control the 'spectral peaks to noise-floor ratio', by means of transmitted noise-mix levels. This results in BWE which preserves the amount of structure in the extended high-frequencies.
• Figure 1 shows a frequency spectrum of a harmonic audio signal, which may also be denoted a harmonic spectra. As can be seen from the figure, the spectrum comprises peaks. This type of spectrum is typical for e.g. sounds from a single instrument, such as a flute, or vocal sounds, etc.
• two parts of a spectrum of a harmonic audio signal will be
• Figure 2 shows a spectrum of a harmonic audio signal.
• the two parts discussed below can be seen as the lower part to the left of the BWE crossover frequency and the upper part to the right of the BWE crossover frequency.
• the original spectrum i.e. the spectrum of the original audio signal (as seen at the encoder side) is illustrated in light gray.
• the bandwidth extended part of the spectrum is illustrated in dark/darker gray.
• the bandwidth extended part of the spectrum is not encoded by the encoder, but is recreated at the decoder by use of the received lower part of the spectrum, as previously described.
• both the original (light-gray) spectrum and the BWE (dark-gray) spectrum can be seen for the higher frequencies.
• the original spectrum for the higher frequencies is unknown to the decoder, with the exception of a gain value for each BWE band (or high frequency band).
• the BWE bands are separated by dashed lines in figure 2.
• Figure 3a could be studied for a better understanding of the problem of mismatch between gain values and peak positions in a bandwidth extended part of a spectrum.
• the original spectrum comprises a peak, but the recreated BWE spectrum does not comprise a peak. This can be seen in band 202 in figure 2.
• the gain which is calculated for the original band
• Band 304a in figure 3a represents the opposite situation, i.e. that the corresponding band of the original spectrum does not comprise a peak, but the corresponding band of the recreated BWE spectrum comprises a peak.
• the obtained gain for the band is calculated for a low- energy band.
• the situation shown in band 302a is worse for a listener than the situation in band 304a for various reasons. That is, simply described; it is typically more unpleasant for a listener to experience an abnormal presence of a sound component than an abnormal absence of a sound component.
• the first step in the BWE algorithm is to calculate gains for all bands:
• the second step (which is optional) in the BWE algorithm is to calculate a noise-mix parameter or coefficient a , which is a function of e.g. the average peak energy E p and average noise-floor energy E n j- 0 f the BWE spectra, as:
• the parameter a has been derived according to (3) below.
• the exact expression used may be selected in different ways, e.g. depending on what is suitable for the type of codec or quantizer to be used, etc..
• the peak and noise-floor energies can be calculated e.g. by tracking of the respective max and min spectrum energy.
• the noise-mix parameter a may be quantized using a low number of bits.
• a is quantized with 2 bits.
• the parameter a is transmitted to the decoder.
• the BWE region can be split into two or more sections 's', and a noise-mix parameter a s could be calculated, independently, in each of these sections. In such a case, the encoder would transmit a set of noise-mix parameters to the decoder, e.g. one per section.
• the decoder extracts, from a bit-stream, the set of calculated quantized gains G b (one for each band) and one or more quantized noise-mix parameters or factors a .
• the decoder also receives the quantized transform coefficients for the low-frequency part of the spectrum, i.e. the part of the spectrum (of the harmonic audio signal) that was encoded, as opposed to the high-frequency part, which is to be bandwidth extended.
• X b be a set of energy-normalized, quantized low-frequency coefficients. These coefficients are then mixed with noise, e.g. pre-generated noise stored e.g. in a noise codebook 6 . Using pre-generated, pre-stored noise gives an opportunity to ensure the quality of the noise, i.e. that it does not comprise any unintentional discrepancies or deviations. However, the noise could alternatively be generated "on the fly", when needed.
• the coefficients X b could be mixed with the noise in the noise codebook 6 e.g. as follows:
• the range for the noise-mix parameter or factor could be set in different ways.
• the range for the noise-mix factor has been set to
• noise-mix operation creates a vector that better resembles the statistical properties of the high- frequency part of the spectrum of the original signal, as compared to a BWE high- frequency spectrum region consisting of a flipped or translated low-frequency spectrum region.
• the noise mix operation can be performed independently on different parts of the BWE region, e.g. if multiple noise-mix factors (a) are provided and received.
• the set of received quantized gains G b is used directly on the corresponding bands in the BWE region.
• these received quantized gains G b are first modified, e,g, when appropriate, based on information about the BWE spectrum peak positions.
• the required information about the positions of the peaks can be extracted from the low-frequency region information in the bit-stream, or be estimated by a peak picking algorithm on the quantized transform coefficients for the low-band (or the derived coefficients of the BWE band).
• the information about the peaks in the low-frequency region may then be translated to the high- frequency (BWE) region. That is, when the high-band (BWE) signal is derived from the low-band signal, the algorithm can register in which bands (of the BWE region) the spectral peaks are located.
• a flag f p (b) may be used to indicate whether the low- frequency coefficients moved (flipped or translated) to band b in the BWE region contains peaks.
• G b the gain of the gain
• the gain modification is done for each band e.g. according to the following expression:
• the gain for this band is modified to be a weighted sum of the gains for the current band and for the two neighboring bands.
• the weights are equal, i.e. 1/3, which leads to that the modified gain is the mean value of the gain for the current band and the gains for the two neighboring bands.
• the gain for this band is selected to be e.g. the minimum of the gain of the current band and the gains of the two neighboring bands.
• the gain for a band comprising a peak could alternatively be selected or calculated as a weighted sum, such as e.g. the mean, of more than 3 bands, e.g. 5 or 7 bands, or be selected as the median value of e.g. 3, 5 or 7 bands.
• the peak will most likely be slightly attenuated, as compared to when using a "true” gain.
• an attenuation as compared to the "true” gain may be beneficial, as compared to the opposite, since moderate attenuation is better, from perceptual point of view, as compared to amplification resulting in an exaggerated audio component, as previously mentioned.
• This set of transform coefficients Y b are used to reconstruct the high-frequency part of the audio signal's waveform.
• the solution described herein is an improvement to the BWE concept, commonly used in transform domain audio coding.
• the presented algorithm preserves the peaky structure (peak to noise-floor ratio) in the BWE region, thus providing improved audio quality of the reconstructed signal.
• transform audio codec or “transform codec” embraces an encoder-decoder pair, and is the term which is commonly used in the field.
• transform audio encoder or “encoder”
• transform audio decoder or “decoder” are used, in order to separately describe the functions/parts of a transform codec.
• transform audio decoder or “decoder” are used, in order to separately describe the functions/parts of a transform codec.
• a reconstructed corresponding frequency band b' of a BWE region comprises a spectral peak or not.
• a gain value associated with the reconstructed frequency band b' is set to a first value, in an action 406a: 1 , based on the received plurality of gain values.
• a gain value associated with the reconstructed frequency band b' does not comprise any spectral peak.
• reconstructed frequency band b' is set to a second value, in an action 406a:2, based on the received plurality of gain values.
• the second value is lower than or equal to the first value.
• Gain values associated with the bands of the upper part of the frequency spectrum are received in action 401 b.
• Information related to the lower part of the frequency spectrum i.e. transform coefficients and gain values, etc., is also assumed to be received at some point (not shown in figure 4a or 4b). Further, it is assumed that a bandwidth extension is performed at some point, where a high- band spectrum is created by flipping or translating the low-band spectrum as previously described.
• One or more noise mix coefficients may be received in an optional action 402b.
• the received one or more noise mix coefficients have been calculated in the encoder based on the energy distribution in the original high-band spectrum.
• the noise mix coefficients may then be used for mixing the coefficients in the high band region with noise, cf. equation (4) above, in an (also optional) action 403b.
• the spectrum of the bandwidth extended region will correspond better to the original high-band spectrum in regard of "noisiness" or noise contents.
• it is determined in an action 404b whether the bands of the created BWE region comprises a peak or not. For example, if a band comprises a peak, an indicator associated with the band may be set to 1.
• an indicator associated with that band may be set to 0.
• the gain associated with said band may be modified in an action 405b.
• the gains for adjacent bands are taken into account in order to reach the desired result, as previously described.
• the modified gains may then be applied to the respective bands of the BWE spectrum, which is illustrated as action 406b.
• transform audio decoder adapted to perform the above described procedure for supporting bandwidth extension, BWE, of a harmonic audio signal
• the transform audio decoder could e.g. be an MDCT decoder, or other decoder
• the transform audio decoder 501 is illustrated as to communicate with other entities via a communication unit 502.
• the part of the transform audio decoder which is adapted for enabling the performance of the above described procedure is illustrated as an arrangement 500, surrounded by a broken line.
• the transform audio decoder may further comprise other functional units 516, such as e.g.
• functional units providing regular decoder and BWE functions, and may further comprise one or more storage units 514.
• the transform audio decoder 501 could be implemented e.g. by one or more of: a processor or a micro processor and adequate software with suitable storage therefore, a Programmable Logic Device (PLD) or other electronic component(s).
• PLD Programmable Logic Device
• the transform audio decoder is assumed to comprise functional units for obtaining the adequate parameters provided from an encoding entity.
• the noise- mix coefficient is a new parameter to obtain, as compared to the prior art.
• the decoder should be adapted such that one or more noise-mix coefficients may be obtained when this feature is desired.
• the audio decoder may be described and implemented as comprising a receiving unit, adapted to receive a plurality of gain values associated with a frequency band b and a number of adjacent frequency bands of band b; and possibly a noise-mix coefficient. Such a receiving unit is, however, not explicitly shown in figure 5.
• the transform audio decoder comprises a determining unit, alternatively denoted peak detection unit, 504, which is adapted to determine and indicate which bands of a BWE spectrum region that comprise a peak and which bands that do not comprise a peak. That is the determining unit is adapted to determine whether a reconstructed corresponding frequency band b' of a bandwidth extended frequency region comprises a spectral peak.
• the transform audio decoder may comprise a gain modification unit 506, which is adapted to modify the gain associated with a band depending on if the band comprises a peak or not. If the band comprises a peak, the modified gain is calculated as a weighted sum, e.g. a mean or median value of the (original) gains of a plurality of bands adjacent to the band in question, including the gain of the band in question.
• the transform audio decoder may further comprise a gain applying unit 508, adapted to apply or set the modified gains to the appropriate bands of the BWE spectrum. That is, the gain applying unit is adapted to set a gain value associated with the reconstructed frequency band b' to a first value based on the received plurality of gain values when the reconstructed frequency band b' comprises at least one spectral peak, and to set a gain value associated with the reconstructed frequency band b' to a second value based on the received plurality of gain values when the reconstructed frequency band b' does not comprise any spectral peak, where the second value is lower than or equal to the first value.
• a gain applying unit 508 adapted to apply or set the modified gains to the appropriate bands of the BWE spectrum. That is, the gain applying unit is adapted to set a gain value associated with the reconstructed frequency band b' to a first value based on the received plurality of gain values when the reconstructed frequency band b' comprises at least one spectral peak, and to set
• the applying function may be provided by the (regular) further functionality 516, only that the applied gains are not the original gains, but the modified gains.
• the transform audio decoder may comprise a noise mixing unit 510, adapted to mix the coefficients of the BWE part of the spectrum with noise, e.g. from a code book, based on one or more noise coefficients or parameters provided by the encoder of the audio signal.
• An exemplifying procedure, in an encoder, for supporting bandwidth extension, BWE, of a harmonic audio signal will be described below, with reference to figure 6.
• the procedure is suitable for use in a transform audio encoder, such as e.g. an MDCT encoder, or other encoder.
• the audio signal is primarily thought to comprise music, but could also or alternatively comprise e.g. speech.
• the procedure described below relates to the parts of an encoding procedure which deviates from a conventional encoding of a harmonic audio signal using a transform encoder.
• the actions described below are an optional addition to the deriving of transform coefficients and gains, etc. , for the lower part of the spectrum and the deriving of gains for the bands of the higher part of the spectrum (the part which will be constructed by BWE on the decoder side)
• Peak energy related to the upper part of the frequency spectrum is determined in an action 602. Further, a noise floor energy related to the upper part of the frequency spectrum is determined in an action 603. For example, the average peak energy E p and average noise-floor energy E n j- 0 f one or more sections of the BWE spectra could be calculated, as described above. Further, noise-mix coefficients are calculated in an action 604, according to some suitable formula, e.g. equation (3) above, such that the noise coefficient related to a certain section of the BWE spectrum reflects the amount of noise, or "noisiness" of said section.
• the one or more noise-mix coefficients are provided, in an action 606, to a decoding entity or to a storage along with the conventional information provided by the encoder. The providing may comprise e.g. simply outputting the calculated noise-mix coefficients to an output, and/or e.g. transmitting the coefficients to a decoder.
• the noise-mix coefficients could be quantized before being provided, as previously described.
• transform audio decoder adapted to perform the above described procedure for supporting bandwidth extension, BWE, of a harmonic audio signal
• the transform audio decoder could e.g. be an MDCT decoder, or other decoder.
• the transform audio decoder 701 is illustrated as to communicate with other entities via a communication unit 702.
• the part of the transform audio decoder which is adapted for enabling the performance of the above described procedure is illustrated as an arrangement 700, surrounded by a dashed line.
• the transform audio decoder may further comprise other functional units 712, such as e.g.
• the transform audio encoder 701 could be implemented e.g. by one or more of: a processor or a micro processor and adequate software with suitable storage therefore, a Programmable Logic Device (PLD) or other electronic component(s).
• PLD Programmable Logic Device
• the transform audio encoder may comprise a determining unit 704, which is adapted to determine peak energies and noise-floor energy of the upper part of the spectrum. Further, the transform audio encoder may comprise a noise coefficient unit 706, which is adapted to calculate one or more noise-mix
• the transform audio encoder may further comprise a providing unit 708, adapted to provide the calculated noise-mix coefficients for use by an encoder.
• the providing may comprise e.g. simply outputting the calculated noise-mix coefficients to an output, and/or e.g. transmitting the coefficients to a decoder.
• FIG. 8 schematically shows an embodiment of an arrangement 800 suitable for use in a transform audio decoder, which also can be an alternative way of disclosing an embodiment of the arrangement for use in a transform audio decoder illustrated in figure 5.
• a processing unit 806 e.g. with a DSP (Digital Signal Processor).
• the processing unit 806 can be a single unit or a plurality of units to perform different steps of procedures described herein.
• the arrangement 800 may also comprise the input unit 802 for receiving signals, such as a the encoded lower part of the spectrum, gains for the whole spectrum and noise-mix coefficient(s) (cf.
• the output unit 804 for output signal(s), such as a the modified gains and/or the complete spectrum (cf. if encoder: the noise- mix coefficients).
• the input unit 802 and the output unit 804 may be arranged as one in the hardware of the arrangement.
• the arrangement 800 comprises at least one computer program product 808 in the form of a non-volatile or volatile memory, e.g. an EEPROM, a flash memory and a hard drive.
• the computer program product 808 comprises a computer program 810, which comprises code means, which when run in the processing unit 806 in the arrangement 800 causes the arrangement and/or the transform audio encoder to perform the actions of the procedure described earlier in conjunction with figure 4.
• the code means in the computer program 810 of the arrangement 800 may comprise an obtaining module 810a for obtaining information related to a lower part of an audio spectrum, and gains related to the whole audio spectrum. Further, noise-coefficients related to the upper part of the audio spectrum may be obtained.
• the computer program may comprise a detection module 810b for detecting and indicating whether bands of the reconstructed bands b of a bandwidth extended frequency region comprises a spectral peak or not.
• the computer program 810 may further comprise a gain modification module 810c for modifying the gain associated with the bands of the upper, reconstructed, part of the spectrum.
• the computer program 810 may further comprise a gain applying module 81 Od for applying the modified gains to the corresponding bands of the upper part of the spectrum. Further, the computer program 810 may comprise a noise mixing module 81 Od, for mixing the upper part of the spectrum with noise based on received noise-mix coefficients.
• the computer program 810 is in the form of computer program code structured in computer program modules.
• the modules 810a-d essentially perform the actions of the flow illustrated in figure 4a or 4b to emulate the arrangement 500 illustrated in figure 5. In other words, when the different modules 810a-d are run on the processing unit 806, they correspond at least to the units 504-510 of figure 5.
• code means in the embodiment disclosed above in conjunction with figure 8 are implemented as computer program modules which when run on the processing unit causes the arrangement and/or transform audio encoder to perform steps described above in the conjunction with figures mentioned above, at least one of the code means may in alternative embodiments be implemented at least partly as hardware circuits.
• the functional blocks may include or encompass, without limitation, digital signal processor (DSP) hardware, reduced instruction set processor, hardware (e.g., digital or analog) circuitry including but not limited to application specific integrated circuit(s) (ASIC), and (where appropriate) state machines capable of performing such functions.
• DSP digital signal processor
• ASIC application specific integrated circuit

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
• Human Computer Interaction (AREA)
• Signal Processing (AREA)
• Health & Medical Sciences (AREA)
• Audiology, Speech & Language Pathology (AREA)
• Computational Linguistics (AREA)
• Acoustics & Sound (AREA)
• Multimedia (AREA)
• Spectroscopy & Molecular Physics (AREA)
• Quality & Reliability (AREA)
• Compression, Expansion, Code Conversion, And Decoders (AREA)
• Tone Control, Compression And Expansion, Limiting Amplitude (AREA)
• Circuits Of Receivers In General (AREA)

Priority Applications (12)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Related Child Applications (2)

Publications (1)

Family

ID=47666458

Family Applications (1)

Country Status (12)

Cited By (5)

Families Citing this family (7)

Citations (2)

Family Cites Families (46)

• 2012
  • 2012-12-21 EP EP12821332.9A patent/EP2831875B1/en active Active
  • 2012-12-21 KR KR1020177002815A patent/KR101740219B1/ko active Active
  • 2012-12-21 US US14/388,052 patent/US9437202B2/en active Active
  • 2012-12-21 HU HUE12821332A patent/HUE028238T2/en unknown
  • 2012-12-21 PL PL12821332T patent/PL2831875T3/pl unknown
  • 2012-12-21 JP JP2015503154A patent/JP5945626B2/ja active Active
  • 2012-12-21 ES ES12821332.9T patent/ES2561603T3/es active Active
  • 2012-12-21 WO PCT/SE2012/051470 patent/WO2013147668A1/en not_active Ceased
  • 2012-12-21 MY MYPI2014702776A patent/MY167474A/en unknown
  • 2012-12-21 CN CN201280071983.7A patent/CN104221082B/zh active Active
  • 2012-12-21 KR KR1020147029750A patent/KR101704482B1/ko active Active
  • 2012-12-21 CN CN201710139608.6A patent/CN106847303B/zh active Active
  • 2012-12-21 MY MYPI2018001313A patent/MY197538A/en unknown
  • 2012-12-21 RU RU2014143463A patent/RU2610293C2/ru active
  • 2012-12-21 RU RU2017103506A patent/RU2725416C1/ru active
• 2014
  • 2014-08-28 ZA ZA2014/06340A patent/ZA201406340B/en unknown
• 2016
  • 2016-05-30 JP JP2016107734A patent/JP6251773B2/ja active Active
  • 2016-07-27 US US15/220,756 patent/US9626978B2/en active Active
• 2017
  • 2017-03-06 US US15/450,271 patent/US10002617B2/en active Active
  • 2017-10-05 JP JP2017195350A patent/JP6474874B2/ja active Active
  • 2017-11-27 JP JP2017227001A patent/JP6474877B2/ja active Active

Patent Citations (2)

Also Published As

Similar Documents

Legal Events