Objective: A realistic three-dimensional reproduction of the simulated sound field of a room through loudspeakers.

Motivation: The sound field resulting from a sound event in a room can be simulated with the help of a simulation tool developed at our institute. Now, to allow listeners to “enter” this simulated room, this simulation has to be reproduced through loudspeakers in the most elegant, precise and complete way.

Problem: Already in the first stages of the sound field simulation aspects as how sound is perceived by individual human listeners are explored. This leads to the use of two different simulation algorithms, one to precisely simulate the direct sound and early reflections and another to simulate the later reflections that usually build up a diffuse sound field.
But on the reproduction side, be it by loudspeakers arrays or headphones, there are still improving efforts to be made. We see here the potential to combine different reproduction methods according to their properties related to the human perception of sound leading to an optimal room acoustic reproduction system.

Work Plan:
1. Investigate which sound reproduction method more adequately reproduces each part of the room impulse response (direct sound, early reflections and diffuse decay).
2. Develop a hybrid reproduction system that combine different methods (such as Vector-base Amplitude Panning, Ambisonics or Binaural technique) to achieve an optimal reproduction of the reflection pattern.
3. Implement the developed method in the room acoustic simulation software RAVEN.
4. Test and evaluate the system’s performance and capabilities.

Application: The system will be developed at the Virtual Reality Lab at ITA and will be used for the auralization of virtual rooms.