AES E-Library

Conversion of Discretely Sampled Sound Field Data to Auralization Formats

Sound field simulations at low frequencies often use finite-element or other mesh-based methods. For auralization, output data from these methods need to be converted to a format compatible with auralization methods, such as binaural reproduction, wave field synthesis (WFS), higher order Ambisonics (HOA), or vector base amplitude panning (VBAP). The mesh data can be viewed as a spatial sampling of the sound pressure distribution. A method is proposed for converting the mesh data to plane-wave components using a circular array of virtual sources centered around a reference position. Such a plane-wave decomposition (PWD) is straightforward to process further for auralization. Emphasis is put on generalized modal decompositions of sound fields through singular-value decomposition, and on the relation between modal bandwidth and the ratio of mesh width to wavelength. The special case of a decomposition into cylindrical harmonics is studied in detail. Results are presented for two-dimensional examples, and numerical issues are discussed.

Authors: Støfringsdal, Bård; Svensson, Peter
Affiliation: Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
JAES Volume 54 Issue 5 pp. 380-400; May 2006 Import into BibTeX

Click to purchase paper or login as an AES member. If your company or school subscribes to the AES Journal then you can look for this paper in the institutional version of the Online Journal. If you are not an AES member and would like to subscribe to the E-Library then Join the AES!

This paper costs $20 for non-members, $5 for AES members and is free for E-Library subscribers.

Learn more about the AES E-Library

E-Library Location: (CD JAES54)   /jaes54/5/pg380.pdf

Start a discussion about this paper!