Charles Q. Robinson

Low-complexity binaural decoding using time/frequency domain HRTF equalization

Binaural rendering technology is used to generate a two-channel signal from one or more channel signals, where each channel signal has associated with it a position relative to the listener. The resulting binaural signal, when played back over an appropriate device such as headphones, gives the sensation of audio signal(s) originating from the assigned position. The binaural rendering process typically involves applying a pair of Head-Related Transform Function (HRTF) equalizer to each input channel signal. The left and right ear signals from each of the input channels are then combined to generate a binaural signal. In this paper, we introduce a Time/Frequency (T/F) domain HRTF equalization technique which can be used to accomplish HRTF-based binaural rendering. The proposed technique can be conveniently combined with multi-channel/spatial decoding systems, such as multi-channel HE-AAC or MPEG surround decoder for low-complexity binaural rendering of multi-channel program.