3D Reproduction of Room Auralizations by Combining Intensity Panning, Crosstalk Cancellation and Ambisonics

Popular room acoustic simulations use hybrid models for precise calculation of the early specular reflections and stochastic algorithms for the late diffuse decay. Splitting the impulse response into early and late parts is also psychoacoustically reasonable. The early part is responsible for the localization and the spatial and spectral perception of sources, which makes the correct reproduction of its time-frequency structure important. In contrast the later part is responsible for the sense of spaciousness and envelopment, properties related to the room and its diffuse decay. Nevertheless, in auralization systems the reproduction of the whole impulse response is done through the same reproduction system and method, even though there are systems better suited to coherent reproduction (important for the early arrivals of an impulse response) and others better suited for the reproduction of incoherent fields (the reverberant tail of an impulse response). A hybrid approach is presented which uses one common loudspeaker system for the simultaneous rendering of different reproduction methods. A method with strong localization cues such as binaural via crosstalk cancellation or VBAP is used for the direct sound and early reflections, while a method with higher immersion and envelopment such as Ambisonics is used for the diffuse decay