title: Active stereo sound localization.
abstract: Estimating the direction of arrival of sound in three-dimensional space is typically performed by generalized time-delay processing on a set of signals from a fixed array of omnidirectional microphones. This requires specialized multichannel A/D hardware, and careful arrangement of the microphones into an array. This work is motivated by the desire to instead only use standard two-channel audio A/D hardware and portable equipment. To estimate direction of arrival of persistent sound, the position of the microphones is made variable by mounting them on one or more computer-controlled pan-and-tilt units. In this paper, we describe the signal processing and control algorithm of a device with two omnidirectional microphones on a fixed baseline and two rotational degrees of freedom. Experimental results with real data are reported with both impulsive and speech sounds in an untreated, normally reverberant indoor environment.
authors.affiliation: Department of Computer Science, York University, Toronto M3J 1P3, Canada.
authors.forename: Greg L
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Reid
authors.forename: Evangelos
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Milios
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000703:Analog-Digital Conversion; D004867:Equipment Design; D006801:Humans; D008838:Microcomputers; D010700:Phonetics; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000295:instrumentation*; D013017:Sound Localization; D014159:Transducers