Auralization of a car pass-by inside an urban canyon using measured impulse responses

Development of methodologies for the auralization of moving cars can be of great value for a virtual acoustic experience of urban areas. In this paper(1) a methodology for the auralization of car pass-by based on measured binaural impulse responses (BIRs) is presented. Measured BIRs for different locations in a street canyon were convolved with dry synthesized car signals in which cross-fade windows were applied in order to create a smooth transition between the source positions. Next, the convolved signals are summed in order to create the final car pass-by auralizations. A same/different listening test was carried out in order to investigate if increasing the angular spacing between the discrete source positions affects the perception of the auralizations. The experiments revealed that the auralizations with a larger angular increment (up to 16 degrees) are perceptually different to the reference auralizations (2 degrees spacing), even in the case where the increment increased by only 2 degrees compared to the reference. Compared to previous listening experiments of a car pass-by in the scenario without buildings it was shown that the discrimination performance of the subjects was significantly better compared to the test conditions where buildings are absent, where subjects found it very difficult to distinguish differences between auralizations of larger and smaller increment. (C) 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Automated summary

The paper presents a methodology for the auralization of car pass-by based on measured binaural impulse responses, and a listening test revealed that increasing the angular spacing between the discrete source positions affects the perception of the auralizations. The discrimination performance of subjects was significantly better in the scenario with buildings compared to the test conditions without buildings.