Sound delivery to listening point using tangent line method.

Abstract

In personal audio systems, sounds should propagate toward the listening point and attenuate beyond the listening point. This study deals with controlling directivity and distance attenuation using loudspeaker arrays. The array signal processing is based on tangent line method (TLM), which can generate acoustic beams following arbitrary convex trajectories. A curvilinear acoustic beam is produced as an envelope of tangent lines, i.e., straight acoustic beams. Specifying the envelope length enables controlling distance attenuation while enhancing directivity. In this study, the TLM for arbitrary circular trajectories is formulated. Optimization algorithm is applied to identify the trajectory maximizing acoustic contrast.