Numerical optimization of sound coverage and speech intelligibility of sound reinforcement solutions (Paper)
"Numerical optimization of sound coverage and speech intelligibility of sound reinforcement solutions", paper presented at the German Acoustic Society (DAGA: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Akustik), 2024 March 20, Hannover, Germany.
Link to the paper in the DAGA Online Library. (The paper is written and published in German)
Stefan Feistel, Pedro Lima
AFMG Technologies, Berlin, Germany
Abstract
When planning sound reinforcement concepts and room acoustics, simulation tools are often used to determine result parameters such as direct sound level, overall sound level, reverberation time or speech intelligibility for given configurations of room geometry, materials and loudspeakers. This involves time-consuming manual iterations by the planner, during which the design is modified and re-evaluated. This article presents new, alternative approaches in which the user can specify target parameters and the software then determines the most suitable solutions in a time-efficient manner, taking into account the available degrees of freedom and specified target weightings. In this context, an extended method for the numerical optimization of sound coverage is first introduced, which optimizes the sound radiation onto the listener surfaces using FIR filters for both one-dimensional and two-dimensional loudspeaker arrangements. Subsequently, a second numerical method is introduced, which optimizes the speech intelligibility taking into account the room response, the noise level and the signal masking. Important properties of the methods such as objective function, memory requirements, convergence speed and criteria are discussed. Practical examples using the EASE software, including validation measurements, demonstrate the feasibility and benefits for real-world applications.
Practical benefits
The paper explores new approaches to streamline acoustic and electro-acoustic design, saving time on repetitive iterations. By applying new techniques and modern acoustic simulation software, users can establish more time-efficient workflows, which in turn will provide better solutions and have a positive financial impact.
