Friday, February 27, 2004

12 noon

Redwood Neuroscience Institute

 

Title:  Structural Models of HRTFs

 

Richard O. Duda

CIPIC Interface Laboratory

UC Davis

 

Abstract:

For several years, researchers at the CIPIC Interface Laboratory have been working on the development of models for head-related transfer functions (HRTFs), which play a central role in the perception of spatial sound.  The models exploit our understanding of the reflection and scattering of acoustic waves by the torso, head and pinnae.  The effects of the head and torso can be explained by simple models based on spherical approximations (the so-called "snowman" model).  The effects of the pinnae are more complicated, in that they include the effects of both reflection and resonances of various pinna cavities.  Recent progress on pinna modeling offers hope that we will be able to go directly from anthopometric measurements to individualized HRTFs.  This presentation will provide an overview of this structural approach to HRTF modeling.