Objective quality measurement of audio using multiband dynamic range analysis (original) (raw)

Objective Measurement of Music Quality Using Inter-Band Relationship Analysis

Journal of The Audio Engineering Society, 2011

This paper describes and evaluates an objective measurement that grades the quality of a complex musical signal. The authors have previously identified a potential correlation between inter-band dynamics and the subjective quality of produced music excerpts. This paper describes the previously presented Inter-Band Relationship (IBR) descriptor and extends this work by conducting more thorough testing with real-world music excerpts and a greater number of listening subjects. A high degree of correlation is observed between the Mean Subject Scores (MSS) and the objective IBR descriptor suggesting it could be used as an additional model output variable (MOV) to describe produced music quality. The method lends itself to real-time implementation and therefore can be exploited within mixing, mastering and monitoring tools.

Innovations on the Objective Assessment of Audio Quality

I Congress of Brazilian Audio Engineering Society, 2003

Apresentado na VII Convenção Nacional 26-28 de maio de 2003, São Paulo, Brasil Este artigo foi reproduzido do original entregue pelo autor, sem edições, correções e considerações feitas pelo comitê técnico deste evento. Outros artigos podem ser adquiridos através da Audio Engineering Society,

A New Strategy for Objective Estimation of the Quality of Audio Signals

IEEE Latin America Transactions, 2004

This paper presents a new strategy for the objective assessment of audio signal quality. The resulting method, named Objective Measure of Audio Quality (Medida Objetiva da Qualidade de Audio-MOQA), includes some of the most successful features present in the current audio assessment methods, as well as new techniques resulting from the identification and study of the main limitations of such features. The performance of the new strategy is compared to that one achieved by PEAQ (Perceptual Evaluation of Audio Quality), currently adopted as a standard by International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

A New Method for Objective Assessment of Audio Quality

XX Brazilian Telecommunications Symposium, 2003

This paper presents the initial studies and the structure adopted in the development of a new method for objective assessment of audio quality, named Objective Measure of Audio Quality (Medida Objetiva da Qualidade de Audio -MOQA). New techniques are presented and their impact on the global performance of the method is analysed. The results are compared to that one reached by PEAQ method, which is currently adopted as standard by International Telecommunication Union.

A New Strategy for Objective Estimation of Audio Signals Quality

IEEE Latin America Transactions, 2004

This paper presents a new strategy for the objective assessment of audio signal quality. The resulting method, named Objective Measure of Audio Quality (Medida Objetiva da Qualidade de Audio -MOQA), includes some of the most successful features present in the current audio assessment methods, as well as new techniques resulting from the identification and study of the main limitations of such features. The performance of the new strategy is compared to that one achieved by PEAQ (Perceptual Evaluation of Audio Quality), currently adopted as a standard by International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Audio quality assessment techniques—A review, and recent developments

Signal Processing, 2009

Assessing the perceptual quality of wideband audio signals is an important consideration in many audio and multimedia networks and devices. Examples of such multimedia technologies are: streaming audio over the Internet, Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM), Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB), VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), mobile phones, as well as compression algorithms for digital audio. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) standard for audio quality (BS.1387) is commonly referred to as perceptual evaluation of audio quality (PEAQ). PEAQ is currently the only available standardised method for the purpose of audio quality assessment. This paper includes a brief technical summary of the standardised PEAQ algorithm. Furthermore, this paper outlines recent advancements in the general area of audio quality assessment since the publication of the ITU standard, and discusses possible techniques, including some recent findings, that could be used to extend the applicability of PEAQ and improve the accuracy of the algorithm in assessing the quality of multimedia devices and systems.

Perception of Audio Quality in Productions of Popular Music

Journal of the Audio Engineering Society, 2016

The quality of recorded music is often highly disputed. To gain insight into the dimensions of quality perception, subjective and objective evaluation of musical program material, extracted from commercial CDs, was undertaken. It was observed that perception of audio quality and liking of the music can be affected by separate factors. Familiarity with stimuli affected like ratings while quality ratings were most associated with signal features related to perceived loudness and dynamic range compression. The effect of listener expertise was small. Additionally, the sonic attributes describing quality ratings were gathered and indicate a diverse lexicon relating to timbre, space, defects, and other concepts. The results also suggest that while the perceived quality of popular music may have decreased over recent years, like ratings were unaffected.

Strategies to Increase the Applicability of Methods for Objective Assessment of Audio Quality

116th Convention of the Audio Engineering Society, 2004

The current ITU's standard for objective assessment of audio quality, Perceptual Evaluation of Audio Quality (PEAQ), has some shortcomings that prevent its reliable use for a number of codification conditions and some kind of signals. The paper aims to improve the PEAQ performance through the following proposals: 1-modifications in the manner the signals are submitted to the assessment; 2-improvement of existing Model Output Variables (MOVs); 3-creation of new MOVs; 4-determination of a better architecture for the neural network that maps the MOVs into a single estimate for the subjective score. The results are compared to those ones achieved by PEAQ.

Measurement of sound quality for critical listening

For the critical assessment of music recordings the uniformity of the pressure amplitude response with respect to frequency has robustly been defended as one of the principals of prime importance for any electro-acoustic monitoring system. This has been particularly so in the appraisal of the room responses, where non-linear factors such as intermodulation distortions do not apply. However, despite the traditional emphasis being placed on the even distribution of modal and diffuse energy, recent investigations have begun to indicate that the uniformity of the modal decay rate is far more important than has previously been appreciated in terms of the definition of accurate and revealing monitoring acoustics. Parallel work on loudspeaker systems has also been tending to lead to similar conclusions. Modulation transfer function related experiments have begun to demonstrate how the effects of temporal response smearing can significantly reduce the ability of any room/loudspeaker system to convey to the ears of the listeners the complex details within musical recordings. Measurements in real control rooms, and work on the subjective perception of room modes based on binaural room simulations, have now begun to highlight the importance of fast and uniform temporal decays over the whole audio frequency band where monitoring accuracy is a prime requirement. Studies on factors such as modal distribution and decay rates have revealed perception biases that indicate their relative importance in defining perceptually accurate monitoring conditions. The emerging trend is that to achieve such conditions, the temporal response of electroacoustic systems must be considered at all times, and the all-pervading pre-eminence of the pressure amplitude response may have to be compromised.

PEMO-Q—A New Method for Objective Audio Quality Assessment Using a Model of Auditory Perception

IEEE Transactions on Audio, Speech and Language Processing, 2006

A new method for the objective assessment and prediction of perceived audio quality is introduced. It represents an expansion of the speech quality measure , introduced by Hansen and Kollmeier, and is based on a psychoacoustically validated, quantitative model of the "effective" peripheral auditory processing by Dau et al. To evaluate the audio quality of a given distorted signal relative to a corresponding high-quality reference signal, the auditory model is employed to compute "internal representations" of the signals, which are partly assimilated in order to account for assumed cognitive aspects. The linear cross correlation coefficient of the assimilated internal representations represents the perceptual similarity measure (PSM). PSM shows good correlations with subjective quality ratings if different types of audio signals are considered separately, whereas a better accuracy of signal-independent quality prediction is achieved by a second quality measure PSM represented by the fifth percentile of the sequence of instantaneous audio quality PSM(t). The new measures were evaluated using a large database of subjective listening tests that were originally carried out on behalf of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG) for the evaluation of various low bit-rate audio codecs. Additional tests with data unknown in the development phase of the model were carried out. Except for linear distortions, the new method shows a higher prediction accuracy than the ITU-R recommendation BS.1387 ("PEAQ") for the tested data.