Stereo Audio Rendering for Personal Sound Zones Using a Binaural Spatially Adaptive Neural Network (BSANN)

TL;DR

This paper introduces a binaural neural network framework for personal sound zones that enables independent stereo audio rendering for multiple listeners, significantly improving spatial accuracy, isolation, and robustness in real environments.

Contribution

It presents a novel BSANN-based method integrating acoustic modeling and active crosstalk cancellation for enhanced spatial audio in personal sound zones.

Findings

Improved inter-zone and inter-program isolation metrics.

Enhanced crosstalk cancellation performance.

Greater robustness to room asymmetry.

Abstract

A binaural rendering framework for personal sound zones (PSZs) is proposed to enable multiple head-tracked listeners to receive fully independent stereo audio programs. Current PSZ systems typically rely on monophonic rendering and therefore cannot control the left and right ears separately, which limits the quality and accuracy of spatial imaging. The proposed method employs a Binaural Spatially Adaptive Neural Network (BSANN) to generate ear-optimized loudspeaker filters that reconstruct the desired acoustic field at each ear of multiple listeners. The framework integrates anechoically measured loudspeaker frequency responses, analytically modeled transducer directivity, and rigid-sphere head-related transfer functions (HRTFs) to enhance acoustic accuracy and spatial rendering fidelity. An explicit active crosstalk cancellation (XTC) stage further improves three-dimensional spatial perception. Experiments show significant gains in measured objective performance metrics, including inter-zone isolation (IZI), inter-program isolation (IPI), and crosstalk cancellation (XTC), with log-frequency-weighted values of 10.23/10.03 dB (IZI), 11.11/9.16 dB (IPI), and 10.55/11.13 dB (XTC), respectively, over 100-20,000 Hz. The combined use of ear-wise control, accurate acoustic modeling, and integrated active XTC produces a unified rendering method that delivers greater isolation performance, increased robustness to room asymmetry, and more faithful spatial reproduction in real acoustic environments.