Spatially Oriented Format for Acoustics: A Data Exchange Format Representing Head-Related Transfer Functions

P Majdak, T Carpentier, R Nicol, M Parmentier, A Roginska, Y Suzuki, K Watanabe, H Wierstorf, H Ziegelwanger, M Noisternig, "Spatially Oriented Format for Acoustics: A Data Exchange Format Representing Head-Related Transfer Functions," in 134th Convention of the Audio Engineering Society, Paper 8880 (2013). [ link ] [ paper ]

Bibtex

@inproceedings{Majdak2013,
    title     = {Spatially Oriented Format for Acoustics: A Data Exchange
                 Format Representing Head-Related Transfer Functions},
    author    = {Majdak, Piotr and Iwaya, Yukio and Carpentier, Thibaut and
                 Nicol, Rozenn and Parmentier, Matthieu and Roginska, Agnieszka
                 and Suzuki, Yoiti and Watanabe, Kankji and Wierstorf, Hagen
                 and Ziegelwanger, Harald and Noisternig, Markus},
    booktitle = {134th Convention of the Audio Engineering Society},
    address   = {Roma, Italy},
    month     = {May},
    year      = {2013},
    url       = {http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=16781}
}

Abstract

Head-related transfer functions (HRTFs) describe the spatial filtering of the incoming sound. So far available HRTFs are stored in various formats, making an exchange of HRTFs difficult because of incompatibilities between the formats. We propose a format for storing HRTFs with a focus on interchangeability and extendability. The spatially oriented format for acoustics (SOFA) aims at representing HRTFs in a general way, thus, allowing to store data such as directional room impulse responses (DRIRs) measured with a microphone-array excited by a loudspeaker array. SOFA specifications consider data compression, network transfer, a link to complex room geometries, and aim at simplifying the development of programming interfaces for Matlab, Octave, and C++. SOFA conventions for a consistent description of measurement setups are provided for future HRTF and DRIR databases.

Supplementary material

The SOFA HRTF format has become an AES standard in the meantime, see http://www.aes.org/publications/standards/search.cfm?docID=99

For more information on the format and available data bases, see https://www.sofaconventions.org

API implementations in Matlab/Octave and C++ can be found at https://github.com/sofacoustics

Two example applications using the API and providing more functionality like getting the impulse response for a particular listening position and direction are the Two!Ears Binaural Simulator and the Sound Field Synthesis Toolbox, in particular get_ir().