Basics of Audio Coding

INTRODUCTION High quality audio compression has found its way from research to widespread applications within a couple of years. Early research of 15 years ago was translated into standardization efforts of ISO/IE and I!"#$ 1% years ago. Since the finalization of &'E(#1 in 1))*+ many applications ha,e -een de,ised. In the last couple of years+ Internet audio deli,ery has emerged as a powerful category of applications. !hese techniques made headline news in many parts of the world -ecause of the potential to change the way of -usiness for the music industry. urrently+ among others the following applications employ low -it#rate audio coding techniques. # /igital 0udio 1roadcasting 2E"$E30 /01+ 4orldSpace+ IS/1+ /$&5 # IS/6 transmission of high quality audio for -roadcast contri-ution and distri-ution purposes # 0rchi,al storage for -roadcasting # 0ccompanying audio for digital !7 2/71+ 0!S + 7ideo /+ 0$I15 # Internet streaming 2$eal0udio+ &icrosoft 6etshow+ 0pple 8uic9time and others5 # 'orta-le audio 2mpman+ mplayer:+ $io+ ;yra+ <E'' and others5 # Storage and e=change of music files on computers THE BASICS OF HIGH QUALITY AUDIO CODING !he -asic tas9 of a perceptual audio coding system is to compress the digital audio data in a way that # the compression is as efficient as possi-le+ i.e. the compressed file is as small as possi-le and # the reconstructed 2decoded5 audio sounds e=actly 2or as close as possi-le5 to the original audio -efore compression. Learn more in IIT Kharagpur's First Online Course on Image and Video processing, Visit http://goo.gl/hM !"a Other requirements for audio compression techniques include low comple=ity 2to ena-le software decoders or ine=pensi,e hardware decoders with low power consumption5 and fle=i-ility to cope with different application scenarios. !he technique to do this is called perceptual encoding and uses 9nowledge from psychoacoustics to reach the target of efficient -ut inaudi-le compression. 'erceptual

encoding is a lossy compression technique+ i.e. the decoded file is not a -it#e=act replica of the original digital audio data. It consists of th fo!!o"ing #ui!ding #!oc$s%

# >ilter -an9. 0 filter -an9 is used to decompose the input signal into su-#sampled spectral components 2time/frequency domain5. !ogether with the corresponding filter -an9 in the decoder it forms an analysis/synthesis system. # 'erceptual model. "sing either the time domain input signal and/or the output of the analysis filter -an9+ an estimate of the actual 2time and frequency dependent5 mas9ing threshold is computed using rules 9nown from psychoacoustics. !his is called the perceptual model of the perceptual encoding system. # 8uantization and coding. !he spectral components are quantized and coded with the aim of 9eeping the noise+ which is introduced -y quantizing+ -elow the mas9ing threshold. /epending on the algorithm+ this step is done in ,ery different ways+ from simple -loc9 companding to analysis#-y#synthesis systems using additional noiseless compression. # Encoding of -itstream. 0 -itstream formatter is used to assem-le the -itstream+ which typically consists of the quantized and coded spectral coefficients and some side information+ e.g. -it allocation information. 0ll current high quality low -it#rate audio coding systems follow the -asic paradigm descri-ed a-o,e. !hey differ in the types of filter -an9s used+ in the quantization and coding techniques and in the use of additional features. Learn more in IIT Kharagpur's First Online Course on Image and Video processing, Visit http://goo.gl/hM !"a Source. eeng.dcu.ie