Title of Invention	AN APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR SPECTRAL ENVELOPE ADJUSTMENT OF A SIGNAL
Abstract	The present invention proposes an apparatus for improving the performance of a real-valued filterbank based spectral envelope adjuster. By adaptively locking the gain values for adjacent channels dependent on the sign of the channels, as defined in the application, reduced aliasing is achieved. Furthermore, the grouping of the channels during gain-calculation, gives an improved energy estimate of the real valued subband signals in the filterbank.

Title of Invention

AN APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR SPECTRAL ENVELOPE ADJUSTMENT OF A SIGNAL

Abstract

The present invention proposes an apparatus for improving the performance of a real-valued filterbank based spectral envelope adjuster. By adaptively locking the gain values for adjacent channels dependent on the sign of the channels, as defined in the application, reduced aliasing is achieved. Furthermore, the grouping of the channels during gain-calculation, gives an improved energy estimate of the real valued subband signals in the filterbank.

Full Text	METHOD FOR REDUCTION OF ALIASING INTRODUCED BY SPECTRAL ENVELOPE ADJUSTMENT IN REAL-VALUED FILTERBANKS. TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to systems comprising spectral envelope adjustment of audio signals using a real-valued sub- band filterbank. It reduces the aliasing introduced when using a real-valued subband filterbank for spectral envelope adjust- ment. It also enables an accurate energy calculation for sinu- soidal components in a real-valued subband filterbank. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION It has been shown in PCT/SE02/00626 "Aliasing reduction using complex exponential modulated filterbanks", that a complex- exponential modulated filterbank is an excellent tool for spectral envelope adjustment audio signals. In such a procedure the spectral envelope of the signal is represented by energy-values corresponding to certain filterbank channels. By estimating the current energy in those channels, the corresponding subband samples can be modified to have the desired energy, and hence the spectral envelope is adjusted. If restraints on computational complexity prevents the usage of a complex exponential modulated filterbank, and only allows for a cosine modulated (real-valued) implementation, severe aliasing is obtained when the filterbank is used for spectral envelope adjustment. This is particularly obvious for audio signals with a strong tonal structure, where the aliasing components will cause intermodulation with the original spectral components. The present invention offers a solution to this by putting restraints on the gain-values as a function of frequency in a signal dependent manner. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is the object of the present invention to provide an improved technique for spectral envelope adjustment. This object is achieved by an apparatus or a method for spectral envelope adjustment of a signal in accordance with claims 1 or 19 or by a computer program in accordance with claim 20. The present invention relates to the problem of intermodulation introduced by aliasing in a real-valued filterbank used for spectral envelope adjustment. The present invention analyses the input signal and uses the obtained information to restrain the envelope adjustment capabilities of the filterbank by grouping gain-values of adjacent channel in an order determined by the spectral characteristic of the signal at a given time. For a real-valued filterbank e.g. a pseudo-QMF where transition bands overlap with closest neighbour only, it can be shown that due to aliasing cancellation properties the aliasing is kept below the stop-band level of the prototype filter. If the prototype filter is designed with a sufficient aliasing suppression the filterbank is of perfect reconstruction type from a perceptual point of view, although this is not the case in a strict mathematical sense. However, if the channel gain of adjacent channels are altered between analysis and synthesis, the aliasing cancellation properties are violated, and aliasing components will appear audible in the output signal. By performing a low-order linear prediction on the subband samples of the filterbank channels, it is possible to asses, by observing the properties of the LPC polynomial, where in a filterbank channel a strong tonal component is present. Hence it is possible to assess which adjacent channels that must not have independent gain-values in order to avoid a strong aliasing component from the tonal component present in the channel. The present invention comprises the following features: Analysing means of the subband channels to asses where in a subband channel a strong tonal component is present; Analysing by means of a low-order linear predictor in every subband channel; Gain grouping decision based on the location of the zeros of the LPC polynomial; Accurate energy calculation for a real-valued implementation. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE ACCOMPANYING DRAWINGS The present invention will now be described by way of illustrative examples, not limiting the scope or spirit of the invention, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Fig. 1 illustrates a frequency analysis of the frequency range covered by channel 15 to 24 of an M channel subband filterbank, of an original signal containing multiple sinusoidal components. The frequency resolution of the displayed analysis is intentionally higher than the frequency resolution of the used filterbanks in order to display where in a filterbank channel the sinusoidal is present; Fig. 2 illustrates a gain vector containing the gain values to be applied to the subband channels 15 - 24 of the original signal. Fig. 3 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment in a real-valued implementation without the present invention; Fig. 4 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment in a complex-valued implementation; Fig. 5 illustrates in which half of every channel a sinusoidal component is present; Fig. 6 illustrates the preferred channel grouping according to the present invention; Fig. 7 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment in a real-valued implementation with the present invention; Fig. 8 illustrates a block diagram of the inventive apparatus; Fig. 9 illustrates combinations of analysis and synthesis filterbanks for which the invention can be advantageously used. Fig. 10 illustrates a block diagram of the means for examining from Fig. 8 in accordance with the preferred embodiment; and Fig. 11 illustrates a block diagram of the means for gain adjusting from Fig. 8 in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention. DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The below-described embodiments are merely illustrative for the principles of the present invention for improvement of a spectral envelope adjuster based on a real-valued filterbank. It is understood that modifications and variations of the arrangements and the details described herein will be apparent to others skilled in the art. It is the intent, therefore, to be limited only by the scope of the impending patent claims and not by the specific details presented by way of description and explanation of the embodiments herein. In the following description a real-valued pseudo-QMF is used comprising a real-valued analysis as well as a real valued synthesis. It should be understood however, that the aliasing problem addressed by the present invention also appears for systems with a complex analysis and a real-valued synthesis, as well as any other cosine-modulated filterbank apart from the pseudo-QMF used in this description. The present invention is applicable for such systems as well. In a pseudo-QMF every channel essentially only overlaps its adjacent neighbour in frequency. The frequency-response of the channels is shown in the subsequent figures by the dashed lines. This is only for illustrative purposes to indicate the overlapping of the channels, and should not be interpreted as the actual channel response given by the prototype filter. In Fig. 1 the frequency analysis of an original signal is displayed. The figure only displays the frequency range covered by 15.p/M to 25.p/M of the M channel filterbank. In the following description the designated channel numbers are derived from their low crossover frequency, hence channel 16 covers the frequency range 16.p/M to 17.p/M excluded the overlap with its neighbours. If no modification is done to the subband samples between analy- sis and synthesis the aliasing will be limited by the proper- ties of the prototype filter. If the subband samples for adja- cent channels are modified according to a gain vector, as dis- played in Fig.2, with independent gain values for every chan- nel the aliasing cancellation properties are lost. Hence an aliasing component will show up in the output signal mirrored around the cross-over region of the filterbank channels, as displayed in Fig 3. This is not true for an complex implemen- tation as outlined in PCT/SE02/00626 where the output, as dis- played in Fig. 4, would not suffer from disturbing aliasing components. In order to avoid the aliasing components that causes severe intermodulation distortion in the output, the present invention teaches that two adjacent channels that share a sinusoidal component as e.g. channel 18 and 19 in Fig 1, must be modified similarly, i.e. the gain factor applied to the two channels must be identical. This is hereafter referred to as a coupled gain for these channels. This of course im- plies that the frequency resolution of the envelope adjuster is sacrificed, in order to reduce the aliasing. However, given a sufficient number of channels, the loss in frequency resolu- tion is a small price to pay for the absence of severe inter- modulation distortion. In order to assess which channels should have coupled gain- factors, the present invention teaches the usage of in-band linear prediction. If a low order linear prediction is used, e.g. a second order LPC, this frequency analysis tool is able to resolve one sinusoidal component in every channel. By ob- serving the sign of the first predictor polynomial coefficient it is easy to determine if the sinusoidal component is situ- ated in the upper or lower half of the frequency range of the subband channel. A second order prediction polynomial is obtained by linear prediction using the autocorrelation method or the covariance method for every channel in the QMF filterbank that will be affected by the spectral envelope ad- justment. The sign of the QMF-bank channel is defined according to: where k is the channel number, M is the number of channels, and where the frequency inversion of every other QMF channel is taken into account. Hence, it is possible for every channel to asses where a strong tonal component is situated, and thus grouping the channels together that share a strong sinusoidal component. In Fig. 5 the sign of each channel is indicated and hence in which half of the subband channel the sinusoidal is situated, where +1 indicates the upper half and -1 indicates the lower half. The invention teaches that in order to avoid the aliasing components the subband channel gain factors should be grouped for the channels where channel k has a negative sign and channel k-1 has a positive sign. Accordingly the channel signs as illustrated by Fig. 5 gives the required grouping ac- cording to Fig. 6, where channel 16 and 17 are grouped, 18 and 19 are grouped, 21 and 22 are grouped, and channel 23 and 24 are grouped. This means that the gain values Sk{m) for the grouped channels k and k-1 are calculated together, rather than separately, according to: where Erefk(m) is the reference energy, and Ek(m)is the estimated energy, at the point m in time. This ensures that the grouped channels get the same gain value. Such grouping of the gain factors preserves the aliasing cancellation properties of the filterbank and gives the output according to Fig. 7. Here it is obvious that the aliasing components present in Fig. 3, are vanished. If there is no strong sinusoidal component, the zeros will nevertheless be situated in either half of the z-plane, indicated by the sign of the channel, and the channels will be grouped accordingly. This means that there is no need for de- tection based decision making whether there is a strong tonal component present or not. In a real-valued filterbank, the energy estimation is not straightforward as in a complex representation. If the energy is calculated by summing the squared subband samples of a sin- gle channel, there is a risk of tracking the time envelope of the signal rather than the actual energy. This is due to the fact that a sinusoidal component can have an arbitrary fre- quency from 0 to the filterbank channel width. If a sinusoidal component is present in a filterbank channel it can have a very low relative frequency, albeit being a high frequency si- nusoidal in the original signal. Assessing the energy of this signal becomes difficult in a real-valued system since, if the averaging time is badly chosen with respect to the frequency of the sinusoidal, a tremolo (amplitude-variation) can be in- troduced, when in fact the signal energy actually is constant. The present invention teaches however, that the filterbank channels should be grouped two-by-two given the location of the sinusoidal components. This significantly reduces the tremolo-problem, as will be outlined below. In a cosine-modulated filterbank the analysis filters hk{n)are cosine-modulated versions of a symmetric low-pass prototype filter P0(n)as where M is the number of channels, k = 0, 1, ..., M-l, N is the prototype filter order and n = 0, 1, ..., N. The symmetry of the prototype filter is assumed here to be with respect to n = N/2. The derivations below are similar in case of half sample symme- try. Given a sinusoidal input signal x(n) = Acos(?n + ?) with frequency 0=?=p, the subband signal of channel k = I can be computed to be approximately where P(w) is the real valued discrete time Fourier transform of the shifted prototype filter P0(n+N/2) . The approximation is good when P(? +p(k+ 1/2)/M) is small, and this holds in particu- lar if P(w) is negligible for \|w\|=p/M, a hypothesis underlying the discussion which follows. For spectral envelope adjustment, the averaged energy within a subband k might be calculated as where w{n) is a window of lengthL . Inserting equation (5) in equation(6) leads to where ?(?) is a phase term which is independent of k and W(w) is the discrete time Fourier transform of the window. This energy can be highly fluctuating if ? is close to an integer multiple of p/M , although the input signal is a stationary sinusoid. Artifacts of tremolo type will appear in a system based on such single real analysis bank channel energy esti- mates . On the other hand, assuming that p(k-1/2)/M =?=p{k +1/2)/M and that P(w) is negligible for \|w\|=p/M , only the subband channels k and k-1 have nonzero outputs, and these channels will be grouped together as proposed by the present invention. The en- ergy estimate based on these two channels is where For most useful designs of prototype filters, it holds that S(?) is approximately constant in the frequency range given above. Furthermore, if the window w{n) has a low-pass filter character, then \|e(?)\| is much smaller than \|W(0)\|, so the fluc- tuation of the energy estimate of equation (8) is signifi- cantly reduced compared to that of equation (7). Fig. 8 illustrates an inventive apparatus for spectral enve- lope adjustment of a signal. The inventive apparatus includes a means 80 for providing a plurality of subband signals. It is to be noted that a subband signal has associated therewith a channel number k indicating a frequency range covered by the subband signal. The subband signal originates from a channel filter having the channel number k in an analysis filterbank. The analysis filterbank has a plurality of channel filters, wherein the channel filter having the channel number k has a certain channel response which is overlapped with a channel response of an adjacent channel filter having a lower channel number k-1. The overlapping takes place in a certain overlap- ping range. As to the overlapping ranges, reference is made to figures 1, 3, 4, and 7 showing overlapping impulse responses in dashed lines of adjacent channel filters of an analysis filterbank. The subband signals output by the means 80 from Fig. 8 are in- put into a means 82 for examining the subband signals as to aliasing generating signal components. In particular, the means 82 is operative to examine the subband signal having as- sociated therewith the channel number k and to examine an ad- jacent subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k-1. This is to determine whether the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal have aliasing generating sig- nal components in the overlapping range such as a sinusoidal component as illustrated for example in Fig. 1. It is to be noted here that the sinusoidal signal component for example in the subband signal having associated therewith channel number 15 is not positioned in the overlapping range. The same is true for the sinusoidal signal component in the subband signal having associated therewith the channel number 20. Regarding the other sinusoidal components shown in Fig. 1, it becomes clear that those are in overlapping ranges of corresponding adjacent subband signals. The means 82 for examining is operative to identify two adja- cent subband signals, which have an aliasing generating signal component in the overlapping range. The means 82 is coupled to a means 84 for calculating gain adjustment values for adjacent subband signals. In particular, the means 84 is operative to calculate the first gain adjustment value and a second gain adjustment value for the subband signal on the one hand and the adjacent subband signal on the other hand. The calculation is performed in response to a positive result of the means for examining. In particular, the means for calculating is opera- tive to determine the first gain adjustment value and the sec- ond gain adjustment value not independent on each other but dependent on each other. The means 84 outputs a first gain adjustment value and a sec- ond gain adjustment value. It is to be noted at this point that, preferably, the first gain adjustment value and the sec- ond gain adjustment value are equal to each other in a pre- ferred embodiment. In the case of modifying gain adjustment values, which have been calculated for example in a spectral band replication encoder, the modified gain adjustment values corresponding to the original SBR gain adjustment values are both smaller than the higher value of the original values and higher than the lower value of the original values as will be outlined later on. The means 84 for calculating gain adjustment values therefore calculates two gain adjustment values for the adjacent subband signals. These gain adjustment values and the subband signals themselves are supplied to a means 8 6 for gain adjusting the adjacent subband signals using the calculated gain adjustment, values. Preferably, the gain adjustment performed by the means 86 is performed by a multiplication of subband samples by the gain adjustment values so that the gain adjustment values are gain adjustment factors. In other words, the gain adjustment of a subband signal having several subband samples is per- formed by multiplying each subband sample from a subband by the gain adjustment factor, which has been calculated for the respective subband. Therefore, the fine structure of the sub- band signal is not touched by the gain adjustment. In other words, the relative amplitude values of the subband samples are maintained, while the absolute amplitude values of the subband samples are changed by multiplying these samples by the gain adjustment value associated with the respective sub- band signal. At the output of means 86, gain-adjusted subband signals are obtained. When these gain-adjusted subband signals are input into a synthesis filterbank, which is preferably a real-valued synthesis filterbank, the output of the synthesis filterbank, i.e., the synthesized output signal does not show significant aliasing components as has been described above with respect to Fig. 7. It is to be noted here that a complete cancellation of alias- ing components can be obtained, when the gain values of the adjacent subband signals are made equal to each other. Never- theless, at least a reduction of aliasing components can be obtained when the gain adjustment values for the adjacent sub- band signals are calculated dependent on each other. This means that an improvement of the aliasing situation is already obtained, when the gain adjustment values are not totally equal to each other but are closer to each other compared to the case, in which no inventive steps have been taken. Normally, the present invention is used in connection with spectral band replication (SBR) or high frequency reconstruc- tion (HFR), which is described in detail in WO 98/57436 A2 . As it is known in the art, spectral envelope replication or high frequency reconstruction includes certain steps at the encoder-side as well as certain steps at the decoder-side. In the encoder, an original signal having a full bandwidth is encoded by a source encoder. The source-encoder produces an output signal, i.e., an encoded version of the original sig- nal, in which one or more frequency bands that were included in the original signal are not included any more in the en- coded version of the original signal. Normally, the encoded version of the original signal only includes a low band of the original bandwidth. The high band of the original bandwidth of the original signal is not included in the encoded version of the original signal. At the encoder-side, there is, in addi- tion, a spectral envelope analyser for analysing the spectral envelope of the original signal in the bands, which are miss- ing in the encoded version of the original signal. This miss- ing band(s) is, for example, the high band. The spectral enve- lope analyser is operative to produce a coarse envelope repre- sentation of the band, which is missing in the encoded version of the original signal. This coarse spectral envelope repre- sentation can be generated in several ways. One way is to pass the respective frequency portion of the original signal through an analysis filterbank so that respective subband sig- nals for respective channels in the corresponding frequency range are obtained and to calculate the energy of each subband so that these energy values are the coarse spectral envelope representation. Another possibility is to conduct a Fourier analysis of the missing band and to calculate the energy of the missing fre- quency band by calculating an average energy of the spectral coefficients in a group such as a critical band, when audio signals are considered, using a grouping in accordance with the well-known Bark scale. In this case, the coarse spectral envelope representation con- sists of certain reference energy values, wherein one refer- ence energy value is associated with a certain frequency band. The SBR encoder now multiplexes this coarse spectral envelope representation with the encoded version of the original signal to form an output signal, which is transmitted to a receiver or an SBR-ready decoder. The SBR-ready decoder is, as it is known in the art, operative to regenerate the missing frequency band by using a certain or all frequency bands obtained by decoding the encoded version of the original signal to obtain a decoded version of the original signal. Naturally, the decoded version of the origi- nal signal also does not include the missing band. This miss- ing band is now reconstructed using the bands included in the original signal by spectral band replication. In particular, one or several bands in the decoded version of the original signal are selected and copied up to bands, which have to be reconstructed. Then, the fine structure of the copied up sub- band signals or frequency/spectral coefficients are adjusted using gain adjustment values, which are calculated using the actual energy of the subband signal, which has been copied up on the one hand, and using the reference energy which is ex- tracted from the coarse spectral envelope representation, which has been transmitted from the encoder to the decoder. Normally, the gain adjustment factor is calculated by deter- mining the quotient between the reference energy and the ac- tual energy and by taking the square root of this value. This is the situation, which has been described before with respect to Fig. 2. In particular, Fig. 2 shows such gain ad- justment values which have, for example, been determined by a gain adjustment block in a high frequency reconstruction or SBR-ready decoder. The inventive device illustrated in Fig. 8 can be used for completely replacing a normal SBR-gain adjustment device or can be used for enhancing a prior art gain-adjustment device. In the first possibility, the gain-adjustment values are de- termined for adjacent subband signals dependent on each other in case the adjacent subband signals have an aliasing problem. This means that, in the overlapping filter responses of the filters from which the adjacent subband signals originate, there were aliasing-generating signal components such as a to- nal signal component as has been discussed in connection with Fig. 1. In this case, the gain adjustment values are calcu- lated by means of the reference energies transmitted from the SBR-ready encoder and by means of an estimation for the energy of the copied-up subband signals, and in response to the means for examining the subband signals as to aliasing generating signal components. In the other case, in which the inventive device is used for enhancing the operability of an existing SBR-ready decoder, the means for calculating gain adjustment values for adjacent subband signals can be implemented such that it retrieves the gain adjustment values of two adjacent subband signals, which have an aliasing problem. Since a typical SBR-ready encoder does not pay any attention to aliasing problems, these gain adjustment values for these two adjacent subband signals are independent on each other. The inventive means for calculating the gain adjustment values is operative to derive calculated gain adjustment values for the adjacent subband signals based on the two retrieved "original" gain adjustment values. This can be done in several ways. The first way is to make the sec- ond gain adjustment value equal to the first gain adjustment value. The other possibility is to make the first gain adjust- ment value equal to the second gain adjustment value. The third possibility is to calculate the average of both original gain adjustment values and to use this average as the first calculated gain adjustment value and the second calculated en- velope adjustment value. Another opportunity would be to se- lect different or equal first and second calculated gain ad- justment values, which are both lower than the higher original gain adjustment value and which are both higher than the lower gain adjustment value of the two original gain adjustment val- ues. When Fig. 2 and Fig. 6 are compared, it becomes clear that the first and the second gain adjustment values for two adjacent subbands, which have been calculated dependent on each other, are both higher than the original lower value and are both smaller than the original higher value. In accordance with another embodiment of the present inven- tion, in which the SBR-ready encoder already performs the fea- tures of providing subband signals (block 8 0 of Fig. 8), exam- ining the subband signals as to aliasing generating signal components (block 82 of Fig. 8) and calculating gain adjust- ment values for adjacent subband signals (block 84) are per- formed in a SBR-ready encoder, which does not do any gain ad- justing operations. In this case, the means for calculating, illustrated by reference sign 84 in Fig. 8, is connected to a means for outputting the first and the second calculated gain adjustment value for transmittal to a decoder. In this case, the decoder will receive an already "aliasing- reduced" coarse spectral envelope representation together with preferably an indication that the aliasing-reducing grouping of adjacent subband signals has already been conducted. Then, no modifications to a normal SBR-decoder are necessary, since the gain adjustment values are already in good shape so that the synthesized signal will show no aliasing distortion. In the following, certain implementations of the means 80 for providing subband signals are described. In case the present invention is implemented in a novel encoder, the means for providing a plurality of subband signals is the analyser for analysing the missing frequency band, i.e., the frequency band that is not included in the encoded version of the original signal. In case the present invention is implemented in a novel de- coder, the means for providing a plurality of subband signals can be an analysis filterbank for analysing the decoded ver- sion of the original signal combined with an SBR device for transposing the low band subband signals to high band subband channels. In case, however, the encoded version of the origi- nal signal includes quantized and potentially entropy-encoded subband signals themselves, the means for providing does not include an analysis filterbank. In this case, the means for providing is operative to extract entropy-decoded and re- quantized subband signals from the transmitted signal input to the decoder. The means for providing is further operative to transpose such low band extracted subband signals in accor- dance with any of the known transposition rules to the high band as it is known in the art of spectral band replication or high frequency reconstruction. Fig. 9 shows the cooperation of the analysis filterbank (which can be situated in the encoder or the decoder) and a synthesis filterbank 90, which is situated in an SBR-decoder. The syn- thesis filterbank 90 positioned in the decoder is operative to receive the gain-adjusted subband signals to synthesize the high band signal, which is then, after synthesis, combined to the decoded version of the original signal to obtain a full- band decoded signal. Alternatively, the real valued synthesis filterbank can cover the whole original frequency band so that the low band channels of the synthesis filterbank 90 are sup- plied with the subband signals representing the decoded ver- sion of the original signal, while the high band filter chan- nels are supplied with the gain adjusted subband signals out- put by means 8 4 from Fig. 8. As has been outlined earlier, the inventive calculation of gain adjustment values in dependence from each other allows to combine a complex analysis filterbank and a real-valued syn- thesis filterbank or to combine a real-valued analysis filter- bank and a real-valued synthesis filterbank in particular for low cost decoder applications. Fig. 10 illustrates a preferred embodiment of the means 82 for examining the subband signals. As has been outlined before with respect to Fig. 5, the means 82 for examining from Fig. 8 includes a means 100 for determining a low order predictor polynomial coefficient for a subband signal and an adjacent subband signal so that coefficients of predictor polynomials are obtained. Preferably, as has been outlined with respect to equation (1), the first predictor polynomial coefficient of a second order prediction polynomial as defined in the equation (1) is calculated. The means 100 is coupled to means 102 for determining a sign of a coefficient for the adjacent subband signals. In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the means 102 for determining is operative to calculate the equation (2) so that a subband signal and the adjacent subband signal are obtained. The sign for a subband signal obtained by means 102 depends, on the one hand, on the sign of the predictor polynomial coefficient and, on the other hand, of the channel number or subband number k. The means 102 in Fig. 10 is coupled to a means 104 for analysing the signs to determine adjacent subband signals having aliasing- problematic components. In particular, in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the means 104 is operative to determine subband signals as subband signals having aliasing-generating signal components, in case the subband signal having the lower channel number has a positive sign and the subband signal hav- ing the higher channel number has a negative sign. When Fig. 5 is considered, it becomes clear that this situation arises for subband signals 16 and 17 so that the subband signals 16 and 17 are determined to be adjacent subband signals having cou- pled gain adjustment values. The same is true for subband sig- nals 18 and 19 or subband signals 21 and 22 or subband signals 23 and 24. It is to be noted here that, alternatively, also another pre- diction polynomial, i.e., a prediction polynomial of third, forth or fifth order can be used, and that also another poly- nomial coefficient can be used for determining the sign such as the second, third or forth order prediction polynomial co- efficient. The procedure shown with respect to equations 1 and 2 is, however, preferred since it involves a low calculation overhead. Fig. 11 shows a preferred implementation of the means for cal- culating gain adjustment values for adjacent subband signals in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present in- vention. In particular, the means 84 from Fig. 8 includes a means 110 for providing an indication of a reference energy for adjacent subbands, a means 112 for calculating estimated energies for the adjacent subbands and a means 114 for deter- mining first and second gain adjustment values. Preferably, the first gain adjustment value gk and the second gain adjust- ment value gk-1 are equal. Preferably, means 114 is operative to perform equation (3) as shown above. It is to be noted here that normally, the indication on the reference energy for ad- jacent subbands is obtained from an encoded signal output by a normal SBR encoder. In particular, the reference energies con- stitute the coarse spectral envelope information as generated by a normal SBR-ready encoder. The invention also relates to a method for spectral envelope adjustment of a signal, using a filterbank where said filter- bank comprises a real valued analysis part and a real valued synthesis part or where said filterbank comprises a complex analysis part and a real valued synthesis part, where a lower, in frequency, channel and the adjacent higher, in frequency, channel are modified using the same gain value, if said lower channel has a positive sign and said higher channel has a nega- tive sign, so that the relation between the subband samples of said lower channel and the subband samples of said higher chan- nel is maintained. In the above method, preferably, said gain-value is calculated by using the averaged energy of said adjacent channels. Depending on the circumstances, the inventive method of spec- tral envelope adjustment can be implemented in hardware or in software. The implementation can take place on a digital stor- age medium such as a disk or a CD having electronically read- able control signals, which can cooperate with a programmable computer system so that the inventive method is carried out. Generally, the present invention, therefore, is a computer program product having a program code stored on a machine- readable carrier, for performing the inventive method, when the computer-program product runs on a computer. In other words, the invention is, therefore, also a computer program having a program code for performing the inventive method, when the computer program runs on a computer. We Claim 1. Apparatus for spectral envelope adjustment of a signal, comprising: means (80) for providing a plurality of subband signals, a subband signal having associated therewith a channel number k indicating a frequency range covered by the sub-band signal, the subband signal originating from a channel filter having the channel number k in an analysis filterbank having a plurality of channel filters, wherein the channel filter having the channel number k has a channel response which is overlapped with a channel response of an adjacent channel filter having a channel number k-1 in an overlapping range; means (82) for examining the subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k and for examining an adjacent subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k-:L to determine, whether the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal have aliasing generating signal components in the overlapping range; means (82) for calculating a first gain adjustment value and a second gain adjustment value for the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal in response to a positive result of the means for examining, wherein the means for calculating is operative to determine the first gain adjustment value and the second gain adjustment value dependent on each other; and means (86) for gain adjusting the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal using the first and the second gain adjusting values or for outputting the first and the second gain adjustment values for transmission or storing. 2. Apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to calculate signs of subband signals based on coefficients of prediction polynomials for the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal (100, 102), and to indicate (104) a positive result, when the signs have a predetermined relationship to each other. 3. Apparatus as claimed in claim 2, wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to apply an auto-correlation method or a co-variance method. 4. Apparatus as claimed in claim 2 or 3, wherein the prediction polynomial is a low order polynomial is a low order to polynomial having a first order coefficient, wherein the order of the low order polynomial is smaller than 4 and in which the means for examining (82) is operative to use the first order coefficient for calculating the signs of the subband signals. 5. Apparatus as claimed in claims 2, 3 or 4, wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to calculate the sign for a subband signal based on the following equation: wherein k is the channel number, and a1 is the first - order coefficient. Apparatus as claimed in one of claims 2 to 5, wherein the predetermined relationship is defined such that the subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k has a first sign and the adjacent subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k-1 has a second sign, which is opposite the first sign. Apparatus as claimed in claim 6, wherein the first sign is negative, and the second sign is positive. Apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to perform a tonal analysis for the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal for determining a tonal component having a tonality measure above a tonally threshold. Apparatus as claimed in claim 8, wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to determine, whether the tonal component is in the overlapping range of channel k and channel k-1. 10.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, comprising means for providing a first reference spectral envelope value for the subband signal and a second reference spectral envelope value for the adjacent subband signal (110), wherein the means (82) for calculating is operative to determine (112) a first energy measure indicating a signal energy of the subband signal and a second energy measure indicating a signal energy of the adjacent sub-band signal, and wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to calculate (114) the first and the second gain adjustment values based on a linear combination of the first reference spectral envelope value and the second reference spectral envelope value or a linear combination of the first energy measure or the second energy measure. 11. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the means (84) for calculating is operative to calculate the first and the second gain adjustment values such that they differ by less than a predetermined threshold or are equal to each other. 12. Apparatus as claimed in claim 11, wherein the pre-determined threshold is lower than or equal to 6 dB. 13. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims comprising means for providing an unmodified first gain adjustment value for the subband signal and an unmodified second gain adjustment value for the adjacent subband signal, and wherein the means (84) for calculating is operative to calculate the first and the second gain adjustment values so that both are larger than or equal to a lower value of the first and the second unmodified gain adjustment values and smaller or equal to a higher value of the first and the second unmodified gain adjustment values. 14. Apparatus as claimed in claim 13, wherein the unmodified first gain adjustment value and the unmodified second gain adjustment value are indicative for a spectral envelope of an original signal in a frequency band, wherein the frequency band is to be reconstructed by a spectral band replication. 15.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, comprising a synthesis filterbank (90) for filtering the gain adjusted subband signals to obtain a synthesized output signal. 16. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the analysis filterbank is a real valued filterbank, and wherein the synthesis filterbank is a real valued filterbank. 17. Apparatus as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 15, wherein the analysis filterbank is a complex-valued filterbank, and in which the synthesis filterbank is a real-valued filterbank. 18.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the means (84) for calculating is operative to calculate the first gain adjustment value and the second gain adjustment value based on an average energy of the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal. 19. A method of spectral envelope adjustment of a signal, comprising: providing (80) a plurality of subband signals, a subband signal having associated therewith a channel number k indicating the frequency range covered by the subband signal, the subband signal originating from a channel filter having the channel number k in an analysis filterbank having a plurality of channel filters, wherein the channel filter having the channel number k has a channel response which is overlapped with a channel response of an adjacent channel filter having a channel number k-1 in an overlapping range; examining (82) the subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k and for examining an adjacent subband signal having associated therewith the channel number k-1 to determine, whether the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal having aliasing generating signal components in the overlapping range; calculating (84) a first gain adjustment value and a second gain adjustment value for the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal in response to a positive result of the means for examining, wherein the means for calculating is operative to determine the first gain adjustment value and the second gain adjustment value dependent on each other; and gain adjusting (86) the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal using the first and the second gain adjusting values or outputting the first and the second gain adjustment values for transmission or storing. 20. A computer program product for performing the method as claimed in claim 19. The present invention proposes an apparatus for improving the performance of a real-valued filterbank based spectral envelope adjuster. By adaptively locking the gain values for adjacent channels dependent on the sign of the channels, as defined in the application, reduced aliasing is achieved. Furthermore, the grouping of the channels during gain-calculation, gives an improved energy estimate of the real valued subband signals in the filterbank.

Full Text

METHOD FOR REDUCTION OF ALIASING INTRODUCED BY SPECTRAL
ENVELOPE ADJUSTMENT IN REAL-VALUED FILTERBANKS.
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to systems comprising spectral
envelope adjustment of audio signals using a real-valued sub-
band filterbank. It reduces the aliasing introduced when using
a real-valued subband filterbank for spectral envelope adjust-
ment. It also enables an accurate energy calculation for sinu-
soidal components in a real-valued subband filterbank.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It has been shown in PCT/SE02/00626 "Aliasing reduction using
complex exponential modulated filterbanks", that a complex-
exponential modulated filterbank is an excellent tool for
spectral envelope adjustment audio signals. In such a procedure
the spectral envelope of the signal is represented by energy-values
corresponding to certain filterbank channels. By
estimating the current energy in those channels, the corresponding
subband samples can be modified to have the desired
energy, and hence the spectral envelope is adjusted. If restraints
on computational complexity prevents the usage of a
complex exponential modulated filterbank, and only allows for
a cosine modulated (real-valued) implementation, severe aliasing
is obtained when the filterbank is used for spectral envelope
adjustment. This is particularly obvious for audio signals
with a strong tonal structure, where the aliasing components
will cause intermodulation with the original spectral
components. The present invention offers a solution to this by
putting restraints on the gain-values as a function of frequency
in a signal dependent manner.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is the object of the present invention to provide an improved
technique for spectral envelope adjustment.
This object is achieved by an apparatus or a method for spectral
envelope adjustment of a signal in accordance with claims
1 or 19 or by a computer program in accordance with claim 20.
The present invention relates to the problem of intermodulation
introduced by aliasing in a real-valued filterbank used
for spectral envelope adjustment. The present invention analyses
the input signal and uses the obtained information to restrain
the envelope adjustment capabilities of the filterbank
by grouping gain-values of adjacent channel in an order determined
by the spectral characteristic of the signal at a given
time. For a real-valued filterbank e.g. a pseudo-QMF where
transition bands overlap with closest neighbour only, it can
be shown that due to aliasing cancellation properties the
aliasing is kept below the stop-band level of the prototype
filter. If the prototype filter is designed with a sufficient
aliasing suppression the filterbank is of perfect reconstruction
type from a perceptual point of view, although this is
not the case in a strict mathematical sense. However, if the
channel gain of adjacent channels are altered between analysis
and synthesis, the aliasing cancellation properties are violated,
and aliasing components will appear audible in the output
signal. By performing a low-order linear prediction on the
subband samples of the filterbank channels, it is possible to
asses, by observing the properties of the LPC polynomial,
where in a filterbank channel a strong tonal component is present.
Hence it is possible to assess which adjacent channels
that must not have independent gain-values in order to avoid a
strong aliasing component from the tonal component present in
the channel.
The present invention comprises the following features:
Analysing means of the subband channels to asses where in a
subband channel a strong tonal component is present;
Analysing by means of a low-order linear predictor in every
subband channel;
Gain grouping decision based on the location of the zeros of
the LPC polynomial;
Accurate energy calculation for a real-valued implementation.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE ACCOMPANYING DRAWINGS

The present invention will now be described by way of illustrative
examples, not limiting the scope or spirit of the invention,
with reference to the accompanying drawings, in
which:
Fig. 1 illustrates a frequency analysis of the frequency
range covered by channel 15 to 24 of an M channel
subband filterbank, of an original signal containing
multiple sinusoidal components. The frequency resolution
of the displayed analysis is intentionally
higher than the frequency resolution of the used
filterbanks in order to display where in a filterbank
channel the sinusoidal is present;
Fig. 2 illustrates a gain vector containing the gain values
to be applied to the subband channels 15 - 24 of the
original signal.
Fig. 3 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment
in a real-valued implementation without the
present invention;
Fig. 4 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment
in a complex-valued implementation;
Fig. 5 illustrates in which half of every channel a sinusoidal
component is present;
Fig. 6 illustrates the preferred channel grouping according
to the present invention;
Fig. 7 illustrates the output from the above gain adjustment
in a real-valued implementation with the present
invention;
Fig. 8 illustrates a block diagram of the inventive apparatus;
Fig. 9 illustrates combinations of analysis and synthesis
filterbanks for which the invention can be advantageously
used.
Fig. 10 illustrates a block diagram of the means for examining
from Fig. 8 in accordance with the preferred embodiment;
and
Fig. 11 illustrates a block diagram of the means for gain adjusting
from Fig. 8 in accordance with the preferred
embodiment of the present invention.
DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
The below-described embodiments are merely illustrative for
the principles of the present invention for improvement of a
spectral envelope adjuster based on a real-valued filterbank.
It is understood that modifications and variations of the arrangements
and the details described herein will be apparent
to others skilled in the art. It is the intent, therefore, to
be limited only by the scope of the impending patent claims
and not by the specific details presented by way of description
and explanation of the embodiments herein.
In the following description a real-valued pseudo-QMF is used
comprising a real-valued analysis as well as a real valued
synthesis. It should be understood however, that the aliasing
problem addressed by the present invention also appears for
systems with a complex analysis and a real-valued synthesis,
as well as any other cosine-modulated filterbank apart from
the pseudo-QMF used in this description. The present invention
is applicable for such systems as well. In a pseudo-QMF every
channel essentially only overlaps its adjacent neighbour in
frequency. The frequency-response of the channels is shown in
the subsequent figures by the dashed lines. This is only for
illustrative purposes to indicate the overlapping of the channels,
and should not be interpreted as the actual channel response
given by the prototype filter. In Fig. 1 the frequency
analysis of an original signal is displayed. The figure only
displays the frequency range covered by 15.p/M to 25.p/M of
the M channel filterbank. In the following description the
designated channel numbers are derived from their low crossover
frequency, hence channel 16 covers the frequency range
16.p/M to 17.p/M excluded the overlap with its neighbours. If
no modification is done to the subband samples between analy-
sis and synthesis the aliasing will be limited by the proper-
ties of the prototype filter. If the subband samples for adja-
cent channels are modified according to a gain vector, as dis-
played in Fig.2, with independent gain values for every chan-
nel the aliasing cancellation properties are lost. Hence an
aliasing component will show up in the output signal mirrored
around the cross-over region of the filterbank channels, as
displayed in Fig 3. This is not true for an complex implemen-
tation as outlined in PCT/SE02/00626 where the output, as dis-
played in Fig. 4, would not suffer from disturbing aliasing
components. In order to avoid the aliasing components that
causes severe intermodulation distortion in the output, the
present invention teaches that two adjacent channels that
share a sinusoidal component as e.g. channel 18 and 19 in Fig
1, must be modified similarly, i.e. the gain factor applied to
the two channels must be identical. This is hereafter referred
to as a coupled gain for these channels. This of course im-
plies that the frequency resolution of the envelope adjuster
is sacrificed, in order to reduce the aliasing. However, given
a sufficient number of channels, the loss in frequency resolu-
tion is a small price to pay for the absence of severe inter-
modulation distortion.
In order to assess which channels should have coupled gain-
factors, the present invention teaches the usage of in-band
linear prediction. If a low order linear prediction is used,
e.g. a second order LPC, this frequency analysis tool is able
to resolve one sinusoidal component in every channel. By ob-
serving the sign of the first predictor polynomial coefficient
it is easy to determine if the sinusoidal component is situ-
ated in the upper or lower half of the frequency range of the
subband channel.
A second order prediction polynomial

is obtained by linear prediction using the autocorrelation
method or the covariance method for every channel in the QMF
filterbank that will be affected by the spectral envelope ad-
justment. The sign of the QMF-bank channel is defined according
to:

where k is the channel number, M is the number of channels, and
where the frequency inversion of every other QMF channel is
taken into account. Hence, it is possible for every channel to
asses where a strong tonal component is situated, and thus
grouping the channels together that share a strong sinusoidal
component. In Fig. 5 the sign of each channel is indicated and
hence in which half of the subband channel the sinusoidal is
situated, where +1 indicates the upper half and -1 indicates
the lower half. The invention teaches that in order to avoid
the aliasing components the subband channel gain factors should
be grouped for the channels where channel k has a negative sign
and channel k-1 has a positive sign. Accordingly the channel
signs as illustrated by Fig. 5 gives the required grouping ac-
cording to Fig. 6, where channel 16 and 17 are grouped, 18 and
19 are grouped, 21 and 22 are grouped, and channel 23 and 24
are grouped. This means that the gain values Sk{m) for the
grouped channels k and k-1 are calculated together, rather than
separately, according to:
where Erefk(m) is the reference energy, and Ek(m)is the estimated
energy, at the point m in time. This ensures that the grouped
channels get the same gain value. Such grouping of the gain
factors preserves the aliasing cancellation properties of the
filterbank and gives the output according to Fig. 7. Here it is
obvious that the aliasing components present in Fig. 3, are
vanished. If there is no strong sinusoidal component, the zeros
will nevertheless be situated in either half of the z-plane,
indicated by the sign of the channel, and the channels will be
grouped accordingly. This means that there is no need for de-
tection based decision making whether there is a strong tonal
component present or not.
In a real-valued filterbank, the energy estimation is not
straightforward as in a complex representation. If the energy
is calculated by summing the squared subband samples of a sin-
gle channel, there is a risk of tracking the time envelope of
the signal rather than the actual energy. This is due to the
fact that a sinusoidal component can have an arbitrary fre-
quency from 0 to the filterbank channel width. If a sinusoidal
component is present in a filterbank channel it can have a
very low relative frequency, albeit being a high frequency si-
nusoidal in the original signal. Assessing the energy of this
signal becomes difficult in a real-valued system since, if the
averaging time is badly chosen with respect to the frequency
of the sinusoidal, a tremolo (amplitude-variation) can be in-
troduced, when in fact the signal energy actually is constant.
The present invention teaches however, that the filterbank
channels should be grouped two-by-two given the location of
the sinusoidal components. This significantly reduces the
tremolo-problem, as will be outlined below.
In a cosine-modulated filterbank the analysis filters hk{n)are
cosine-modulated versions of a symmetric low-pass prototype
filter P0(n)as

where M is the number of channels, k = 0, 1, ..., M-l, N is the
prototype filter order and n = 0, 1, ..., N. The symmetry of the
prototype filter is assumed here to be with respect to n = N/2.
The derivations below are similar in case of half sample symme-
try.
Given a sinusoidal input signal x(n) = Acos(?n + ?) with frequency
0=?=p, the subband signal of channel k = I can be computed to
be approximately

where P(w) is the real valued discrete time Fourier transform
of the shifted prototype filter P0(n+N/2) . The approximation is
good when P(? +p(k+ 1/2)/M) is small, and this holds in particu-
lar if P(w) is negligible for |w|=p/M, a hypothesis underlying
the discussion which follows. For spectral envelope adjustment,
the averaged energy within a subband k might be calculated as

where w{n) is a window of lengthL . Inserting equation (5) in
equation(6) leads to

where ?(?) is a phase term which is independent of k and
W(w) is the discrete time Fourier transform of the window. This
energy can be highly fluctuating if ? is close to an integer
multiple of p/M , although the input signal is a stationary
sinusoid. Artifacts of tremolo type will appear in a system
based on such single real analysis bank channel energy esti-
mates .
On the other hand, assuming that p(k-1/2)/M =?=p{k +1/2)/M and
that P(w) is negligible for |w|=p/M , only the subband channels
k and k-1 have nonzero outputs, and these channels will be
grouped together as proposed by the present invention. The en-
ergy estimate based on these two channels is

where

For most useful designs of prototype filters, it holds that
S(?) is approximately constant in the frequency range given
above. Furthermore, if the window w{n) has a low-pass filter
character, then |e(?)| is much smaller than |W(0)|, so the fluc-
tuation of the energy estimate of equation (8) is signifi-
cantly reduced compared to that of equation (7).
Fig. 8 illustrates an inventive apparatus for spectral enve-
lope adjustment of a signal. The inventive apparatus includes
a means 80 for providing a plurality of subband signals. It is
to be noted that a subband signal has associated therewith a
channel number k indicating a frequency range covered by the
subband signal. The subband signal originates from a channel
filter having the channel number k in an analysis filterbank.
The analysis filterbank has a plurality of channel filters,
wherein the channel filter having the channel number k has a
certain channel response which is overlapped with a channel
response of an adjacent channel filter having a lower channel
number k-1. The overlapping takes place in a certain overlap-
ping range. As to the overlapping ranges, reference is made to
figures 1, 3, 4, and 7 showing overlapping impulse responses
in dashed lines of adjacent channel filters of an analysis
filterbank.
The subband signals output by the means 80 from Fig. 8 are in-
put into a means 82 for examining the subband signals as to
aliasing generating signal components. In particular, the
means 82 is operative to examine the subband signal having as-
sociated therewith the channel number k and to examine an ad-
jacent subband signal having associated therewith the channel
number k-1. This is to determine whether the subband signal
and the adjacent subband signal have aliasing generating sig-
nal components in the overlapping range such as a sinusoidal
component as illustrated for example in Fig. 1. It is to be
noted here that the sinusoidal signal component for example in
the subband signal having associated therewith channel number
15 is not positioned in the overlapping range. The same is
true for the sinusoidal signal component in the subband signal
having associated therewith the channel number 20. Regarding
the other sinusoidal components shown in Fig. 1, it becomes
clear that those are in overlapping ranges of corresponding
adjacent subband signals.
The means 82 for examining is operative to identify two adja-
cent subband signals, which have an aliasing generating signal
component in the overlapping range. The means 82 is coupled to
a means 84 for calculating gain adjustment values for adjacent
subband signals. In particular, the means 84 is operative to
calculate the first gain adjustment value and a second gain
adjustment value for the subband signal on the one hand and
the adjacent subband signal on the other hand. The calculation
is performed in response to a positive result of the means for
examining. In particular, the means for calculating is opera-
tive to determine the first gain adjustment value and the sec-
ond gain adjustment value not independent on each other but
dependent on each other.
The means 84 outputs a first gain adjustment value and a sec-
ond gain adjustment value. It is to be noted at this point
that, preferably, the first gain adjustment value and the sec-
ond gain adjustment value are equal to each other in a pre-
ferred embodiment. In the case of modifying gain adjustment
values, which have been calculated for example in a spectral
band replication encoder, the modified gain adjustment values
corresponding to the original SBR gain adjustment values are
both smaller than the higher value of the original values and
higher than the lower value of the original values as will be
outlined later on.
The means 84 for calculating gain adjustment values therefore
calculates two gain adjustment values for the adjacent subband
signals. These gain adjustment values and the subband signals
themselves are supplied to a means 8 6 for gain adjusting the
adjacent subband signals using the calculated gain adjustment,
values. Preferably, the gain adjustment performed by the means
86 is performed by a multiplication of subband samples by the
gain adjustment values so that the gain adjustment values are
gain adjustment factors. In other words, the gain adjustment
of a subband signal having several subband samples is per-
formed by multiplying each subband sample from a subband by
the gain adjustment factor, which has been calculated for the
respective subband. Therefore, the fine structure of the sub-
band signal is not touched by the gain adjustment. In other
words, the relative amplitude values of the subband samples
are maintained, while the absolute amplitude values of the
subband samples are changed by multiplying these samples by
the gain adjustment value associated with the respective sub-
band signal.
At the output of means 86, gain-adjusted subband signals are
obtained. When these gain-adjusted subband signals are input
into a synthesis filterbank, which is preferably a real-valued
synthesis filterbank, the output of the synthesis filterbank,
i.e., the synthesized output signal does not show significant
aliasing components as has been described above with respect
to Fig. 7.
It is to be noted here that a complete cancellation of alias-
ing components can be obtained, when the gain values of the
adjacent subband signals are made equal to each other. Never-
theless, at least a reduction of aliasing components can be
obtained when the gain adjustment values for the adjacent sub-
band signals are calculated dependent on each other. This
means that an improvement of the aliasing situation is already
obtained, when the gain adjustment values are not totally
equal to each other but are closer to each other compared to
the case, in which no inventive steps have been taken.
Normally, the present invention is used in connection with
spectral band replication (SBR) or high frequency reconstruc-
tion (HFR), which is described in detail in WO 98/57436 A2 .
As it is known in the art, spectral envelope replication or
high frequency reconstruction includes certain steps at the
encoder-side as well as certain steps at the decoder-side.
In the encoder, an original signal having a full bandwidth is
encoded by a source encoder. The source-encoder produces an
output signal, i.e., an encoded version of the original sig-
nal, in which one or more frequency bands that were included
in the original signal are not included any more in the en-
coded version of the original signal. Normally, the encoded
version of the original signal only includes a low band of the
original bandwidth. The high band of the original bandwidth of
the original signal is not included in the encoded version of
the original signal. At the encoder-side, there is, in addi-
tion, a spectral envelope analyser for analysing the spectral
envelope of the original signal in the bands, which are miss-
ing in the encoded version of the original signal. This miss-
ing band(s) is, for example, the high band. The spectral enve-
lope analyser is operative to produce a coarse envelope repre-
sentation of the band, which is missing in the encoded version
of the original signal. This coarse spectral envelope repre-
sentation can be generated in several ways. One way is to pass
the respective frequency portion of the original signal
through an analysis filterbank so that respective subband sig-
nals for respective channels in the corresponding frequency
range are obtained and to calculate the energy of each subband
so that these energy values are the coarse spectral envelope
representation.
Another possibility is to conduct a Fourier analysis of the
missing band and to calculate the energy of the missing fre-
quency band by calculating an average energy of the spectral
coefficients in a group such as a critical band, when audio
signals are considered, using a grouping in accordance with
the well-known Bark scale.
In this case, the coarse spectral envelope representation con-
sists of certain reference energy values, wherein one refer-
ence energy value is associated with a certain frequency band.
The SBR encoder now multiplexes this coarse spectral envelope
representation with the encoded version of the original signal
to form an output signal, which is transmitted to a receiver
or an SBR-ready decoder.
The SBR-ready decoder is, as it is known in the art, operative
to regenerate the missing frequency band by using a certain or
all frequency bands obtained by decoding the encoded version
of the original signal to obtain a decoded version of the
original signal. Naturally, the decoded version of the origi-
nal signal also does not include the missing band. This miss-
ing band is now reconstructed using the bands included in the
original signal by spectral band replication. In particular,
one or several bands in the decoded version of the original
signal are selected and copied up to bands, which have to be
reconstructed. Then, the fine structure of the copied up sub-
band signals or frequency/spectral coefficients are adjusted
using gain adjustment values, which are calculated using the
actual energy of the subband signal, which has been copied up
on the one hand, and using the reference energy which is ex-
tracted from the coarse spectral envelope representation,
which has been transmitted from the encoder to the decoder.
Normally, the gain adjustment factor is calculated by deter-
mining the quotient between the reference energy and the ac-
tual energy and by taking the square root of this value.
This is the situation, which has been described before with
respect to Fig. 2. In particular, Fig. 2 shows such gain ad-
justment values which have, for example, been determined by a
gain adjustment block in a high frequency reconstruction or
SBR-ready decoder.
The inventive device illustrated in Fig. 8 can be used for
completely replacing a normal SBR-gain adjustment device or
can be used for enhancing a prior art gain-adjustment device.
In the first possibility, the gain-adjustment values are de-
termined for adjacent subband signals dependent on each other
in case the adjacent subband signals have an aliasing problem.
This means that, in the overlapping filter responses of the
filters from which the adjacent subband signals originate,
there were aliasing-generating signal components such as a to-
nal signal component as has been discussed in connection with
Fig. 1. In this case, the gain adjustment values are calcu-
lated by means of the reference energies transmitted from the
SBR-ready encoder and by means of an estimation for the energy
of the copied-up subband signals, and in response to the means
for examining the subband signals as to aliasing generating
signal components.
In the other case, in which the inventive device is used for
enhancing the operability of an existing SBR-ready decoder,
the means for calculating gain adjustment values for adjacent
subband signals can be implemented such that it retrieves the
gain adjustment values of two adjacent subband signals, which
have an aliasing problem. Since a typical SBR-ready encoder
does not pay any attention to aliasing problems, these gain
adjustment values for these two adjacent subband signals are
independent on each other. The inventive means for calculating
the gain adjustment values is operative to derive calculated
gain adjustment values for the adjacent subband signals based
on the two retrieved "original" gain adjustment values. This
can be done in several ways. The first way is to make the sec-
ond gain adjustment value equal to the first gain adjustment
value. The other possibility is to make the first gain adjust-
ment value equal to the second gain adjustment value. The
third possibility is to calculate the average of both original
gain adjustment values and to use this average as the first
calculated gain adjustment value and the second calculated en-
velope adjustment value. Another opportunity would be to se-
lect different or equal first and second calculated gain ad-
justment values, which are both lower than the higher original
gain adjustment value and which are both higher than the lower
gain adjustment value of the two original gain adjustment val-
ues. When Fig. 2 and Fig. 6 are compared, it becomes clear
that the first and the second gain adjustment values for two
adjacent subbands, which have been calculated dependent on
each other, are both higher than the original lower value and
are both smaller than the original higher value.
In accordance with another embodiment of the present inven-
tion, in which the SBR-ready encoder already performs the fea-
tures of providing subband signals (block 8 0 of Fig. 8), exam-
ining the subband signals as to aliasing generating signal
components (block 82 of Fig. 8) and calculating gain adjust-
ment values for adjacent subband signals (block 84) are per-
formed in a SBR-ready encoder, which does not do any gain ad-
justing operations. In this case, the means for calculating,
illustrated by reference sign 84 in Fig. 8, is connected to a
means for outputting the first and the second calculated gain
adjustment value for transmittal to a decoder.
In this case, the decoder will receive an already "aliasing-
reduced" coarse spectral envelope representation together with
preferably an indication that the aliasing-reducing grouping
of adjacent subband signals has already been conducted. Then,
no modifications to a normal SBR-decoder are necessary, since
the gain adjustment values are already in good shape so that
the synthesized signal will show no aliasing distortion.

In the following, certain implementations of the means 80 for
providing subband signals are described. In case the present
invention is implemented in a novel encoder, the means for
providing a plurality of subband signals is the analyser for
analysing the missing frequency band, i.e., the frequency band
that is not included in the encoded version of the original
signal.
In case the present invention is implemented in a novel de-
coder, the means for providing a plurality of subband signals
can be an analysis filterbank for analysing the decoded ver-
sion of the original signal combined with an SBR device for
transposing the low band subband signals to high band subband
channels. In case, however, the encoded version of the origi-
nal signal includes quantized and potentially entropy-encoded
subband signals themselves, the means for providing does not
include an analysis filterbank. In this case, the means for
providing is operative to extract entropy-decoded and re-
quantized subband signals from the transmitted signal input to
the decoder. The means for providing is further operative to
transpose such low band extracted subband signals in accor-
dance with any of the known transposition rules to the high
band as it is known in the art of spectral band replication or
high frequency reconstruction.
Fig. 9 shows the cooperation of the analysis filterbank (which
can be situated in the encoder or the decoder) and a synthesis
filterbank 90, which is situated in an SBR-decoder. The syn-
thesis filterbank 90 positioned in the decoder is operative to
receive the gain-adjusted subband signals to synthesize the
high band signal, which is then, after synthesis, combined to
the decoded version of the original signal to obtain a full-
band decoded signal. Alternatively, the real valued synthesis
filterbank can cover the whole original frequency band so that
the low band channels of the synthesis filterbank 90 are sup-
plied with the subband signals representing the decoded ver-
sion of the original signal, while the high band filter chan-
nels are supplied with the gain adjusted subband signals out-
put by means 8 4 from Fig. 8.
As has been outlined earlier, the inventive calculation of
gain adjustment values in dependence from each other allows to
combine a complex analysis filterbank and a real-valued syn-
thesis filterbank or to combine a real-valued analysis filter-
bank and a real-valued synthesis filterbank in particular for
low cost decoder applications.
Fig. 10 illustrates a preferred embodiment of the means 82 for
examining the subband signals. As has been outlined before
with respect to Fig. 5, the means 82 for examining from Fig. 8
includes a means 100 for determining a low order predictor
polynomial coefficient for a subband signal and an adjacent
subband signal so that coefficients of predictor polynomials
are obtained. Preferably, as has been outlined with respect to
equation (1), the first predictor polynomial coefficient of a
second order prediction polynomial as defined in the equation
(1) is calculated. The means 100 is coupled to means 102 for
determining a sign of a coefficient for the adjacent subband
signals. In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the
present invention, the means 102 for determining is operative
to calculate the equation (2) so that a subband signal and the
adjacent subband signal are obtained. The sign for a subband
signal obtained by means 102 depends, on the one hand, on the
sign of the predictor polynomial coefficient and, on the other
hand, of the channel number or subband number k. The means 102
in Fig. 10 is coupled to a means 104 for analysing the signs
to determine adjacent subband signals having aliasing-
problematic components.
In particular, in accordance with the preferred embodiment of
the present invention, the means 104 is operative to determine
subband signals as subband signals having aliasing-generating
signal components, in case the subband signal having the lower
channel number has a positive sign and the subband signal hav-
ing the higher channel number has a negative sign. When Fig. 5
is considered, it becomes clear that this situation arises for
subband signals 16 and 17 so that the subband signals 16 and
17 are determined to be adjacent subband signals having cou-
pled gain adjustment values. The same is true for subband sig-
nals 18 and 19 or subband signals 21 and 22 or subband signals
23 and 24.
It is to be noted here that, alternatively, also another pre-
diction polynomial, i.e., a prediction polynomial of third,
forth or fifth order can be used, and that also another poly-
nomial coefficient can be used for determining the sign such
as the second, third or forth order prediction polynomial co-
efficient. The procedure shown with respect to equations 1 and
2 is, however, preferred since it involves a low calculation
overhead.
Fig. 11 shows a preferred implementation of the means for cal-
culating gain adjustment values for adjacent subband signals
in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present in-
vention. In particular, the means 84 from Fig. 8 includes a
means 110 for providing an indication of a reference energy
for adjacent subbands, a means 112 for calculating estimated
energies for the adjacent subbands and a means 114 for deter-
mining first and second gain adjustment values. Preferably,
the first gain adjustment value gk and the second gain adjust-
ment value gk-1 are equal. Preferably, means 114 is operative
to perform equation (3) as shown above. It is to be noted here
that normally, the indication on the reference energy for ad-
jacent subbands is obtained from an encoded signal output by a
normal SBR encoder. In particular, the reference energies con-
stitute the coarse spectral envelope information as generated
by a normal SBR-ready encoder.
The invention also relates to a method for spectral envelope
adjustment of a signal, using a filterbank where said filter-
bank comprises a real valued analysis part and a real valued
synthesis part or where said filterbank comprises a complex
analysis part and a real valued synthesis part, where a lower,
in frequency, channel and the adjacent higher, in frequency,
channel are modified using the same gain value, if said lower
channel has a positive sign and said higher channel has a nega-
tive sign, so that the relation between the subband samples of
said lower channel and the subband samples of said higher chan-
nel is maintained.
In the above method, preferably, said gain-value is calculated
by using the averaged energy of said adjacent channels.
Depending on the circumstances, the inventive method of spec-
tral envelope adjustment can be implemented in hardware or in
software. The implementation can take place on a digital stor-
age medium such as a disk or a CD having electronically read-
able control signals, which can cooperate with a programmable
computer system so that the inventive method is carried out.
Generally, the present invention, therefore, is a computer
program product having a program code stored on a machine-
readable carrier, for performing the inventive method, when
the computer-program product runs on a computer. In other
words, the invention is, therefore, also a computer program
having a program code for performing the inventive method,
when the computer program runs on a computer.
We Claim
1. Apparatus for spectral envelope adjustment of a signal, comprising:
means (80) for providing a plurality of subband signals, a subband
signal having associated therewith a channel number k indicating a
frequency range covered by the sub-band signal, the subband signal
originating from a channel filter having the channel number k in an
analysis filterbank having a plurality of channel filters, wherein the
channel filter having the channel number k has a channel response which
is overlapped with a channel response of an adjacent channel filter having
a channel number k-1 in an overlapping range;
means (82) for examining the subband signal having associated
therewith the channel number k and for examining an adjacent subband
signal having associated therewith the channel number k-:L to determine,
whether the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal have aliasing
generating signal components in the overlapping range;
means (82) for calculating a first gain adjustment value and a
second gain adjustment value for the subband signal and the adjacent
subband signal in response to a positive result of the means for
examining, wherein the means for calculating is operative to determine
the first gain adjustment value and the second gain adjustment value
dependent on each other; and
means (86) for gain adjusting the subband signal and the adjacent
subband signal using the first and the second gain adjusting values or for
outputting the first and the second gain adjustment values for
transmission or storing.
2. Apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the means (82) for examining is
operative to calculate signs of subband signals based on coefficients of
prediction polynomials for the subband signal and the adjacent subband
signal (100, 102), and to indicate (104) a positive result, when the signs
have a predetermined relationship to each other.
3. Apparatus as claimed in claim 2, wherein the means (82) for examining is
operative to apply an auto-correlation method or a co-variance method.
4. Apparatus as claimed in claim 2 or 3, wherein the prediction polynomial is
a low order polynomial is a low order to polynomial having a first order
coefficient, wherein the order of the low order polynomial is smaller than
4 and in which the means for examining (82) is operative to use the first
order coefficient for calculating the signs of the subband signals.
5. Apparatus as claimed in claims 2, 3 or 4, wherein the means (82) for
examining is operative to calculate the sign for a subband signal based on
the following equation:
wherein k is the channel number, and a1 is the first - order
coefficient.
Apparatus as claimed in one of claims 2 to 5, wherein the predetermined
relationship is defined such that the subband signal having associated
therewith the channel number k has a first sign and the adjacent subband
signal having associated therewith the channel number k-1 has a second
sign, which is opposite the first sign.
Apparatus as claimed in claim 6, wherein the first sign is negative, and the
second sign is positive.
Apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the means (82) for examining is
operative to perform a tonal analysis for the subband signal and the
adjacent subband signal for determining a tonal component having a
tonality measure above a tonally threshold.
Apparatus as claimed in claim 8, wherein the means (82) for examining is
operative to determine, whether the tonal component is in the overlapping
range of channel k and channel k-1.
10.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, comprising means
for providing a first reference spectral envelope value for the subband
signal and a second reference spectral envelope value for the adjacent
subband signal (110),
wherein the means (82) for calculating is operative to determine
(112) a first energy measure indicating a signal energy of the subband
signal and a second energy measure indicating a signal energy of the
adjacent sub-band signal, and
wherein the means (82) for examining is operative to calculate
(114) the first and the second gain adjustment values based on a linear
combination of the first reference spectral envelope value and the second
reference spectral envelope value or a linear combination of the first
energy measure or the second energy measure.
11. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the means
(84) for calculating is operative to calculate the first and the second gain
adjustment values such that they differ by less than a predetermined
threshold or are equal to each other.
12. Apparatus as claimed in claim 11, wherein the pre-determined threshold is
lower than or equal to 6 dB.
13. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims comprising means for
providing an unmodified first gain adjustment value for the subband signal
and an unmodified second gain adjustment value for the adjacent
subband signal, and
wherein the means (84) for calculating is operative to calculate the
first and the second gain adjustment values so that both are larger than
or equal to a lower value of the first and the second unmodified gain
adjustment values and smaller or equal to a higher value of the first and
the second unmodified gain adjustment values.
14. Apparatus as claimed in claim 13, wherein the unmodified first gain
adjustment value and the unmodified second gain adjustment value are
indicative for a spectral envelope of an original signal in a frequency band,
wherein the frequency band is to be reconstructed by a spectral band
replication.
15.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, comprising a
synthesis filterbank (90) for filtering the gain adjusted subband signals to
obtain a synthesized output signal.
16. Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the analysis
filterbank is a real valued filterbank, and
wherein the synthesis filterbank is a real valued filterbank.
17. Apparatus as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 15, wherein the analysis
filterbank is a complex-valued filterbank, and in which the synthesis
filterbank is a real-valued filterbank.
18.Apparatus as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the means
(84) for calculating is operative to calculate the first gain adjustment value
and the second gain adjustment value based on an average energy of the
subband signal and the adjacent subband signal.
19. A method of spectral envelope adjustment of a signal, comprising:
providing (80) a plurality of subband signals, a subband signal
having associated therewith a channel number k indicating the frequency
range covered by the subband signal, the subband signal originating from
a channel filter having the channel number k in an analysis filterbank
having a plurality of channel filters, wherein the channel filter having the
channel number k has a channel response which is overlapped with a
channel response of an adjacent channel filter having a channel number
k-1 in an overlapping range;
examining (82) the subband signal having associated therewith the
channel number k and for examining an adjacent subband signal having
associated therewith the channel number k-1 to determine, whether the
subband signal and the adjacent subband signal having aliasing
generating signal components in the overlapping range;
calculating (84) a first gain adjustment value and a second gain
adjustment value for the subband signal and the adjacent subband signal
in response to a positive result of the means for examining, wherein the
means for calculating is operative to determine the first gain adjustment
value and the second gain adjustment value dependent on each other;
and
gain adjusting (86) the subband signal and the adjacent subband
signal using the first and the second gain adjusting values or outputting
the first and the second gain adjustment values for transmission or
storing.
20. A computer program product for performing the method as claimed in
claim 19.
The present invention proposes an apparatus for improving the performance of a
real-valued filterbank based spectral envelope adjuster. By adaptively locking the
gain values for adjacent channels dependent on the sign of the channels, as
defined in the application, reduced aliasing is achieved. Furthermore, the
grouping of the channels during gain-calculation, gives an improved energy
estimate of the real valued subband signals in the filterbank.

Documents:

435-KOLNP-2005-(30-03-2012)-CERTIFIED COPIES(OTHER COUNTRIES).pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-(30-03-2012)-CORRESPONDENCE.pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-(30-03-2012)-FORM-13-1.pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-(30-03-2012)-FORM-13.pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-(30-03-2012)-PA-CERTIFIED COPIES.pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-FORM-27-1.pdf

435-KOLNP-2005-FORM-27.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-abstract.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-claims.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-correspondence.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-description (complete).pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-drawings.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-examination report.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 1.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 18.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 2.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 26.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 3.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-form 5.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-reply to examination report.pdf

435-kolnp-2005-granted-specification.pdf

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Patent Number

224775

Indian Patent Application Number

435/KOLNP/2005

PG Journal Number

43/2008

Publication Date

24-Oct-2008

Grant Date

22-Oct-2008

Date of Filing

16-Mar-2005

Name of Patentee

CODING TECHNOLOGIES AB

Applicant Address

DOBELNSGATAN 64, 113 52 STOCKHOLM

Inventors:

#	Inventor's Name	Inventor's Address
1	KRISTOFER KJORLING	LOSTIGEN 10, 170 75 SOLNA
2	LARS VILLEMOES	MANDOLINVAGEN 22, 175 56 JARFALLA

PCT International Classification Number

H04B

PCT International Application Number

PCT/EP2003/009485

PCT International Filing date

2003-08-27

PCT Conventions:

#	PCT Application Number	Date of Convention	Priority Country
1	0202770-4	2002-09-18	Sweden