For several decades, research has demonstrated the benefits
of individualised Head-Related Transfer Functions (HRTFs)
in spatial auditory localisation tasks. The majority of
perceptual studies have focused on comparisons between
laboratory-measured individual HRTFs and non-individual,
generic HRTFs. However, relatively few studies have
examined differences between individual HRTFs acquired
under varying conditions, and even fewer have conducted
direct perceptual comparisons of multiple individual HRTF
sets. With the increasing availability of HRTF measurement
facilities and the emergence of alternative acquisition
techniquessuch as numerical simulations from mesh scans
and commercial solutions that derive HRTFs from
photographic datathere remains a gap in subjective
evaluations across a large set of individual HRTFs. This
study addresses this gap by presenting the first results
from a perceptual comparison of 13 individual HRTF datasets
obtained through various acquisition methods. The
evaluation employed two widely used perceptual assessment
techniques: a localisation test and a trajectory quality
ranking task. A single subject, whose HRTFs have been
acquired from various institutions using a variety of
methods over the past 30 years, participated in the study.
Each evaluation method was conducted under multiple test
conditions, using a custom experimental setup designed for
a portable Head-Mounted Display (HMD) with reference
headphones. The results indicate that conventionally
measured HRTFs provide the highest localisation accuracy,
outperforming simplified measurement techniques, which
yielded the poorest results. Boundary Element Method (BEM)
numerical simulations demonstrated performance comparable
to that of measured HRTFs, whereas the tested commercial
black-box solutions performed less effectively, with
localisation accuracy similar to that of non-individual
HRTFs included in the study. These findings highlight the
continued importance of precise measurement techniques for
achieving optimal spatial audio perception.
(See document for exact affiliation information.)
https://aes2.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=22940
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