Re: MDS-distances

[John Bates <jkbates@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear List,

I think Malcolm is on the right track with his idea of an auditory 
version of three-color vision. I think it can be done. The reason is 
that I've encountered this sort of perception while doing experiments 
in classifying timbre of pulsed sequences. I noticed this effect when 
listening to groups of all possible combinations of sequences of from 
1 to 4 successive impulse waveshapes. The impulse shapes I used were 
either rectangular or overdamped sines with constant amplitude and 
with ordered time spacings. I found that equal spacings give a tonal 
timbre (or pitch) while aperiodic spacings give an atonal timbre. I 
noticed that I heard atonal timbre in terms of the vowels (/ee/, 
/ih/, /eh/,...../oo/.) By a series of tests with different 
combinations of shapes and intervals I could locate the combinations 
that produced the closest match to vowel centers. I found that the 
non-matching timbres would generally lie between adjacent centers. 
For example, if a sample were not an /ah/ it would fall between 
either /aa/ or /aw/, or it might move toward the back vowel /oo/ as 
in an umlaut.

These results led me to suppose that a set of vowels could represent 
cardinal points in a timbre space that applies to human speech as 
well as to environmental sounds. (Why not? The vowels of the human 
vocal cavity can be heard in a wide variety of non-speech sounds.) 
This indicates that a vowel space could be defined perhaps in terms 
of one like the "RGB" space of color TV. For example, consider an 
"FMB" space with F for front-closed, M for middle-open, and B for 
back-closed. Couldn't this space include all of the variants of vowel 
sounds? Couldn't this also provide a more quantitative calibration of 
timbre than one based on things like spectral brightness and "bite?"

If anyone feels like trying these tests, the key is to listen to the 
atonal waveshape groups either individually or in a stream, each one 
separated by more than 25 milliseconds. The 25 ms.separation reduces 
the possibility of mixing the sound of group repetition with group 
timbre. Note that the group of the vowel, /ee/, as the only tonal 
vowel, must contain at least three equally spaced impulses having a 
repetition rate that defines the third formant. Note also that 
whispered speech, or all kinds of environmental sounds including 
transients could be simulated by randomizing the separation and/or 
mixing of timbre and pitch.

IAn example of the dichotomy of timbre and pitch can be shown in the 
experiment by E. Terhardt and H. Fastl, "Zum einfluss von stortonen 
un storgerauschen auf die tonhohe von sinustonen" Acoustica, vol. 25, 
pp53-61, 1971 This is a study of phase masking vs.amplitude where a 
200 Hz tone masks a 400 Hz tone as its phase is varied in steps 0 to 
360 degrees. I've been testing this experiment and have found  that 
the timbre varies with corresponding waveshape changes although the 
two pitches are constant. My experiments are based on Manfred 
Schroeder's description in "Models of hearing," Proceedings of the 
IEEE, Vol. 63, No.9, September,1974. I'm looking for more information 
on how the experiment was run, since Schroeder's paper was only a 
summary. So far I haven't found much about it on the Internet.

John Bates


snip-

> > Failed at what?   Malcolm, I think you have missed the point.
>
> Fair enough.. We have different goals.  I want a model of timbre 
> perception (for speech and music sounds) that rivals the three-color 
> model of color vision science.  Spectral brightness and attack time 
> are not enough of an answer for me.
>
> I don't think the timbre interpolation work I've seen (the 
> vibrabone?) shows that we understand timbre space yet.  As I 
> remember the data, the synthesized instrument was not on a 
> perceptual line directly between the source sounds.