MPEG-H audio - the upcoming standard for universal spatial / 3D audio coding

Recently, a new generation of spatial audio formats were introduced that include height (i.e. elevated loudspeakers) and thus go beyond traditional surround sound formats, such as 5.1 or 7.1, in terms of spatial realism and envelopment of the sound experience. Implementation of these ‘3D formats’ poses many new challenges ranging from production to distribution and coding of 3D material, and traditional surround sound approaches are often no longer considered adequate. In order to facilitate high-quality bitrate-efficient distribution and flexible reproduction of 3D sound, the MPEG standardization group currently started the development effort of MPEG-H Audio Coding which allows the universal carriage of encoded 3D sound from channel-based, object-based and HOA-based sound formats. Reproduction is supported for many output setups ranging from 22.2 and beyond down to 5.1, stereo and binaural reproduction. Depending on the available output loudspeaker setup, the encoded material is rendered to yield highest spatial audio quality, thus overcoming the incompatibility between various 3D (re)production formats. The talk will outline the current status of the standardization project and provide an overview of the architecture of the defined system, its capabilities and performance.