Prototype waveform speech coding with interpolation of pitch,

Abstract

A speech coding system providing reconstructed voiced speech with a smoothly evolving pitch-cycle waveform. A speech signal is represented by isolating and coding prototype waveforms. Each prototype waveform is an exemplary pitch-cycle of voiced speech. A coded prototype waveform is transmitted at regular intervals to a receiver which synthesizes (or reconstructs) an estimate of the original speech segment based on the prototypes. The estimate of the original speech signal is provided by a prototype interpolation process which provides a smooth time-evolution of pitch-cycle waveforms in the reconstructed speech. Illustratively, a frame of original speech is coded by first filtering the frame with a linear predictive filter. Next a pitch-cycle of the filtered original is identified and extracted as a prototype waveform. The prototype waveform is then represented as a set of Fourier series (frequency domain) coefficients. The pitch-period and Fourier coefficients of the prototype, as well as the parameters of the linear predictive filter, are used to represent a frame of original speech. These parameters are coded by vector and scalar quantization and communicated over a channel to a receiver which uses information representing two consecutive frames to reconstruct the earlier of the two frames based on a continuous prototype waveform interpolation process. Waveform interpolation may be combined with conventional CELP techniques for coding unvoiced portions of the original speech signal.