The work presented in this project concerns the implementation of an acoustic locator system. As its name implies, its main function is the detection of the direction of a sound source. Once the direction of the sound source is determined, a positioning system is activated to point to the direction of the sound source. In the case of a multiple speaker setting, the system will control the positioning mechanism to point towards the speaker currently speaking. In the case of a single moving speaker, the system will control positioning unitin order to track the speaker as he moves.

The acoustic locator can be used in teleconferencing settings, where more than one participants arelocated in a room talking with other participants located elsewhere. Often, these participants seat around a table with a web camera and a microphone in front of them (Figure 1), therefore, it is difficult for the camera to capture all of them. In this case the camera and the microphone can be attached on the positioning mechanism of the acoustic locator. The acoustic locator will determine the position of the person speaking and instruct the propositioning mechanism to point towards him.

                     Figure 1

A similar case occurs in conferences when people from the audience wish to intervene or ask a question. If the conference is video recorded or streamed, it is necessary to move the camera so that it points to the person speaking. This operation can be achieved automatically with the help of the acoustic locator. In some cases the chairs in the conference room are not placed on the same level, as shown in figure 2. Therefore, the acoustic locator must also be able to detect the vertical direction of the audio source and the positioning mechanism must be able to provide both horizontal and vertical rotation movements.

                    Figure 2