panner-utils

Utility functions to calculate vector values for the Web Audio PannerNode.

They convert between rotation around aircraft principal axes to forward/up orientation vectors as required by the AudioListener and PannerNode interfaces of the Web Audio API.

Image source

npm i panner-utils

Usage example

const context = new AudioContext();
// point the listener 45 degrees to the left, 60 degrees up and tilt by 15 degrees
const listenerOrientation = calculateListenerOrientation(45, 60, -15);

context.listener.forwardX.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.forward.x, context.currentTime);
context.listener.forwardY.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.forward.y, context.currentTime);
context.listener.forwardZ.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.forward.z, context.currentTime);
context.listener.upX.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.up.x, context.currentTime);
context.listener.upY.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.up.y, context.currentTime);
context.listener.upZ.setValueAtTime(listenerOrientation.up.z, context.currentTime);

const panner = new PannerNode(context, { panningModel: 'HRTF' });
// point the panner 45 degrees to the right and 15 degrees up
const pannerOrientation = calculatePannerOrientation({ yaw: -45, pitch: 15 });

panner.orientationX.setValueAtTime(pannerOrientation.x, context.currentTime);
panner.orientationY.setValueAtTime(pannerOrientation.y, context.currentTime);
panner.orientationZ.setValueAtTime(pannerOrientation.z, context.currentTime);

Reference

The module exports the following two functions:

calculatePannerOrientation

This function takes two arguments, all defaulting to 0:

• yaw – rotation around the Y axis (in degrees)
• pitch – rotation around the X axis (in degrees)

and returns an object with properties x, y, z corresponding to the PannerNode.{orientationX,orientationY,orientationZ} parameters.

You can also pass the arguments in a single object.

Note: this function assumes that, at no rotation ({ yaw: 0, pitch: 0 }), the panner is pointing forward, i.e. away from the listener. This is to harmonise the rotation calculations for both the panner and listener, since by default in Web Audio, the Panner is facing 90 degrees to the left.

calculateListenerOrientation

This function takes three arguments, all defaulting to 0:

• yaw – rotation around the Y axis (in degrees)
• pitch – rotation around the X axis (in degrees)
• roll - rotation around the Z axis (in degrees)

and returns an object with properties forward, up, each of which has the properties x, y, z corresponding to the appropriate PannerNode parameters.

You can also pass the arguments in a single object.