Linear Phase Filters

VOCAL Technologies LTD October 25th, 2012

I.

Introduction
Linear phase lters are practical realizations of zero phase lters. A zero

phase lter is a lter that has symmetry about the origin. Thus when using a zero phase lter, one must take negative indices into account, which is rather tedious and is prone to error. To make things easier, we instead make the lter symmetric about some non-zero point. What results is a linear phase lter shown below:

Figure 1: A Linear Phase Filter The Hamming Window Linear phase lters are important for audio lter design because passing a signal through a linear phase lter will delay all of the frequency components by the same amount, thus leaving the structure of the signal intact, which will preserve speech intelligibility. To understand how phase eect delay, its quite common to start by looking at the frequency response of the ideal delay system h[n] = [n nd ]:
+

H(ej ) =
k=

[n nd ]ejk = ejnd

(1)

This behavior is due to the sampling property of the delta function. We can see that the phase is then: H(ej ) = arg[ejnd ] = nd (2)

Which is a linear function of frequency. Thus, time delay and linear phase

are inexorably linked. If you still dont believe, consider what happens when we put a signal x through the ideal delay system. The output is: y[n] = (x|h)[n] = x[n nd ] This has frequency response: Y (ej ) = X(ej )H(ej ) = X(ej )ejnd (4) (3)

As the equation shows, regardless of what the frequency response of the input x is, it is shifted linearly by nd , while the time domain signal is shifted by nd . Again, time delay and linear phase are inexorably linked. With this in mind, it will be useful to examine some dierent types of lters that will give us a linear phase response. First, we will examine the four types of FIR lters [1].

II.

Linear Phase FIR Filters

The four types of linear phase FIR lters are appropriately named Type I-IV. These lters are categorized by whether they have an even or odd length, and whether they are symmetric or antisymmetric. In all cases, we will dene the center of symmetry to be
M 2

where M 1 is the length of the lter. Since

M 2 .

the lters will have essentially the same shape on either side of the center of symmetry, we can think of each as a lter delayed by from [1]. The examples follow

Type I FIR Filters

Figure 2: Type I FIR Filter As the above gure shows, Type I FIR Filters are odd length lters with a symmetric impulse response given by: h[n] = h[M n] 0nM (5)

Most generally, these lters can be represented as:

M 2

H(e ) = e Where: a[0] a[k] = h[ =

j M 2 k=0

a[k]cos(k)

(6)

M ] 2 M 2h[ k] 2

1k

M 2

(7)

For the example above, the frequency response is:

6

H(ej )

=
k=0

h[n]ejwn 0 ejw0 + 1 ejw1 + 2 ejw2 + 3 ejw3 + 2 ejw4 + 1 ejw5 + 0 ejw6 ej3w (ej2w + 2 ejw + 3 + 2 ejw + ej2w ) ej3w (2(ejw + ejw ) + (ej2w + ej2w ) + 3) ej3w (4cos(w) + 2cos(2w) + 3) 4 (8)

= = = =

Type II FIR Filters

Figure 3: Type II FIR Filter As the above gure shows, Type II FIR Filters are even length lters with a symmetric impulse response. Most generally, these lters can be represented as:
M +1 2

H(ej ) = ej Where: a[k] = 2h[

M 2

k=1

1 b[k]cos[(k )] 2

(9)

M +1 k] 2

1k

M +1 2

(10)

For the example above, the frequency response is:

5

H(ej )

=
k=0

h[n]ejwn 1 ejw0 + 2 ejw1 + 3 ejw2 + 3 ejw3 + 2 ejw4 + 1 ejw5 ej 2 w (ej 2 w + 2 ej 2 w + 3 ej 2 w + 3 ej 2 w + 2 ej 2 w + ej 2 w ) ej 2 w ((ej 2 w + ej 2 w ) + 2(ej 2 w + ej 2 w ) + 3(ej 2 w + ej 2 w ) 5 5 3 1 ej 2 w (2cos( w) + 4cos( w) + 6cos( w)) (11) 2 2 2
5 5 5 3 3 1 1 5 5 3 1 1 3 5

= = = =

Type III FIR Filters

Figure 4: Type III FIR Filter As the above gure shows, Type III FIR Filters are odd length lters with an antisymmetric impulse response given by: h[n] = h[M n] 0nM (12)

Most generally, these lters can be represented as:

M 2

H(e ) = je Where: c[k] = 2h[

j M 2 k=1

c[k]sin(k)

(13)

M k] 2

1k

M 2

(14)

Similarly to the Type I lter, the frequency response of the above example is:
6

H(ej )

=
k=0

h[n]ejwn

= ej3w+ 2 (4sin(w) + 2sin(2w) + 3)

(15)

Type IV FIR Filters

Figure 5: Type IV FIR Filter As the above gure shows, Type IV FIR Filters are even length lters with an antisymmetric impulse response. Most generally, these lters can be represented as:
M +1 2

H(ej ) = jej Where: d[k] = 2h[

M 2

k=1

1 d[k]sin[(k )] 2

(16)

M +1 k] 2

1k

M +1 2

(17)

Similarly to the Type II lter, the frequency response of the above example is:
6

H(ej )

=
k=0

h[n]ejwn (18)

5 5 3 1 = ej 2 w+ 2 (2sin( w) + 4sin( w) + 6sin( w)) 2 2 2

With analogy to (4), it is clear that all of these lters have linear phase. From this discussion, it should be clear to you which FIR lters will be linear phase, and which will not be. Similarly, by shifting in the time domain, you can create a linear phase lter from a zero phase one.

III.

Linear Phase IIR Filters

IIR Filters may be made linear phase by using what is called bi-directional ltering. In bi-directional ltering, the signal of interest is rst ltered via convolution with the IIR lter from left-to-right, and then the output is ltered via the IIR lter going from right-to-left for instance. In this manner, lters that are generally not linear phase like IIR lters can be eectively transformed to lters that are. Of course, in practice, this method demands a great deal of delay because not only do you have to wait for the signal values to create the IIR lter, but you also need to lter the signal twice. However, if your FIR lter is suciently long, using a much lower order IIR lter may be worth the extra computational overhead.

References
[1] A. V. Oppenheim, R. W. Schafer, Transform Analysis of Linear TimeInvariant Systems, in Discrete Time Signal Processing, 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1999, ch. 5, sec. 7, pp. 298300.