MediaSync: Handbook on Multimedia Synchronization

This book provides an approachable overview of the most recent advances in the fascinating field of media synchronization (mediasync), gathering contributions from the most representative and influential experts. Understanding the challenges of this field in the current multi-sensory, multi-device, and multi-protocol world is not an easy task. The book revisits the foundations of mediasync, including theoretical frameworks and models, highlights ongoing research efforts, like hybrid broadband broadcast (HBB) delivery and users' perception modeling (i.e., Quality of Experience or QoE), and paves the way for the future (e.g., towards the deployment of multi-sensory and ultra-realistic experiences). Although many advances around mediasync have been devised and deployed, this area of research is getting renewed attention to overcome remaining challenges in the next-generation (heterogeneous and ubiquitous) media ecosystem. Given the significant advances in this research area, its current relevance and the multiple disciplines it involves, the availability of a reference book on mediasync becomes necessary. This book fills the gap in this context. In particular, it addresses key aspects and reviews the most relevant contributions within the mediasync research space, from different perspectives. Mediasync: Handbook on Multimedia Synchronization is the perfect companion for scholars and practitioners that want to acquire strong knowledge about this research area, and also approach the challenges behind ensuring the best mediated experiences, by providing the adequate synchronization between the media elements that constitute these experiences

Virtual Reality Games for Motor Rehabilitation

This paper presents a fuzzy logic based method to track user satisfaction without the need for devices to monitor users physiological conditions. User satisfaction is the key to any product’s acceptance; computer applications and video games provide a unique opportunity to provide a tailored environment for each user to better suit their needs. We have implemented a non-adaptive fuzzy logic model of emotion, based on the emotional component of the Fuzzy Logic Adaptive Model of Emotion (FLAME) proposed by El-Nasr, to estimate player emotion in UnrealTournament 2004. In this paper we describe the implementation of this system and present the results of one of several play tests. Our research contradicts the current literature that suggests physiological measurements are needed. We show that it is possible to use a software only method to estimate user emotion

Development of a Physics-Aware Dead Reckoning Mechanism for Distributed Interactive Applications

Distributed Interactive Applications (DIAs) are a class of software that allow geographically remote users to interact within a shared virtual environment. Many DIAs seek to present a rich and realistic virtual world to users, both on a visual and behavioural level. A relatively recent addition to virtual environments (both distributed and single user) to achieve the latter has been the simulation of realistic physical phenomena between objects in the environment. However, the application of physics simulation to virtual environments in DIAs currently lags that of single user environments. This is primarily due to the unavailability of entity state update mechanisms which can maintain consistency in such physics-rich environments. The difference is particularly evident in applications built on a peer-to-peer architecture, as a lack of a single authority presents additional challenges in synchronising the state of shared objects while also presenting a responsive simulation. This thesis proposes a novel state maintenance mechanism for physics-rich environments in peer-to-peer DIAs composed of two parts: a dynamic authority scheme for shared objects, and a physics-aware dead reckoning model with an adaptive error threshold. The first part is intended to place a bound on the overall inconsistency present in shared objects, while the second is implemented to minimise the instantaneous inconsistency during users’ interactions with shared objects. A testbed application is also described, which is used to validate the performance of the proposed mechanism. The state maintenance mechanism is implemented for a single type of physicsaware application, and demonstrates a marked improvement in consistency for that application. However, several flexible terms are described in its implementation, as well as their potential relevance to alternative applications. Finally, it should be noted that the physics-aware dead reckoning model does not depend on the authority scheme, and can therefore be employed with alternative authority scheme

Sonic interactions in virtual environments

This book tackles the design of 3D spatial interactions in an audio-centered and audio-first perspective, providing the fundamental notions related to the creation and evaluation of immersive sonic experiences. The key elements that enhance the sensation of place in a virtual environment (VE) are: Immersive audio: the computational aspects of the acoustical-space properties of Virutal Reality (VR) technologies Sonic interaction: the human-computer interplay through auditory feedback in VE VR systems: naturally support multimodal integration, impacting different application domains Sonic Interactions in Virtual Environments will feature state-of-the-art research on real-time auralization, sonic interaction design in VR, quality of the experience in multimodal scenarios, and applications. Contributors and editors include interdisciplinary experts from the fields of computer science, engineering, acoustics, psychology, design, humanities, and beyond. Their mission is to shape an emerging new field of study at the intersection of sonic interaction design and immersive media, embracing an archipelago of existing research spread in different audio communities and to increase among the VR communities, researchers, and practitioners, the awareness of the importance of sonic elements when designing immersive environments