Towards automatic extraction of expressive elements from motion pictures : tempo

This paper proposes a unique computational approach to extraction of expressive elements of motion pictures for deriving high level semantics of stories portrayed, thus enabling better video annotation and interpretation systems. This approach, motivated and directed by the existing cinematic conventions known as film grammar, as a first step towards demonstrating its effectiveness, uses the attributes of motion and shot length to define and compute a novel measure of tempo of a movie. Tempo flow plots are defined and derived for four full-length movies and edge analysis is performed leading to the extraction of dramatic story sections and events signaled by their unique tempo. The results confirm tempo as a useful attribute in its own right and a promising component of semantic constructs such as tone or mood of a film

Role of shot length in characterizing tempo and dramatic story sections in motion pictures

Motivated by existing cinematic conventions known as film grammar, we proposed a computational approach to determine tempo as a high-level movie content descriptor as well as means for deriving dramatic story sections and events occurring in movies. Movie tempo is extracted from two easily computed aspects in our approach: shot length and motion. Story sections and events are generally associated with changes in tempo, and are thus identified by edges located in the tempo function. In this paper, we analyze our initial founding of the tempo function on the basis that the distribution of both shot length and motion in movies is normal. Given that the distribution of shot length is approximately Weibull as confirmed in our experiments, we examine the impact of modelling and modifying the contributions of shot length to tempo. We derive an appropriate normalization function that faithfully encapsulates the role of shot length in tempo perception, and analyze the changes to the story sections identified in films.<br /

Jan Svankmajer: film as puppet theatre

The Czech Surrealist Jan Svankmajer began his career as a puppeteer in Prague. His use of the puppet as a bridge between live action and stop-motion animation dominate his feature films and shorts. This paper explores his interest in the Czech marionette tradition combined with the myth of the Kabbalistic animation of the Golem; both part of the culture and folklore of Prague. For Svankmajer, animation is not merely a special effect but a tangible metaphor for manipulation

An embedded suggestive interface for making home videos

This paper describes a novel suggestive interface embedded in a smart camera prototype aimed at aiding home movie makers. We focus on the problem of generating shot capture suggestions suitable to the user\u27s filming context, intended audience and style, and formulate a novel aesthetic measure by which to judge proposed suggestions. Tight coupling between media and software allows the aesthetic measure to be sensitive to previous footage captures, including those taken without the system\u27s prompting, in a manner allowing flexible, end-to-end migration of the authoring task from user to machine. An approximate method is used to find timely, near-optimal solutions to the aesthetic measure. Qualitative evaluation in the form of a user study shows it to be a promising approach to the flexible home movie authoring context

Toward automatic extraction of expressive elements from motion pictures : tempo

This paper addresses the challenge of bridging the semantic gap that exists between the simplicity of features that can be currently computed in automated content indexing systems and the richness of semantics in user queries posed for media search and retrieval. It proposes a unique computational approach to extraction of expressive elements of motion pictures for deriving high-level semantics of stories portrayed, thus enabling rich video annotation and interpretation. This approach, motivated and directed by the existing cinematic conventions known as film grammar, as a first step toward demonstrating its effectiveness, uses the attributes of motion and shot length to define and compute a novel measure of tempo of a movie. Tempo flow plots are defined and derived for a number of full-length movies and edge analysis is performed leading to the extraction of dramatic story sections and events signaled by their unique tempo. The results confirm tempo as a useful high-level semantic construct in its own right and a promising component of others such as rhythm, tone or mood of a film. In addition to the development of this computable tempo measure, a study is conducted as to the usefulness of biasing it toward either of its constituents, namely, motion or shot length. Finally, a refinement is made to the shot length normalizing mechanism, driven by the peculiar characteristics of shot length distribution exhibited by movies. Results of these additional studies, and possible applications and limitations are discussed

Generative video art

Generative art is historically and widely used for the production of abstract images and animations, each frame corresponding to a generation or iteration of the generative system, which runs within the aesthetic boundaries defined by its author. But rather than being limited to image or sound synthesis, generative systems can also manipulate video samples and still images from external sources, and include vectors that can be mapped to the concepts of shot, sequence, rhythm and montage. Furthermore, generative systems need not be limited to the visual plane and can also render audio, either through sound synthesis or by manipulating sound samples. And in this case, since the output is a constant and uninterrupted audio-visual stream, is it not possible to speak of generative video art, as it becomes indistinguishable from its modern-day video art digital counterparts? Within this perspective, this article traces back the historical roots of generative video art, and proposes a theoretical model for generative video art systems, as a creative intersection of two artistic genres, often seen as disjoint.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Novel approach to determining tempo and dramatic story sections in motion pictures

This paper presents an original computational approach to extraction of movie tempo for deriving story sections and events that convey high level semantics of stories portrayed in motion pictures, thus enabling better video annotation and interpretation systems. This approach, inspired by the existing cinematic conventions known as film grammar, uses the attributes of motion and shot length to define and compute a novel continuous measure of tempo of a movie. Tempo flow plots are derived for several full-length motion pictures and edge detection is performed to extract dramatic story sections and events occurring in the movie, underlined by their unique tempo. The results confirm reliable detection of actual distinct tempo changes and serve as useful index into the dramatic development and narration of the story in motion pictures