Journalistic image access : description, categorization and searching

The quantity of digital imagery continues to grow, creating a pressing need to develop efficient methods for organizing and retrieving images. Knowledge on user behavior in image description and search is required for creating effective and satisfying searching experiences. The nature of visual information and journalistic images creates challenges in representing and matching images with user needs. The goal of this dissertation was to understand the processes in journalistic image access (description, categorization, and searching), and the effects of contextual factors on preferred access points. These were studied using multiple data collection and analysis methods across several studies. Image attributes used to describe journalistic imagery were analyzed based on description tasks and compared to a typology developed through a meta-analysis of literature on image attributes. Journalistic image search processes and query types were analyzed through a field study and multimodal image retrieval experiment. Image categorization was studied via sorting experiments leading to a categorization model. Advances to research methods concerning search tasks and categorization procedures were implemented. Contextual effects on image access were found related to organizational contexts, work, and search tasks, as well as publication context. Image retrieval in a journalistic work context was contextual at the level of image needs and search process. While text queries, together with browsing, remained the key access mode to journalistic imagery, participants also used visual access modes in the experiment, constructing multimodal queries. Assigned search task type and searcher expertise had an effect on query modes utilized. Journalistic images were mostly described and queried for on the semantic level but also syntactic attributes were used. Constraining the description led to more abstract descriptions. Image similarity was evaluated mainly based on generic semantics. However, functionally oriented categories were also constructed, especially by domain experts. Availability of page context promoted thematic rather than object-based categorization. The findings increase our understanding of user behavior in image description, categorization, and searching, as well as have implications for future solutions in journalistic image access. The contexts of image production, use, and search merit more interest in research as these could be leveraged for supporting annotation and retrieval. Multiple access points should be created for journalistic images based on image content and function. Support for multimodal query formulation should also be offered. The contributions of this dissertation may be used to create evaluation criteria for journalistic image access systems

Analysing Creative Image Search Information Needs

Creative professionals in advertising, marketing, design and journalism search for images to visually represent a concept for their project. The main purpose of this paper is to present search facets derived from an analysis of documents known as briefs, which are widely used in creative industries as requirement documents describing information needs. The briefs specify the type of image required, such as the content and context of use for the image and represent the topic from which the searcher builds an image query. We take three main sources—user image search behaviour, briefs, and image search engine search facets to examine the search facets for image searching in order to examine the following research question—are search facet schemes for image search engines sufficient for user needs, or is revision needed? We found that there are three main classes of user search facet, which include business, contextual and image related information. The key argument in the paper is that the facet “keyword/tag” is ambiguous and does not support user needs for more generic descriptions to broaden search or specific descriptions to narrow their search — we suggest that a more detailed search facet scheme would be appropriate

Analysing creative image search information needs.

Creative professionals in advertising, marketing, design and journalism search for images to visually represent a concept for their project. The main purpose of this paper is to present an analysis of documents known as briefs to find search facets, which are widely used in creative industries as a requirements document to describe an information need. The briefs specify the type of image required, such as the content and context of use for the image, and represent the topic from which the searcher builds an image query. This research takes three main sources - user image search behaviour, briefs, search engine meta-data - to examine the search facets for image searching in order to examine the following research question - are meta-data schemes for image search engines sufficient for user needs, or is revision needed? This research found that there are three main classes of user search facet, which include business, contextual and image related information. The key argument in the paper is that the facet 'keyword/tag' is ambiguous and does not support user needs for more generic descriptions to broaden search or specific descriptions to narrow their search - we suggest that a more detailed search facet scheme would be appropriate