Presence 2005: the eighth annual international workshop on presence, 21-23 September, 2005 University College London (Conference proceedings)

OVERVIEW (taken from the CALL FOR PAPERS) Academics and practitioners with an interest in the concept of (tele)presence are invited to submit their work for presentation at PRESENCE 2005 at University College London in London, England, September 21-23, 2005. The eighth in a series of highly successful international workshops, PRESENCE 2005 will provide an open discussion forum to share ideas regarding concepts and theories, measurement techniques, technology, and applications related to presence, the psychological state or subjective perception in which a person fails to accurately and completely acknowledge the role of technology in an experience, including the sense of 'being there' experienced by users of advanced media such as virtual reality. The concept of presence in virtual environments has been around for at least 15 years, and the earlier idea of telepresence at least since Minsky's seminal paper in 1980. Recently there has been a burst of funded research activity in this area for the first time with the European FET Presence Research initiative. What do we really know about presence and its determinants? How can presence be successfully delivered with today's technology? This conference invites papers that are based on empirical results from studies of presence and related issues and/or which contribute to the technology for the delivery of presence. Papers that make substantial advances in theoretical understanding of presence are also welcome. The interest is not solely in virtual environments but in mixed reality environments. Submissions will be reviewed more rigorously than in previous conferences. High quality papers are therefore sought which make substantial contributions to the field. Approximately 20 papers will be selected for two successive special issues for the journal Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments. PRESENCE 2005 takes place in London and is hosted by University College London. The conference is organized by ISPR, the International Society for Presence Research and is supported by the European Commission's FET Presence Research Initiative through the Presencia and IST OMNIPRES projects and by University College London

Enhanced Virtuality: Increasing the Usability and Productivity of Virtual Environments

Mit stetig steigender Bildschirmauflösung, genauerem Tracking und fallenden Preisen stehen Virtual Reality (VR) Systeme kurz davor sich erfolgreich am Markt zu etablieren. Verschiedene Werkzeuge helfen Entwicklern bei der Erstellung komplexer Interaktionen mit mehreren Benutzern innerhalb adaptiver virtueller Umgebungen. Allerdings entstehen mit der Verbreitung der VR-Systeme auch zusätzliche Herausforderungen: Diverse Eingabegeräte mit ungewohnten Formen und Tastenlayouts verhindern eine intuitive Interaktion. Darüber hinaus zwingt der eingeschränkte Funktionsumfang bestehender Software die Nutzer dazu, auf herkömmliche PC- oder Touch-basierte Systeme zurückzugreifen. Außerdem birgt die Zusammenarbeit mit anderen Anwendern am gleichen Standort Herausforderungen hinsichtlich der Kalibrierung unterschiedlicher Trackingsysteme und der Kollisionsvermeidung. Beim entfernten Zusammenarbeiten wird die Interaktion durch Latenzzeiten und Verbindungsverluste zusätzlich beeinflusst. Schließlich haben die Benutzer unterschiedliche Anforderungen an die Visualisierung von Inhalten, z.B. Größe, Ausrichtung, Farbe oder Kontrast, innerhalb der virtuellen Welten. Eine strikte Nachbildung von realen Umgebungen in VR verschenkt Potential und wird es nicht ermöglichen, die individuellen Bedürfnisse der Benutzer zu berücksichtigen. Um diese Probleme anzugehen, werden in der vorliegenden Arbeit Lösungen in den Bereichen Eingabe, Zusammenarbeit und Erweiterung von virtuellen Welten und Benutzern vorgestellt, die darauf abzielen, die Benutzerfreundlichkeit und Produktivität von VR zu erhöhen. Zunächst werden PC-basierte Hardware und Software in die virtuelle Welt übertragen, um die Vertrautheit und den Funktionsumfang bestehender Anwendungen in VR zu erhalten. Virtuelle Stellvertreter von physischen Geräten, z.B. Tastatur und Tablet, und ein VR-Modus für Anwendungen ermöglichen es dem Benutzer reale Fähigkeiten in die virtuelle Welt zu übertragen. Des Weiteren wird ein Algorithmus vorgestellt, der die Kalibrierung mehrerer ko-lokaler VR-Geräte mit hoher Genauigkeit und geringen Hardwareanforderungen und geringem Aufwand ermöglicht. Da VR-Headsets die reale Umgebung der Benutzer ausblenden, wird die Relevanz einer Ganzkörper-Avatar-Visualisierung für die Kollisionsvermeidung und das entfernte Zusammenarbeiten nachgewiesen. Darüber hinaus werden personalisierte räumliche oder zeitliche Modifikationen vorgestellt, die es erlauben, die Benutzerfreundlichkeit, Arbeitsleistung und soziale Präsenz von Benutzern zu erhöhen. Diskrepanzen zwischen den virtuellen Welten, die durch persönliche Anpassungen entstehen, werden durch Methoden der Avatar-Umlenkung (engl. redirection) kompensiert. Abschließend werden einige der Methoden und Erkenntnisse in eine beispielhafte Anwendung integriert, um deren praktische Anwendbarkeit zu verdeutlichen. Die vorliegende Arbeit zeigt, dass virtuelle Umgebungen auf realen Fähigkeiten und Erfahrungen aufbauen können, um eine vertraute und einfache Interaktion und Zusammenarbeit von Benutzern zu gewährleisten. Darüber hinaus ermöglichen individuelle Erweiterungen des virtuellen Inhalts und der Avatare Einschränkungen der realen Welt zu überwinden und das Erlebnis von VR-Umgebungen zu steigern

Ubiquitous haptic feedback in human-computer interaction through electrical muscle stimulation

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Accessibility of Health Data Representations for Older Adults: Challenges and Opportunities for Design

Health data of consumer off-the-shelf wearable devices is often conveyed to users through visual data representations and analyses. However, this is not always accessible to people with disabilities or older people due to low vision, cognitive impairments or literacy issues. Due to trade-offs between aesthetics predominance or information overload, real-time user feedback may not be conveyed easily from sensor devices through visual cues like graphs and texts. These difficulties may hinder critical data understanding. Additional auditory and tactile feedback can also provide immediate and accessible cues from these wearable devices, but it is necessary to understand existing data representation limitations initially. To avoid higher cognitive and visual overload, auditory and haptic cues can be designed to complement, replace or reinforce visual cues. In this paper, we outline the challenges in existing data representation and the necessary evidence to enhance the accessibility of health information from personal sensing devices used to monitor health parameters such as blood pressure, sleep, activity, heart rate and more. By creating innovative and inclusive user feedback, users will likely want to engage and interact with new devices and their own data

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

Music conducting pedagogy and technology : a document analysis on best practices

This document analysis was designed to investigate pedagogical practices of music conducting teachers in conjunction with research of technologists on the use of various technologies as teaching tools. I sought to discern how conducting teachers and pedagogues are applying recent technological advancements into their teaching strategies. I also sought to understand what paths research is taking about the use of software, hardware, and computer systems applied to the teaching of music conducting technique. This dissertation was guided by four main research questions: (1) How has technology been used to aid in the teaching of conducting? (2) What is the role of technology in the context of conducting pedagogy? (3) Given that conducting is a performative act, how can it be developed through technological means? (4) What technological possibilities exist in the teaching of music conducting technique? Data were collected through music conducting syllabi, conducting textbooks, and research articles. Documents were selected through purposive sampling procedures. Analysis of documents through the constant comparative approach identified emerging themes and differences across the three types of documents. Based on a synthesis of information, I discussed implications for conducting pedagogy and made suggestions for conducting educators.Includes bibliographical references

The Sixth Annual Workshop on Space Operations Applications and Research (SOAR 1992)

This document contains papers presented at the Space Operations, Applications, and Research Symposium (SOAR) hosted by the U.S. Air Force (USAF) on 4-6 Aug. 1992 and held at the JSC Gilruth Recreation Center. The symposium was cosponsored by the Air Force Material Command and by NASA/JSC. Key technical areas covered during the symposium were robotic and telepresence, automation and intelligent systems, human factors, life sciences, and space maintenance and servicing. The SOAR differed from most other conferences in that it was concerned with Government-sponsored research and development relevant to aerospace operations. The symposium's proceedings include papers covering various disciplines presented by experts from NASA, the USAF, universities, and industry

Body image distortion in photography

This thesis investigates the theory that photography is, in terms of body image perception, an intrinsically distorting and often fattening medium. In the professional practice of photography, film and television, there is a widely held belief that the camera "adds 10lbs" to the portrayed weight of actors and presenters. The primary questions addressed here relate to the true extent of the fattening effect, to what perceptual mechanisms it can be ascribed and if it can be counteracted in common practice. Current theories in the perception of photographic images rarely, if ever discuss the medium's perceptual accuracy in recording the original scene. It is assumed by many users that most photographs convey essentially the same information they would have seen had they been present when they were taken. Further, it is generally accepted that photographs are an accurate, veridical and scientific method of record and their content should be trusted unless there is evidence of a technical failure, editing or deliberate tampering. This thesis investigates whether this level of trust is appropriate, specifically by examining the reliability of photography in relation to reproducing the face and form of human subjects. Body Image Distortion (B.I.D.) is a term normally used to describe the primary diagnostic symptom of the slimming disease, anorexia nervosa. However, it is demonstrated here that people viewing 2D photographic portraits often make very significant overestimations of size when comparing otherwise identical stereoscopic images. The conclusion is that losing stereoscopic information in conventional 2D photography will cause distortions of perceived body image, and that this is often seen as a distinct flattening and fattening effect. A second fattening effect was also identified in the use of telephoto lenses. It is demonstrated, using psychophysical experiments and geometry that these 2D images cannot convey the same spatial or volumetric information that normal human orthostereoscopic perception will give. The evidence gathered suggests that the Human Visual System requires images to be orthostereoscopic, and be captured using two cameras that mimic as closely as possible the natural vergences, angle of view, depth of field, magnification, brightness, contrast and colour to reproduce scenes as accurately as possible. The experiments reported use three different size estimation methodologies: stereoscopic versus monocular comparisons of human and virtual targets, bodyweight estimations in portraits taken at differing camera to subject distances and synoptic versus direct viewing comparisons. The three techniques were used because photographic images are typically made without disparity and accommodation/vergence information, but with magnifications that are greater than found with direct viewing of a target. By separately analysing the effects of disparity, magnification and accommodation/vergence the reported experiments show how changes in each condition can effect size estimation in photographs. The data suggest that photographs made without orthostereoscopic information will lead to predictably distorted perception and that conventional 2D imaging will almost always cause a significant flattening and fattening effect. In addition, it is argued that the conveyed jaw size, in relation to neck width is an important factor in body-weight perception and this will lead to sexually dimorphic perception: disproportionately larger estimations of bodyweight are made for female faces than male faces under the same photographic conditions