A Robotic Writing Framework-Learning Human Aesthetic Preferences via Human-Machine Interactions

Intelligent robots are required to fully understand human intentions and operations in order to support or collaborate with humans to complete complicated tasks, which is typically implemented by employing human-machine interaction techniques. This paper proposes a new robotic learning framework to perform numeral writing tasks by investigating human-machine interactions with human preferences. In particular, the framework implements a trajectory generative module using a generative adversarial network (GAN)-based method and develops a human preference feedback system to enable the robot to learn human preferences. In addition, a convolutional neural network, acting as a discriminative network, classifies numeral images to support the development of the basic numeral writing ability, and another convolutional neural network, acting as a human preference network, learns a human user’s aesthetic preference by taking the feedback on two written numerical images during the training process. The experimental results show that the written numerals based on the preferences of ten users were different from those of the training data set and that the writing models with the preferences from different users generate numerals in different styles, as evidenced by the Fréchet inception distance (FID) scores. The FID scores of the proposed framework with a preference network were noticeably greater than those of the framework without a preference network. This phenomenon indicates that the human-machine interactions effectively guided the robotic system to learn different writing styles. These results prove that the proposed approach is able to enable the calligraphy robot to successfully write numerals in accordance with the preferences of a human user

A Developmental Evolutionary Learning Framework for Robotic Chinese Stroke Writing

The ability of robots to write Chinese strokes, which is recognized as a sophisticated task, involves complicated kinematic control algorithms. The conventional approaches for robotic writing of Chinese strokes often suffer from limited font generation methods, which limits the ability of robots to perform high-quality writing. This paper instead proposes a developmental evolutionary learning framework that enables a robot to learn to write fundamental Chinese strokes. The framework first considers the learning process of robotic writing as an evolutionary easy-to-difficult procedure. Then, a developmental learning mechanism called “Lift-constraint, act and saturate” that stems from developmental robotics is used to determine how the robot learns tasks ranging from simple to difficult by building on the learning results from the easy tasks. The developmental constraints, which include altitude adjustments, number of mutation points, and stroke trajectory points, determine the learning complexity of robot writing. The developmental algorithm divides the evolutionary procedure into three developmental learning stages. In each stage, the stroke trajectory points gradually increase, while the number of mutation points and adjustment altitudes gradually decrease, allowing the learning difficulties involved in these three stages to be categorized as easy, medium, and difficult. Our robot starts with an easy learning task and then gradually progresses to the medium and difficult tasks. Under various developmental constraint setups in each stage, the robot applies an evolutionary algorithm to handle the basic shapes of the Chinese strokes and eventually acquires the ability to write with good quality. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed framework allows a calligraphic robot to gradually learn to write five fundamental Chinese strokes and also reveal a developmental pattern similar to that of humans. Compared to an evolutionary algorithm without the developmental mechanism, the proposed framework achieves good writing quality more rapidly

Impactful beauty or serious disgust

The Japanese language utilizes primarily three writing systems; Kanji, hiragana and katakana. The latter two are known as kana. All three writing systems have their own unique role when writing in Japanese. Corresponding to their primary roles, there are various ‘sub roles’ as well. This paper will mainly be focusing on the katakana writing system’s lesser known role, emphasizing. Seven interviews have been conducted in order to find answers on this phenomenon. The purpose of this paper is to find out how emphasizing with katakana is utilized, when it is used and by whom it is used. These questions are answered by four Japanese native speakers around the ages 20-21 and three Japanese native speakers that are around the age of 40

AutoGraff: towards a computational understanding of graffiti writing and related art forms.

The aim of this thesis is to develop a system that generates letters and pictures with a style that is immediately recognizable as graffiti art or calligraphy. The proposed system can be used similarly to, and in tight integration with, conventional computer-aided geometric design tools and can be used to generate synthetic graffiti content for urban environments in games and in movies, and to guide robotic or fabrication systems that can materialise the output of the system with physical drawing media. The thesis is divided into two main parts. The first part describes a set of stroke primitives, building blocks that can be combined to generate different designs that resemble graffiti or calligraphy. These primitives mimic the process typically used to design graffiti letters and exploit well known principles of motor control to model the way in which an artist moves when incrementally tracing stylised letter forms. The second part demonstrates how these stroke primitives can be automatically recovered from input geometry defined in vector form, such as the digitised traces of writing made by a user, or the glyph outlines in a font. This procedure converts the input geometry into a seed that can be transformed into a variety of calligraphic and graffiti stylisations, which depend on parametric variations of the strokes

Disentangling Writer and Character Styles for Handwriting Generation

Training machines to synthesize diverse handwritings is an intriguing task. Recently, RNN-based methods have been proposed to generate stylized online Chinese characters. However, these methods mainly focus on capturing a person's overall writing style, neglecting subtle style inconsistencies between characters written by the same person. For example, while a person's handwriting typically exhibits general uniformity (e.g., glyph slant and aspect ratios), there are still small style variations in finer details (e.g., stroke length and curvature) of characters. In light of this, we propose to disentangle the style representations at both writer and character levels from individual handwritings to synthesize realistic stylized online handwritten characters. Specifically, we present the style-disentangled Transformer (SDT), which employs two complementary contrastive objectives to extract the style commonalities of reference samples and capture the detailed style patterns of each sample, respectively. Extensive experiments on various language scripts demonstrate the effectiveness of SDT. Notably, our empirical findings reveal that the two learned style representations provide information at different frequency magnitudes, underscoring the importance of separate style extraction. Our source code is public at: https://github.com/dailenson/SDT.Comment: accepted by CVPR 2023. Source code: https://github.com/dailenson/SD

StrokeStyles: Stroke-based Segmentation and Stylization of Fonts

We develop a method to automatically segment a font’s glyphs into a set of overlapping and intersecting strokes with the aim of generating artistic stylizations. The segmentation method relies on a geometric analysis of the glyph’s outline, its interior, and the surrounding areas and is grounded in perceptually informed principles and measures. Our method does not require training data or templates and applies to glyphs in a large variety of input languages, writing systems, and styles. It uses the medial axis, curvilinear shape features that specify convex and concave outline parts, links that connect concavities, and seven junction types. We show that the resulting decomposition in strokes can be used to create variations, stylizations, and animations in different artistic or design-oriented styles while remaining recognizably similar to the input font

Applying sensory distortion devices in artistic production : practice-based studies of creating artefacts with perceptual devices which confuse artists' vision and kinesthesis

PhD ThesisWhen I was an art school student, I was trained to pursue the likeness of subjects in all my artworks. This practice-based research explores alternative forms of self-expression in art practice. The exploration starts by questioning the relationship between perceptual devices, artists’ perceptions and artistic production. Most perceptual devices are designed to enhance artists’ sensory capabilities and facilitate the creation of art. Their success is often based on enabling artists to achieve a likeness of the subject drawn or making the creation of artefacts easier. My research focuses on investigating the consequences and artistic potential of applying sensory distortion devices that confuse, mislead and distort artists’ vision and kinesthesis, increasing the difficulty of making art, and exploring the productive potential of such devices to engender new creative forms. In this research three visual distortion devices and two kinaesthetic distortion devices are prototyped and used in experimental calligraphy, painting and drawing exercises. After analysing the artists’ experience of using these devices, the influence and artistic potential of applying them are examined. It is discovered that distorted vision and kinesthesis can greatly influence the making of art by disrupting habitual eye-hand coordination and control over producing artefacts. Besides which, the use of visual and kinaesthetic distortion devices can be a technique for new forms of artistic expression. It can also be an effective technique for creating serendipitous opportunities in the visual arts and a way of exploring and provoking reflection upon artistic methodologies. Consideration of the attributes of visual and kinaesthetic distortion devices and distorted perceptions during the process of prototyping can benefit the generation of ideas, methods of production and the contents of artworks. Some practical implications for creating art with visual and kinaesthetic distortion devices are also explored. They are discussed in relation to theories of human performance, such as flow theory, and attitudes toward the conflict between habitual and unfamiliar perceptual experience. Keeping an open and uncritical mind toward unfamiliarity, chaos and the accidents caused by distorted perceptions and reduced control of drawing instruments is suggested to working artists. Finally, this research contributes to art education by demonstrating a possible way of achieving self-exploration through art making

数字书法研究综述

数字书法将传统书法的创作工具、视觉艺术效果、书写技巧和创作等用数字化的方式再现.本文首先在回顾数字书法研究历史和研究特点的基础上,给出数字书法的主要研究内容和研究方向,包括:书法工具的数字化建模、书法图像的分析与处理、书法字形的合成与美化等;然后阐述数字书法每一类问题的具体研究目标、研究现状和研究趋势;最后,探讨数字书法进一步发展需要予以关注的重要问题和研究方向.国家自然科学基金(批准号:61772440);;航空科学基金(批准号:20165168007)资助项

Exploring moderators between perceived stress and well-being of chinese entrepreneurs

At present, entrepreneurs have received unprecedented recognition and attention from both the government and the society. Although stress can increase the driving force of innovation to a certain extent, excessive stress can still lead to serious outcomes. While bringing stress, characteristics such as high independence and task diversity can also enhance entrepreneurs' well-being. How can entrepreneurs maintain a high level of well-being in a stressful situation? It is a problem worthy of attention. Although a large number of studies have examined the moderators of the relationship between perceived stress and stress outcomes in the general population, there are few studies on the moderators between entrepreneurial perceived stress and well-being. Therefore, on the basis of exploring the stressors of Chinese entrepreneurial entrepreneurs, this study focuses on one research question: What factors can moderate entrepreneurs’ perceived stress and well-being? This paper mainly uses qualitative method and Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel (CMH) to analyze the data. The study found that stress coping strategies, entrepreneurial motivation, organizational identity and social capital within the entrepreneurial team play a moderating role between perceived stress and life satisfaction. Specifically, the study found that: (1) problem-solving strategies can alleviate the negative impact of perceived stress on life satisfaction; (2) entrepreneurs with internal entrepreneurial motivation can achieve higher happiness; (3) entrepreneurs without clear organizational identity can achieve higher happiness; (4) high TMT social capital can cushion the negative impact of perceived stress on life satisfaction. The study has taken a step forward in exploring Chinese entrepreneurs' entrepreneurial stressors as well as the moderators of perceived stress and well-being, laying a theoretical foundation for further empirical examinations.Hoje, tanto no nível do governo quanto no nível social, o valor dos empresários empreendedores tem recebido reconhecimento e atenção sem precedentes. Embora a pressão aumente a força motriz para a inovação em certa medida, a pressão excessiva ainda pode causar sérias consequências. Enquanto traz a pressão, as características de alta independência autônoma, diversidade de tarefas e outras de empreendedorismo também podem aumentar a felicidade dos empresários. Como os empresários empreendedores podem manter um alto nível de felicidade sob uma situação de alta pressão é um problema real que merece atenção. Quanto à pesquisa teórica, embora um grande número de estudos tenha estudado os fatores reguladores da relação entre pressão percebida e resultados causados pela pressão na população em geral, ainda existem poucos estudos sobre os fatores reguladores entre a pressão percebida e a felicidade dos empresários. Por isso, com base na das fontes de pressão de empresários empreendedores na China, este estudo concentra-se em uma pergunta de estudo: Quais fatores regulam a relação entre a pressão percebida e a satisfação com a vida dos empresários empreendedores? O texto utiliza principalmente métodos qualitativos e Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel (CMH) para analisar os dados. O estudo descobriu que a estratégia de enfrentamento à pressão, motivação empreendedora, identidade de organização e capital social dentro da equipa empreendedora desempenham uma função reguladora entre a pressão percebida e a satisfação com a vida. Em termos, o estudo descobriu que (1) o uso da estratégia de solução de problemas pode aliviar o impacto negativo da pressão percebida na satisfação com a vida; (2) os empresários com motivação empreendedora interna podem alcançar maior sensação de felicidade; (3) os empresários sem identidade de organização clara podem obter uma maior sensação de felicidade; (4) O alto capital social TMT pode aliviar o impacto negativo da pressão percebida na satisfação com a vida. A conclusão deste texto tenta explorar as fontes de pressão dos empresários empreendedores na China e os fatores regulatórios na relação entre a pressão percebida e a sensação de felicidade, estabelecendo uma base teórica para os futuros testes comprobatórios