13,336 research outputs found
Prosody-Based Automatic Segmentation of Speech into Sentences and Topics
A crucial step in processing speech audio data for information extraction,
topic detection, or browsing/playback is to segment the input into sentence and
topic units. Speech segmentation is challenging, since the cues typically
present for segmenting text (headers, paragraphs, punctuation) are absent in
spoken language. We investigate the use of prosody (information gleaned from
the timing and melody of speech) for these tasks. Using decision tree and
hidden Markov modeling techniques, we combine prosodic cues with word-based
approaches, and evaluate performance on two speech corpora, Broadcast News and
Switchboard. Results show that the prosodic model alone performs on par with,
or better than, word-based statistical language models -- for both true and
automatically recognized words in news speech. The prosodic model achieves
comparable performance with significantly less training data, and requires no
hand-labeling of prosodic events. Across tasks and corpora, we obtain a
significant improvement over word-only models using a probabilistic combination
of prosodic and lexical information. Inspection reveals that the prosodic
models capture language-independent boundary indicators described in the
literature. Finally, cue usage is task and corpus dependent. For example, pause
and pitch features are highly informative for segmenting news speech, whereas
pause, duration and word-based cues dominate for natural conversation.Comment: 30 pages, 9 figures. To appear in Speech Communication 32(1-2),
Special Issue on Accessing Information in Spoken Audio, September 200
Automated speech and audio analysis for semantic access to multimedia
The deployment and integration of audio processing tools can enhance the semantic annotation of multimedia content, and as a consequence, improve the effectiveness of conceptual access tools. This paper overviews the various ways in which automatic speech and audio analysis can contribute to increased granularity of automatically extracted metadata. A number of techniques will be presented, including the alignment of speech and text resources, large vocabulary speech recognition, key word spotting and speaker classification. The applicability of techniques will be discussed from a media crossing perspective. The added value of the techniques and their potential contribution to the content value chain will be illustrated by the description of two (complementary) demonstrators for browsing broadcast news archives
Exploration of audiovisual heritage using audio indexing technology
This paper discusses audio indexing tools that have been implemented for the disclosure of Dutch audiovisual cultural heritage collections. It explains the role of language models and their adaptation to historical settings and the adaptation of acoustic models for homogeneous audio collections. In addition to the benefits of cross-media linking, the requirements for successful tuning and improvement of available tools for indexing the heterogeneous A/V collections from the cultural heritage domain are reviewed. And finally the paper argues that research is needed to cope with the varying information needs for different types of users
Access to recorded interviews: A research agenda
Recorded interviews form a rich basis for scholarly inquiry. Examples include oral histories, community memory projects, and interviews conducted for broadcast media. Emerging technologies offer the potential to radically transform the way in which recorded interviews are made accessible, but this vision will demand substantial investments from a broad range of research communities. This article reviews the present state of practice for making recorded interviews available and the state-of-the-art for key component technologies. A large number of important research issues are identified, and from that set of issues, a coherent research agenda is proposed
InfoLink: analysis of Dutch broadcast news and cross-media browsing
In this paper, a cross-media browsing demonstrator named InfoLink is described. InfoLink automatically links the content of Dutch broadcast news videos to related information sources in parallel collections containing text and/or video. Automatic segmentation, speech recognition and available meta-data are used to index and link items. The concept is visualised using SMIL-scripts for presenting the streaming broadcast news video and the information links
Integrating Prosodic and Lexical Cues for Automatic Topic Segmentation
We present a probabilistic model that uses both prosodic and lexical cues for
the automatic segmentation of speech into topically coherent units. We propose
two methods for combining lexical and prosodic information using hidden Markov
models and decision trees. Lexical information is obtained from a speech
recognizer, and prosodic features are extracted automatically from speech
waveforms. We evaluate our approach on the Broadcast News corpus, using the
DARPA-TDT evaluation metrics. Results show that the prosodic model alone is
competitive with word-based segmentation methods. Furthermore, we achieve a
significant reduction in error by combining the prosodic and word-based
knowledge sources.Comment: 27 pages, 8 figure
Spoken content retrieval: A survey of techniques and technologies
Speech media, that is, digital audio and video containing spoken content, has blossomed in recent years. Large collections are accruing on the Internet as well as in private and enterprise settings. This growth has motivated extensive research on techniques and technologies that facilitate reliable indexing and retrieval. Spoken content retrieval (SCR) requires the combination of audio and speech processing technologies with methods from information retrieval (IR). SCR research initially investigated planned speech structured in document-like units, but has subsequently shifted focus to more informal spoken content produced spontaneously, outside of the studio and in conversational settings. This survey provides an overview of the field of SCR encompassing component technologies, the relationship of SCR to text IR and automatic speech recognition and user interaction issues. It is aimed at researchers with backgrounds in speech technology or IR who are seeking deeper insight on how these fields are integrated to support research and development, thus addressing the core challenges of SCR
Multimedia search without visual analysis: the value of linguistic and contextual information
This paper addresses the focus of this special issue by analyzing the potential contribution of linguistic content and other non-image aspects to the processing of audiovisual data. It summarizes the various ways in which linguistic content analysis contributes to enhancing the semantic annotation of multimedia content, and, as a consequence, to improving the effectiveness of conceptual media access tools. A number of techniques are presented, including the time-alignment of textual resources, audio and speech processing, content reduction and reasoning tools, and the exploitation of surface features
From media crossing to media mining
This paper reviews how the concept of Media Crossing has contributed to the advancement of the application domain of information access and explores directions for a future research agenda. These will include themes that could help to broaden the scope and to incorporate the concept of medium-crossing in a more general approach that not only uses combinations of medium-specific processing, but that also exploits more abstract medium-independent representations, partly based on the foundational work on statistical language models for information retrieval. Three examples of successful applications of media crossing will be presented, with a focus on the aspects that could be considered a first step towards a generalized form of media mining
Many uses, many annotations for large speech corpora: Switchboard and TDT as case studies
This paper discusses the challenges that arise when large speech corpora
receive an ever-broadening range of diverse and distinct annotations. Two case
studies of this process are presented: the Switchboard Corpus of telephone
conversations and the TDT2 corpus of broadcast news. Switchboard has undergone
two independent transcriptions and various types of additional annotation, all
carried out as separate projects that were dispersed both geographically and
chronologically. The TDT2 corpus has also received a variety of annotations,
but all directly created or managed by a core group. In both cases, issues
arise involving the propagation of repairs, consistency of references, and the
ability to integrate annotations having different formats and levels of detail.
We describe a general framework whereby these issues can be addressed
successfully.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figure
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