Design of a Virtual Human Presenter

We created a virtual human presenter based on extensions to the JackTM animated agent system. Inputs to the presenter system are in the form of speech texts with embedded commands, most of which relate to the virtual presenter\u27s body language. The system then makes him act as a presenter with presentation skills in real-time 3D animation synchronized with speech outputs. He can make presentations with virtual visual aids, with virtual 3D environments, or even on the WWW

Presenting in Virtual Worlds: An Architecture for a 3D Anthropomorphic Presenter

Multiparty-interaction technology is changing entertainment, education, and training. Deployed examples of such technology include embodied agents and robots that act as a museum guide, a news presenter, a teacher, a receptionist, or someone trying to sell you insurance, homes, or tickets. In all these cases, the embodied agent needs to explain and describe. This article describes the design of a 3D virtual presenter that uses different output channels (including speech and animation of posture, pointing, and involuntary movements) to present and explain. The behavior is scripted and synchronized with a 2D display containing associated text and regions (slides, drawings, and paintings) at which the presenter can point. This article is part of a special issue on interactive entertainment

Presenting in Virtual Worlds: Towards an Architecture for a 3D Presenter explaining 2D-Presented Information

Entertainment, education and training are changing because of multi-party interaction technology. In the past we have seen the introduction of embodied agents and robots that take the role of a museum guide, a news presenter, a teacher, a receptionist, or someone who is trying to sell you insurances, houses or tickets. In all these cases the embodied agent needs to explain and describe. In this paper we contribute the design of a 3D virtual presenter that uses different output channels to present and explain. Speech and animation (posture, pointing and involuntary movements) are among these channels. The behavior is scripted and synchronized with the display of a 2D presentation with associated text and regions that can be pointed at (sheets, drawings, and paintings). In this paper the emphasis is on the interaction between 3D presenter and the 2D presentation

Design of a virtual human presenter

We have created a virtual human presenter who accepts speech texts with embedded commands as inputs. The presenter acts in real-time 3D animation synchronized with speech. The system was developed on the Jack animated-agent system. Jack provides a 3D graphical environment for controlling articulated figures, including detailed human model

Design of a Virtual Assistant to Improve Interaction Between the Audience and the Presenter

This article presents a novel design of a Virtual Assistant as part of a human-machine interaction system to improve communication between the presenter and the audience that can be used in education or general presentations for improving interaction during the presentations (e.g., auditoriums with 200 people). The main goal of the proposed model is the design of a framework of interaction to increase the level of attention of the public in key aspects of the presentation. In this manner, the collaboration between the presenter and Virtual Assistant could improve the level of learning among the public. The design of the Virtual Assistant relies on non-anthropomorphic forms with ‘live’ characteristics generating an intuitive and self-explainable interface. A set of intuitive and useful virtual interactions to support the presenter was designed. This design was validated from various types of the public with a psychological study based on a discrete emotions’ questionnaire confirming the adequacy of the proposed solution. The human-machine interaction system supporting the Virtual Assistant should automatically recognize the attention level of the audience from audiovisual resources and synchronize the Virtual Assistant with the presentation. The system involves a complex artificial intelligence architecture embracing perception of high-level features from audio and video, knowledge representation, and reasoning for pervasive and affective computing and reinforcement learning to teach the intelligent agent to decide on the best strategy to increase the level of attention of the audience

Framework to Enhance Teaching and Learning in System Analysis and Unified Modelling Language

Cowling, MA ORCiD: 0000-0003-1444-1563; Munoz Carpio, JC ORCiD: 0000-0003-0251-5510Systems Analysis modelling is considered foundational for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) students, with introductory and advanced units included in nearly all ICT and computer science degrees. Yet despite this, novice systems analysts (learners) find modelling and systems thinking quite difficult to learn and master. This makes the process of teaching the fundamentals frustrating and time intensive. This paper will discuss the foundational problems that learners face when learning Systems Analysis modelling. Through a systematic literature review, a framework will be proposed based on the key problems that novice learners experience. In this proposed framework, a sequence of activities has been developed to facilitate understanding of the requirements, solutions and incremental modelling. An example is provided illustrating how the framework could be used to incorporate visualization and gaming elements into a Systems Analysis classroom; therefore, improving motivation and learning. Through this work, a greater understanding of the approach to teaching modelling within the computer science classroom will be provided, as well as a framework to guide future teaching activities

Case Study: “Hair meets Design”: The Application of Storytelling in the Context of Long-Distance Collaboration and Virtual Teamwork

Virtual teamwork and long distance collaboration is an increasingly attractive option in design education especially when students and other participants, (for example, industry guests or sponsors) cannot meet in the same physical place or classroom. The constant improvement in technology allows this type of electronic communication to be increasingly accepted as an appropriate format for collaboration and evaluation of student projects. This paper discusses the collaboration between members of a company in Germany and a group of industrial design students in California. It will present the work flow, the evaluation tools and the formats introduced during the process. Since the participants of this project could not meet physically to discuss and evaluate ideas, it was imperative for the teams to develop standard visual formats that were easy to understand and re-utilize. These formats had to be flexible enough for the purpose of adding comments from the evaluators. Because the physical presence of the presenter is missing, it is necessary to adjust the content and layout of the messages in order to make them more relevant and self-explanatory. The message has to be easy to understand without the help of a presenter or lecturer. One of the most significant questions in this project was how to present multiple “layers of information” in one single image at the same time (for example, how to depict work flow, time sequence and object hierarchy in one single frame). In a normal situation (where the presenter is physically present in front of an audience) he/she can verbally add secondary information that would not be visually included but it is necessary in order to understand the relevance of the image being presented. This additional verbal information could be related to time, hierarchy, etc. This paper will discuss the development and evaluation of visual formats that present multiple layers of information in one single image. It describes the methods used and reports the solutions. Ultimately, this paper explains the relevance of using storytelling in the context of long-distance design collaboration. Keywords: Virtual Teamwork; Long-Distance Collaboration; Storytelling; Infographics</p

Panel Transcript Only

This file contains the video recording of the virtual panel and discussion. The official flyer for the event is also available here and contains the panel presenter\u27s biographies

Refining personal and social presence in virtual meetings

Virtual worlds show promise for conducting meetings and conferences without the need for physical travel. Current experience suggests the major limitation to the more widespread adoption and acceptance of virtual conferences is the failure of existing environments to provide a sense of immersion and engagement, or of ‘being there’. These limitations are largely related to the appearance and control of avatars, and to the absence of means to convey non-verbal cues of facial expression and body language. This paper reports on a study involving the use of a mass-market motion sensor (Kinect™) and the mapping of participant action in the real world to avatar behaviour in the virtual world. This is coupled with full-motion video representation of participant’s faces on their avatars to resolve both identity and facial expression issues. The outcomes of a small-group trial meeting based on this technology show a very positive reaction from participants, and the potential for further exploration of these concepts