Stars in their eyes: What eye-tracking reveal about multimedia perceptual quality

Perceptual multimedia quality is of paramount importance to the continued take-up and proliferation of multimedia applications: users will not use and pay for applications if they are perceived to be of low quality. Whilst traditionally distributed multimedia quality has been characterised by Quality of Service (QoS) parameters, these neglect the user perspective of the issue of quality. In order to redress this shortcoming, we characterise the user multimedia perspective using the Quality of Perception (QoP) metric, which encompasses not only a user’s satisfaction with the quality of a multimedia presentation, but also his/her ability to analyse, synthesise and assimilate informational content of multimedia. In recognition of the fact that monitoring eye movements offers insights into visual perception, as well as the associated attention mechanisms and cognitive processes, this paper reports on the results of a study investigating the impact of differing multimedia presentation frame rates on user QoP and eye path data. Our results show that provision of higher frame rates, usually assumed to provide better multimedia presentation quality, do not significantly impact upon the median coordinate value of eye path data. Moreover, higher frame rates do not significantly increase level of participant information assimilation, although they do significantly improve overall user enjoyment and quality perception of the multimedia content being shown

Multimedia clip type: Quality of perception impact on users with and without hearing loss

This paper investigates how variance in multimedia video clip type affects quality of perception (QoP) for users ith and without hearing loss. QoP encompasses not only a user's satisfaction with the quality of a multimedia presentation (subjective), but also his or her ability to analyse, synthesise and assimilate its’ informational content objective). Results show that clip type has a significant impact on the level of deaf information assimilation. Results uggest that certain video content aids deaf information assimilation, for example: those with less textual content. However, it was found that audio / captioned information does not significantly impact user QoP, when Video-textual (VT) information was found to have a significant effect on both hearing and deaf QoP. A positive correlation was found between predicted level of information assimilation and level of enjoyment, independent of hearing level or clip type

Personalized video summarization by highest quality frames

In this work, a user-centered approach has been the basis for generation of the personalized video summaries. Primarily, the video experts score and annotate the video frames during the enrichment phase. Afterwards, the frames scores for different video segments will be updated based on the captured end-users (different with video experts) priorities towards existing video scenes. Eventually, based on the pre-defined skimming time, the highest scored video frames will be extracted to be included into the personalized video summaries. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of our proposed model, we have compared the video summaries generated by our system against the results from 4 other summarization tools using different modalities

Improving perceptual multimedia quality with an adaptable communication protocol

Copyrights @ 2005 University Computing Centre ZagrebInnovations and developments in networking technology have been driven by technical considerations with little analysis of the benefit to the user. In this paper we argue that network parameters that define the network Quality of Service (QoS) must be driven by user-centric parameters such as user expectations and requirements for multimedia transmitted over a network. To this end a mechanism for mapping user-oriented parameters to network QoS parameters is outlined. The paper surveys existing methods for mapping user requirements to the network. An adaptable communication system is implemented to validate the mapping. The architecture adapts to varying network conditions caused by congestion so as to maintain user expectations and requirements. The paper also surveys research in the area of adaptable communications architectures and protocols. Our results show that such a user-biased approach to networking does bring tangible benefits to the user

Perceived synchronization of olfactory multimedia

This is the post-print version of this Article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2010 IEEEThe concept of synchronization is of fundamental importance in multimedia systems and applications. The focus of this this paper is on olfaction-enhanced multimedia, which concerns itself with associating computer-generated smell with other media. However, the lingering nature of smell, as opposed to the transitory nature of other media objects that multimedia applications are accustomed to, such as video and audio, means that specific attention needs to be given when synchronizing other media content with olfactory data. Consequently, this paper presents the results of an experimental study carried out to explore and investigate the temporal boundaries within which olfactory-data output in an olfaction-enhanced multimedia application can be successfully synchronized with other media objects from an end-user perspective. Results show the presence of two main synchronization regions, and that olfaction ahead of audiovisual content is more tolerable than olfaction behind content

Visualizing pain data for wheelchair users: A ubiquitous approach

Copyright @ 2005 Rinton PressWe describe a wireless enabled solution for the vizualisation of pain data. Our approach uses pain drawings to record spatial location and type of pain and enables data collection with appropriate time stamping, thus providing a means for the seldom-recorded (but often attested) time-varying nature of pain, with consequential impact on monitoring the effectiveness of patient treatment regimes. Moreover, since the implementation platform of our solution is that of a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), data collection takes place ubiquitously, providing back pain sufferers with mobility problems (such as wheelchair users) with a convenient means of logging their pain data and of seamlessly uploading it to a hospital server using WiFi technology. Stakeholder results show that, notwithstanding problems related to PDA data input, our approach is generally perceived to be an easy to use and convenient solution to the challenges of anywhere/anytime data collection

SOLACE: A framework for electronic negotiations

Copyright @ 2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbHMost existing frameworks for electronic negotiations today are tied to specific negotiation systems for which they were developed, preventing them from being applied to other negotiation scenarios. Thus, the evaluation of electronic negotiation systems is difficult as each one is based on a different framework. Additionally, each developer has to design a new framework for any system to be developed, leading to a ‘reinvention of the wheel’. This paper presents SOLACE—a generic framework for multi-issue negotiations, which can be applied to a variety of negotiation scenarios. In contrast with other frameworks for electronic negotiations, SOLACE supports hybrid systems in which the negotiation participants can be humans, agents or a combination of the two. By recognizing the importance of strategies in negotiations and incorporating a time attribute in negotiation proposals, SOLACE enhances existing approaches and provides a foundation for the flexible electronic negotiation systems of the future

How level and type of deafness affects user perception of multimedia video clips

Our research investigates the impact that hearing has on the perception of digital video clips, with and without captions, by discussing how hearing loss, captions and deafness type affects user QoP (Quality of Perception). QoP encompasses not only a user's satisfaction with the quality of a multimedia presentation, but also their ability to analyse, synthesise and assimilate informational content of multimedia . Results show that hearing has a significant effect on participants’ ability to assimilate information, independent of video type and use of captions. It is shown that captions do not necessarily provide deaf users with a ‘greater level of information’ from video, but cause a change in user QoP, depending on deafness type, which provides a ‘greater level of context of the video’. It is also shown that post-lingual mild and moderately deaf participants predict less accurately their level of information assimilation than post-lingual profoundly deaf participants, despite residual hearing. A positive correlation was identified between level of enjoyment (LOE) and self-predicted level of information assimilation (PIA), independent of hearing level or hearing type. When this is considered in a QoP quality framework, it puts into question how the user perceives certain factors, such as ‘informative’ and ‘quality’

Promoting game accessibility: Experiencing an induction on inclusive design practice at the global games jam

Copyright @ 2013 The AuthorsThe Global Games Jam (GGJ) attracts many people who are passionate about games development, coming from a range of educational backgrounds. Therefore, the event can be experienced by novices and student developers as an opportunity for learning. This provides an opening to promote themes and ideas that could help form future thinking about games design, emerging as a form of induction on key design issues for new practitioners. Such an approach aims to raise awareness about issues which learners could help develop and take with them into industry. However, the experience itself affords a deep experiential rhetoric and dialogue with experts that could be an effective pedagogical tool for issues seldom addressed deeply in formal educational settings. This paper describes an account by one such individual, being introduced to game accessibility through participation in the GGJ. As such, it is not intended as a rigorous empirical analysis, but rather a perspective on one way a game jam can be experienced, inviting further research on the topic

A user perspective of quality of service in m-commerce

This is the post-print version of the Article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2004 Springer VerlagIn an m-commerce setting, the underlying communication system will have to provide a Quality of Service (QoS) in the presence of two competing factors—network bandwidth and, as the pressure to add value to the business-to-consumer (B2C) shopping experience by integrating multimedia applications grows, increasing data sizes. In this paper, developments in the area of QoS-dependent multimedia perceptual quality are reviewed and are integrated with recent work focusing on QoS for e-commerce. Based on previously identified user perceptual tolerance to varying multimedia QoS, we show that enhancing the m-commerce B2C user experience with multimedia, far from being an idealised scenario, is in fact feasible if perceptual considerations are employed