Integrating internal behavioural models with external expression

Users will believe in a virtual character more if they can empathise with it and understand what ‘makes it tick’. This will be helped by making the motivations of the character, and other processes that go towards creating its behaviour, clear to the user. This paper proposes that this can be achieved by linking the behavioural or cognitive system of the character to expressive behaviour. This idea is discussed in general and then demonstrated with an implementation that links a simulation of perception to the animation of a character’s eyes

Paradata and Bayesian networks: a tool for monitoring and troubleshooting the data production process

The problem of monitoring and managing the data production process by means of process flow indicators is presented in a decision theory framework. Here it is shown how to represent and solve the decision problem via influence diagrams, i.e. Bayesian network supporting decisions. An illustrative example is provided.Expected utility, graphical models, probability update,

Model assisted approaches to complex survey sampling from finite populations using Bayesian Networks

A class of estimators based on the dependency structure of a multivariate variable of interest and the survey design is defined. The dependency structure is the one described by the Bayesian networks. This class allows ratio type estimators as a subclass identified by a particular dependency structure. It will be shown by a Monte Carlo simulation how the adoption of the estimator corresponding to the population structure is more efficient than the others. It will also be underlined how this class adapts to the problem of integration of information from two surveys through probability updating system of the Bayesian networks.Graphical models, probability update, survey design

Autonomous Secondary Gaze Behaviours

In this paper we describe secondary behaviour, this is behaviour that is generated autonomously for an avatar. The user will control various aspects of the avatars behaviour but a truly expressive avatar must produce more complex behaviour than a user could specify in real time. Secondary behaviour provides some of this expressive behaviour autonomously. However, though it is produced autonomously it must produce behaviour that is appropriate to the actions that the user is controlling (the primary behaviour) and it must produce behaviour that corresponds to what the user wants. We describe an architecture which achieves these to aims by tagging the primary behaviour with messages to be sent to the secondary behaviour and by allowing the user to design various aspects of the secondary behaviour before starting to use the avatar. We have implemented this general architecture in a system which adds gaze behaviour to user designed actions

Individuality and Contextual Variation of Character Behaviour for Interactive Narrative.

This paper presents a system for generating non-verbal communication behaviour suitable for characters in interactive narrative. It is possible to customise the behaviour of individual character using a system of character profiles. This allows characters to have a strong individuality and personality. These same profiles also allow the characters’ behaviour to be altered in different contexts, allowing for suitably changing behaviour as the story unfolds