The variety of features available to represent multimedia data constitutes a rich pool of information. However, the plethora of data poses a challenge in terms of feature selection and integration for effective retrieval. Moreover, to further improve effectiveness, the
retrieval model should ideally incorporate context-dependent feature representations to allow for retrieval on a higher semantic level. In this paper we present a retrieval model and learning framework for the purpose of interactive information retrieval. We describe
how semantic relations between multimedia objects based on user interaction can be learnt and then integrated with visual and textual features into a unified framework. The framework models both feature similarities and semantic relations in a single graph. Querying in this model is implemented using the theory of random walks. In addition, we present ideas to implement short-term learning from relevance feedback. Systematic experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach for image retrieval. However, the model is not restricted to the image domain and could easily be employed for retrieving multimedia data (and even a combination of different domains, eg images, audio and text documents)
