1,721,000 research outputs found
Natural and multimodal interfaces for human-machine and human-robot interaction
Full text linkL'abstract è presente nell'allegato / the abstract is in the attachmen
Storytelling in the Metaverse: From Desktop to Immersive Virtual Reality Storyboarding
Full text linkCreatives from the animation and film industries have always been experimenting with innovative tools and methodologies to improve the creation of prototypes of their visual sequences before bringing them to life. In recent years, as realistic real-time rendering techniques have emerged, the increasing popularity of virtual reality (VR) can lead to new approaches and solutions, leveraging the immersive and interactive features provided by 3D immersive experiences. A 3D desktop application and a novel storyboarding pipeline, which can automatically generate a storyboard including camera details and a textual description of the actions performed in three-dimensional environments, have already been investigated in previous work. The aim was to exploit new technologies to improve existing 3D storytelling approaches, thus providing a software solution for expert and novice storyboarders. This research investigates 3D storyboarding in immersive virtual reality (IVR) to move toward a new storyboarding paradigm. IVR systems provide peculiarities such as body-controlled exploration of the 3D scene and a head-dependant camera view that can extend features of traditional storyboarding tools. The proposed system enables users to set up the virtual stage, adding elements to the scene and exploring the environment as they build it. After that, users can select the available characters or the camera, control them in first person, position them in the scene, and perform actions selecting from a list of options, each paired with a corresponding animation. Relying on the concept of state-machine, the system can automatically generate the list of available actions depending on the context. Finally, the descriptions for each storyboard panel are automatically generated based on the history of activities performed. The proposed application maintains all the functionalities of the desktop version and can be effectively used to create storyboards in immersive virtual environments
A Novel Approach to 3D Storyboarding
Full text linkCreatives in the animation and film industries constantly explore new and innovative tools and methods to enhance their creative process, especially in pre-production. As realistic, real-time rendering techniques have emerged in recent years, 3D game engines, modeling, and animation tools have been exploited to support storyboarding and movie prototyping. This research proposes a 3D storyboarding tool to improve existing storytelling approaches. A novel storyboarding pipeline is proposed, which can automatically generate a storyboard including camera details and a textual description of the events occurring in each scene. Users create storyboards by selecting actors, performing available actions, positioning the camera in the 3D scene, and taking screenshots to save a vignette of the storyboard; the corresponding description is generated based on the actors' actions and their status. A software implementation of the proposed pipeline has also been developed in the guise of a 3D desktop application aimed at expert and novice storyboarders. The system has been tested to evaluate its usability. Preliminary results confirm that the users have appreciated the application
A Systematic Review of Augmented Reality Interfaces for Collaborative Industrial Robots
Full text linkIndustry 4.0 is moving factories towards a high level of collaboration between
human workers and industrial robots, with the aim of improving efficiency and
productivity. Among other technologies, Augmented Reality (AR) is one of the
most researched in recent years to provide novel user interfaces that could easily
blend the real world with additional information. This literature review aims
at identifying the main strengths and weaknesses of AR with industrial robots
in human-robot collaborative scenarios. The term industrial robot is meant
according to the ISO 8373:2012 definition. To this end, starting from 3734
initial works, 63 papers have been selected and analysed. The results suggest
that AR technology shows its effectiveness also in this particular domain. With
respect to traditional approaches, AR systems are faster and more appreciated
by users. Nonetheless, the use of AR in human-robot collaborative scenarios
is so cutting edge that not all the considered works have properly evaluated
the proposed user interfaces. Future research should improve the qualitative
evaluation in order to clearly point out both limitations and strengths of the
proposed systems, involving also expert users in tests
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
A Comparison Between Two Different Approaches for a Collaborative Mixed-Virtual Environment in Industrial Maintenance
Full text linkNowadays the market is becoming increasingly competitive, factories are required not only to enhance the product quality but also to reduce manufacturing and maintenance times. In an industrial context, modern factories are composed by many automated systems, such as industrial robots, which can perform different tasks. Although industrial robots are becoming more powerful and efficient, human workers are still required to accomplish different operations, such as training and maintenance procedures. The proposed research aims to assess a remote interaction system in an industrial training collaborative mixed-reality (CMR) environment. A remote expert user is capable of explaining a training procedure to an unskilled local user. Remote and local users interact using different interaction systems: the remote operator gives assistance using an immersive Virtual Reality (VR) device, whereas the local user interacts using a wearable Augmented Reality (AR) device. A comparison between an interaction based on the presence of a virtual human and one based on the use of abstract icons is proposed. In the first case, a virtual 3D representation of the remote technician is shown to the local user by using AR: the remote technician can pinpoint the components involved in the training procedure and the local user can visualize the instructions through some animations of the virtual avatar. In the second case, the local user cannot see a 3D representation of the remote technician; on the other hand, different 3D models, such as animated icons, are displayed to the local operator through AR depending on the component pinpointed by the remote technician in the virtual environment. Each 3D icon should suggest to the local user which component has to be manipulated at the current step of the procedure. Preliminary results suggest that the interface that requires less resources to be developed and managed should be preferred. Although in no audio condition the virtual avatar may improve the sense of presence of the remote technician, the use of abstract metaphors seems to be of primary importance to successfully complete an industrial task
A Comparison of Three Different NeuroTag Visualization Media: Brain Visual Stimuli by Monitor, Augmented and Virtual Reality Devices
Full text linkBrain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) proved to overcome some limitations of other input modes (e.g., gestures, voice, haptic, etc.). BCIs are able to detect the brain activity, thus identifying searched patterns. When a specific brain activity is recognized, a well-defined action can be triggered, thus implementing a human-machine interaction paradigm. BCIs can be used in different domains ranging from industry to services for impaired people. This paper considers BCIs that can be designed and developed by the NextMind, which is a small and ergonomics device to capture the activity of the visual cortex. Objects called NeuroTags can be inserted in both 2D and 3D scenes; these objects act like switches when the user is able to focus on them. The aim of this work is to evaluate different NeuroTag configurations (varying in terms of size and distance) as well as different visualization devices: a monitor, a virtual reality head-mounted display, and an augmented reality head-mounted display. User tests outline that the best tradeoff between robustness and selection speed is obtained by medium-size and medium-spaced NeuroTags; on the other hand, monitor visualization outperforms the AR solution, whereas it is not possible to identify statistically significant differences between monitor-VR and AR-VR
- …
