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International Conference on Entertainment Computing

ICEC 2012: Entertainment Computing - ICEC 2012 pp 158–171Cite as

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The ICOCOON Virtual Meeting Room: A Virtual Environment as a Support Tool for Multipoint Teleconference Systems

The ICOCOON Virtual Meeting Room: A Virtual Environment as a Support Tool for Multipoint Teleconference Systems

  • Aljosha Demeulemeester19,
  • Katriina Kilpi20,
  • Shirley A. Elprama20,
  • Sammy Lievens21,
  • Charles-Frederik Hollemeersch19,
  • An Jacobs20,
  • Peter Lambert19 &
  • …
  • Rik Van de Walle19 
  • Conference paper
  • 3799 Accesses

  • 2 Citations

Part of the Lecture Notes in Computer Science book series (LNISA,volume 7522)

Abstract

Globalization and increasing collaboration between remote teams drive the need for teleconference systems. However, currently no videoconferencing system matches the face-to-face experience for a business meeting with many participants in a flexible and affordable manner. In search for a better solution, we created a Virtual Meeting Room (VMR) application that visualizes key events detected using computer vision (e.g., participant entering the meeting room, talking, presenting) in a 3D virtual environment. The goal was to provide a good sense of overview to users when many meeting participants - represented by 3D avatars - from remote locations join a teleconference. In this paper, a technical overview of the working prototype - built using 3D game technology - is presented. Also, feedback from multiple user tests performed during the development of the prototype is discussed and presented as a set of recommendations. From the technical perspective, we found that existing 3D game technology is mature, affordable and contains the features needed to build the VMR application. From the users’ and experts’ feedback, we conclude that the VMR has merits as a teleconferencing support tool accompanying a video stream that conveys more detailed non-verbal communication of the active speaker.

Keywords

  • Virtual World
  • Video Stream
  • Second Life
  • Meeting Participant
  • Video Aggregator

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IBBT, Department of Electronics and Information Systems, Multimedia Lab, Ghent University, Gaston Crommenlaan 8 bus 201, B-9050, Ledeberg-Ghent, Belgium

    Aljosha Demeulemeester, Charles-Frederik Hollemeersch, Peter Lambert & Rik Van de Walle

  2. IBBT-SMIT, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 9, B-1050, Brussels, Belgium

    Katriina Kilpi, Shirley A. Elprama & An Jacobs

  3. Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs, Copernicuslaan 50, B-2018, Antwerpen, Belgium

    Sammy Lievens

Authors
  1. Aljosha Demeulemeester
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  2. Katriina Kilpi
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  3. Shirley A. Elprama
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  4. Sammy Lievens
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  5. Charles-Frederik Hollemeersch
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  6. An Jacobs
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  7. Peter Lambert
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  8. Rik Van de Walle
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Technologie-Zentrum Informatik und Informationstechik (TZI), Universität Bremen, Postfach 33 04 40, 28334, Bremen, Germany

    Marc Herrlich

  2. Digital Media, TZI, University of Bremen, Germany

    Rainer Malaka

  3. Abteilung für Informatik und angewandte Kognitionswissenschaften, Universität Duisburg-Essen, Forsthausweg 2, 47057, Duisburg, Germany

    Maic Masuch

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© 2012 IFIP International Federation for Information Processing

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Cite this paper

Demeulemeester, A. et al. (2012). The ICOCOON Virtual Meeting Room: A Virtual Environment as a Support Tool for Multipoint Teleconference Systems. In: Herrlich, M., Malaka, R., Masuch, M. (eds) Entertainment Computing - ICEC 2012. ICEC 2012. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 7522. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-33542-6_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-33542-6_14

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-33541-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-33542-6

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