Avatars in Networked Virtual Environments

Çapın, Tolga; Pandžić, Igor S.; Magnenat‐Thalmann, Nadia; Thalmann, Daniel

doi:10.1002/0470841761

Cited by 39 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Distributed virtual human (avatar) animation is used in many applications that depict human models interacting with networked virtual environments [2]. Distributed virtual environments (DVEs) either require exchange of motion files between hosts to simulate the avatar motion, or use locally stored motion data [3]- [6], [24].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Model-Based Power Aware Compression Algorithms for MPEG-4 Virtual Human Animation in Mobile Environments

Chattopadhyay¹,

Bhandarkar²,

2007

IEEE Trans. Multimedia

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Abstract-MPEG-4 body animation parameters (BAP) are used for animation of MPEG-4 compliant virtual human-like characters. Distributed virtual reality applications and networked games on mobile computers require access to locally stored or streamed compressed BAP data. Existing MPEG-4 BAP compression techniques are inefficient for streaming, or storing, BAP data on mobile computers, because: 1) MPEG-4 compressed BAP data entails a significant number of CPU cycles, hence significant, unacceptable power consumption, for the purpose of decompression; 2) the lossy MPEG-4 technique of frame dropping to reduce network throughput during streaming leads to unacceptable animation degradation; and 3) lossy MPEG-4 compression does not exploit structural information in the virtual human model. In this article, we propose two novel algorithms for lossy compression of BAP data, termed as BAP-Indexing and BAP-Sparsing. We demonstrate how an efficient combination of the two algorithms results in a lower network bandwidth requirement and reduced power for data decompression at the client end when compared to MPEG-4 compression. The algorithm exploits the structural information in the virtual human model, thus maintaining visually acceptable quality of the resulting animation upon decompression. Consequently, the hybrid algorithm for BAP data compression is ideal for streaming of motion animation data to power-and network-constrained mobile computers.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Model-Based Power Aware Compression Algorithms for MPEG-4 Virtual Human Animation in Mobile Environments

Chattopadhyay¹,

Bhandarkar²,

2007

IEEE Trans. Multimedia

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…One can mention NPSNET-4, DIVE, MR. TOOLKIT, BRICKNET, MASSIVE, and VELVET [7,11,16,20,25,26] amongst others. Comparison of several of such architectures has been performed based on aspects related to visualization [6], information, process and user distribution [6], and network communication [15].…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

The H-N2N framework: towards providing interperception in massive applications

Burlamaqui

Azevedo

Dantas

et al. 2009

Multimed Tools Appl

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We propose a framework with a flexible architecture that have been designed and implemented for collaborative interaction of users, to be applied in massive applications through the Web. We introduce the concept of interperception and use technologies as massive virtual environments and teleoperation for the creation of environments (mixing virtual and real ones) in order to promote accessibility and transparency in the interaction between people, and between people and animate devices (such as robots) through the Web. Experiments with massive games, with interactive applications in digital television, with users and robots interacting in virtual and real versions of museums and cultural centers are presented to validate our proposal.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Compression by indexing: an improvement over MPEG-4 body animation parameter compression

Chattopadhyay

Bhandarkar

2006

SPIE Proceedings

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Body Animation Parameters (BAPs) are used to animate MPEG-4 compliant virtual human-like characters. In order to stream BAPs in real time interactive environments, the BAPs are compressed for low bitrate representation using a standard MPEG-4 compression pipeline. However, the standard MPEG-4 compression is inefficient for streaming to power-constrained devices, since the streamed data requires extra power in terms of CPU cycles for decompression. In this paper, we have proposed and implemented an indexing technique for a BAP data stream, resulting in a compressed representation of the motion data. The resulting compressed representation of the BAPs is superior to the MPEG-4-based BAP compression in terms of both, required network throughput and power consumption at the client end to receive the compressed data stream and extract the original BAP data from the compressed representation. Although the resulting motion after decompression at the client end is lossy, the motion distortion is minimized by intelligent use of the hierarchical structure of the skeletal avatar model. Consequently, the proposed indexing method is ideal for streaming of motion data to power-and network-constrained devices such as PDAs, Pocket PCs and Laptop PCs operating in battery mode and other cellular devices in a mobile network environment.

show abstract

Avatars in Networked Virtual Environments

Cited by 39 publications

References 0 publications

Model-Based Power Aware Compression Algorithms for MPEG-4 Virtual Human Animation in Mobile Environments

Model-Based Power Aware Compression Algorithms for MPEG-4 Virtual Human Animation in Mobile Environments

The H-N2N framework: towards providing interperception in massive applications

Compression by indexing: an improvement over MPEG-4 body animation parameter compression

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About