Interview of Gillian Hayes: Interactive Visual Supports for Children with Autism

Gillian Hayes is an Assistant Professor in Informatics in the School of Information and Computer Science and the School of Education at UC Irvine.  Some of her research has focused on the use of interactive technologies with children who have autism. She recently was interviewed about a feature article she co-authored that was published in Personal and Ubiquitous Computing:  Interactive Visual Supports for Children with Autism.

The interview can be found on the following Facebook Notes page:

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=439770255457&id=179582945448&ref=mf

Gillian is the editor of an upcoming  special issue of Personal and Ubiquitous Computing on the topic in of technologies for autism.


RELATED 
Some links from the interview:

Gillian's paper in PUC 
(Personal and Ubiquitous Computing)
PUC theme issue on Technologies for Autism
Gillian Hayes
STAR
Gillian talks about autism and technology

"Does TV Content Work on DOOH" - Words of Wisdom from Bill Gerba

Bill Gerba blogs about DOOH, which stands for "Digital-Out-of-Home", focusing on displays and kiosks in public spaces that offer dynamic and/or interactive content, usually for the purpose of advertising and marketing.   If this is an area that interests you, take a look at Bill Gerba's most recent post, "Does TV Content Work on DOOH?  Maybe, Maybe Not" - WireSpring: Digital Signage Insider (9/24/10)


Gerba refers to a "Marketing Funnel" graphic to illustrate some of his points.  Six of the seven concepts represented in the graphic, shared below, might be useful to think about for people working in the field of public displays for purposes other than advertising or marketing:





Most of us have noticed that there are many more large-screen displays around.   Some displays intrusively attempt to grab your attention through loud and garish informercial-like content.   Some are designed to be interactive and pleasant, but go un-noticed by passers-by at all!   


There still is a long road to go.


The good news is that a small (and growing) number of scholarly researchers are focusing their attention to displays situated in public spaces, as mentioned in my previous post, "PD-NET Project: Exploring large-scale networks...of pervasive public displays."

Future of Screens, Interactive Video Research, XNA 4.0 Multitouch, Pogue's Recent Post

Here are a few topics and links of interest:
THE FUTURE OF SCREENS, CIRCA 2014


If you haven't seen this short video clip, take a look. It was created by TAT MobileUI, and includes examples of how screen interaction can take place across a variety of surfaces and settings.

"This is the result of TAT's Open Innovation experiment. It is an experience video showing the future of screen technology with stretchable screens, transparent screens and e-ink displays, to name a few." TAT MobileUI. TAT stands for  The Astonishing Tribe. According to information from the TAT website, "TAT is a Swedish software technology and design company offering products and services that differentiate and enhance the user experience of portable devices. TAT is headquartered in Malmö, Sweden, and has local offices in Korea and USA."


Ola Larsén, the Vice President of Marketing at TAT, recently spoke at the ARM Multimedia conference in Taiwan, focusing on UX trends and tablets:    "Enabling a cross device connected user experience". To dig deeper, see the original post in Gizmodo and take a look at the comments:
The Future of Screens Circa 2014  (Kyle VanHemert, Gizmodo, 9/1/2010)


INTERACTIVE VIDEO RESOURCES/EXAMPLES
 I have a need to create "touchable" interactive video, and I plan to share what crosses my path on this blog from time to time.   Over the past several months, there has been some growth in the world of interactive video. The information below is just a beginning:


Interactive Video Research
Thanks to a link from Johannes Schöning,  I learned about the Dragon project, headed by Dr. Jan Borchers of the Computer Science Department at RWTH Aachen University in Germany. I haven't yet explored the research or used the application, which can be downloaded from the Dragon project website.  


Description (from the Dragon website): " DRAGON is a direct-manipulation interaction technique for frame-accurate navigation in video scenes. This technique benefits tasks such as professional and amateur video editing, review of sports footage, and forensic analysis of video scenes."
     "By directly dragging objects in the scene along their movement trajectory, DRAGON enables users to quickly and precisely navigate to a specific point in the video timeline where an object of interest is in a desired location. Examples include the specific frame where a sprinter crosses the finish line, or where a car passes a traffic light."
     "DRAGON is a research project by Thorsten Karrer, Malte Weiss, Moritz Wittenhagen, Jan Borchers and others at the Media Computing Group. It is funded in part through the German B-IT Foundation and the UMIC DFG Excellence Initiative."
Related Publication (more can be found on the Dragon website)
Christian Brockly. Evaluation of direct manipulation techniques for in-scene video navigation. Master's thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany, February 2009.  

The following companies are involved in some form of interactive video work, mostly focused on marketing and advertising: INNOVID in-video innovation: "Existing Video ads can be intrusive and out of context. At Innovid, we believe that online video should be as interactive as the Internet is today, with many interchangeable elements that give the viewer dynamic content rather than a static succession of frames. We`re bringing this vision to life by innovating the way viewers interact with and engage with online video ads . iRoll®, our interactive pre-roll ad product, has powered the most interactive pre-roll campaigns with well-known brands and agencies." Innovid Platform iRoll® - Interactive Pre-roll Innovid Studio Innovid is hiring! Sales Account Executive - NYC Office Flash Programmer/designer Flash/Flex Developer Computer Vision Specialist Linux Server-Side Developer with strong IT orientation Article: Interactive video: A powerful beast (David Rossiter, iMedia Connection) QUICK.TV Quick.tv is a company co-founded by Nick Bell and Tod Yeadon.  The information about the company was in the process of being updated when I visited the website. I knew if I went to the iTVT website, I'd find more information about Quick.TV and interactive video, thanks to iTVT co-founder Tracy Swedlow: QuickTV in Interactive Video Partnership with Ooyala  (Tracy Swedlow, iTVT, 7/11/10) "According to Quick.tv, Ooyala customers will see a "seamless integration" of Quick.tv overlays into the Ooyala video player. The company says that a library of off-the-shelf widgets can be used to deploy interactive features quickly, while an advanced editor allows users to create their own custom widgets. "The widget approach is efficient and flexible," Bell continued. "It offers a wide range of monetization, engagement and editorial overlays for immediate use, whilst offering an editing facility with limitless creative potential for those who want to deliver a more specific user experience. The analytics generated by viewer interactions take video accountability and market intelligence to a new level." Howto.TV in interactive video partnership with Ooyala (Tracy Swedlow, iTVT, 7/13/10) Hotspotting: Overlay.TV integrates with MarketLive to power interactive video commerce for Armani/Exchange(Tracy Swedlow, iTVT, 9/1/2010) OOYALA Ooyala is a provider of video platform applications and services. Ooyala is involved in interactive video and has an iVideo API.  The company is expanding into the field of on-line educational video.  I'd would be great if they worked towards providing interactive video content for use on classroom interactive whiteboards! I Googled Ooyala and found out that the company recently raised more than $22 million: Ooyala Raises $22 Million to Accommodate Global Expansion.   OVERLAY.TV Overlay.TV: "Helping online retailers create, manage, and deliver interactive video experiences to drive traffic, increase conversion, and engage shoppers".  While browsing through the Overlay.TV website, I came across a series of posts worth reading: "Six Interactive Video Ideas to Get You Started" Related article: Ottowa company makes clickable fashionable (CBC News, 9/8/10) Comment:  I wish the emphasis was on touch, NOT click! KOKOKAKA Kokokaka Interactive (Ad company) Wrangler's Blue Bell Website - You can drag the character around, right inside of the video!

Demonstration of Drag Video Function (Bluebell Inventions)

I'm continuing my search for examples of the use of interactive video in education- particularly video produced for larger touch-screen displays or IWBs.


INTERACTIVE MULT-TOUCH GAMES SUPPORTED BY XNA 4.0?
Shaun Hargreaves Explains It All:
Touch input on Windows in XNA Game Studio 4.0

DAVID POGUE'S RECENT POST & COMMENTS FROM HIS READERS
RELEASED TOO SOON (David Pogue, NYT, 9/16/2010)
Since most of my readers are interested in emerging technologies, I thought I'd share a link to one of David Pogue's recent posts. David Pogue knows what he's talking about.  He's a guy who keeps up with new technologies better than most.   In the article, Pogue discusses his review of a new product, Vulkano, which was designed to record TV shows and also provide a means to watch shows via the internet.  Although his post focuses on the problems that can ensue when a product is marched to market before it is ready, the best part is the conversation generated by his post about this problem.  Pogue's comments struck a chord among people across a range of industries.  

The comments should be must-reads for university students preparing for careers in the world of business and technology!

Video Experiments: Sea Life Medley: Extended version with music

I'm playing around with my sea life video clips to get ideas for creating interactive educational videos in the future for use on interactive whiteboards and other large touch-screen surfaces.

Here's my YouTube description:
This is a medley of several video clips taken of sea life, mostly living in aquariums. Awesome jellyfish can be viewed from 1:34- 3:45. The music consists of clips from iMovie, and then William Orbit's "Sea Green" and "Surfin". I created this video for students I work with who have more complex disabilities, such as severe autism.

Wrangler Bluebell Jeans Interactive Ad on my TouchSmart PC -"How-to", plus a demo of ad on iPad

The content of this blog post was removed at the request of Wrangler.

Interesting blog roll and links on Christian Zoellner's TUI Blog by FORM+ZWECK; FILE Electronic Arts Festival

Christian Zoellner blogs about "tangible interaction & new interfaces" on the TUI Blog by Form + Zweck, a design magazine.  Christian is a designer and "presearcher" who lives and works in Berlin, Germany.  He teaches at the University of Fine Arts, Berlin. He maintains the Christian Zoellner website.

As I write this post, Christian is attending the FILE electronic arts festival, which focuses on "interactive art in public spaces, game design, and sonification".  It sounds like a fantastic conference! The festival is actually a group of events:  File Machinima, File Documenta, File Media Art, File Hypersonica, File Games, File Symposium, File Prix Lux, and workshops.


Christian Zoellner's Links:

• algorhythmics
• alt N research
• arduino
• bausteln
• cc
• christian zoellner
• createdigitalmotion.com
• createdigitalmusic.com
• de:bug
• doors of perception
• form+zweck
• fritzing
• groovemechanic
• hardhack
• interactiondesign.org
• interactivemultimediatechnology
• intuity.medialab
• M.I.T
• maker faire
• my future me
• nui-group
• openprocessing
• prado media lab
• processing
• salection
• smiles at strangers
• TEI conference
• the kitchen
• tinker
• tui.blog @ youtube

(I just noticed I'm on this list of links.)

RELATED

FILE SAO PAULO 2010:  July 27-August 29

"This year, besides the Centro Cultural FIESP - Ruth Cardoso programme, FILE launches FILE PAI (Paulista Avenue Interactive = Interactive Public Art), a project of digital public art that will occupy several spaces at Paulista Avenue with interactive works of art.

0 - Interactive Projection, 1 - Brigadeiro subway station, 2 - Electronic sound bus, 3 - Nomadic electronic graffiti, 4 - Paraíso subway station, 5 - Fnac store, 6 - FIESP Cultural Center - Ruth Cardoso, 7 - Trianon-Masp subway station, 8 - Conjunto Nacional building, 9 - Consolação subway station, 10 - Cervantes Institute, and 11 - São Paulo Art Museum - MASP compose the FILE PAI set, which intends to highlight the significance of interactive public art in order to understand and to absorb the new social phenomena provided by technology and, thus, to constitute strategies to interconnect with those new mass behaviors."

SOMEWHAT RELATED
Building Music at Spark Festival 09 (opens up to a full screen video of a musical building,from  Play the Magic.

Multi-touch Parallel Coordinates for Interactive InfoVis (video and Info) via Dr. Robert Kosara

Dr. Robert Kosara's area of research is information and data visualization. He is an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science, College of Computing and Informatics, at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and also a member of the Charlotte Visualization Center.   He's fascinated with parallel sets/categorical data visualization.

Dr. Kosara is known for his deep thoughts about information visualization, as well as persuading others that they should think deep thoughts about the subject, too! His latest work is an example of interesting multi-touch interaction with representation of parallel coordinates using multi-touch trackpads commonly found on laptops, including the Macbook Pro.

Indirect Multi-touch Interaction for Brushing in Parallel Coordinates:

Indirect Multi-Touch Interaction for Brushing in Parallel Coordinates from Robert Kosara on Vimeo.


BELOW IS INFORMATION FROM THE VIMEO WEBSITE:

"This is the companion video for a paper we submitted recently. It describes a technique for interacting with parallel coordinates using the multi-touch trackpad found on laptops like Apple's MacBook Pro. 


Below is the abstract from that paper:
Interaction in visualization is often complicated and tedious. Brushing data in a visualization such as Parallel Coordinates allows the user to select data points according to certain criteria. Modifying a brush or combining it with another one usually requires a lot of additional effort and mode switches.
We propose the use of multi-touch interaction to provide fast and convenient interaction with Parallel Coordinates. By using a multi-touch trackpad rather than the screen directly, the users hands do not obscure the visualization during interaction. Using one, two, three, or four fingers, the user can easily and quickly perform complex selections. Being able to change the selections rapidly, the user can explore the data set more easily and effectively, and can focus on the data rather than the interaction."


RELATED
Robert Kosara's info about parallel sets
EagarEyes Shorts
IEEE VizWeek 2010 (21st IEEE Visualization Conference; 16th IEEE InfoVis Conference; 5th IEEE VAST Conference)  October 24-29, 2010, Salt Lake City, Utah


A plug for a couple of Dr. Kosara's recent publications:

Caroline Ziemkiewicz, Robert Kosara,
Implied Dynamics in Information Visualization,
Proceedings Advanced Visual Interfaces (AVI), pp. 215–222, 2010. (acceptance rate 20%)

Robert Kosara,
Turning a Table into a Tree: Growing Parallel Sets into a Purposeful Project,
in Steele, Iliinsky (eds), Beautiful Visualization, pp. 193–204, O'Reilly Media, 2010.

Caroline Ziemkiewicz, Robert Kosara,
Embedding Information Visualization Within Visual Representation,
in Ras, Ribarsky (eds), Advances in Information and Intelligent Systems, Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 251, pp. 307–326, Springer Verlag, 2010.

Interactive Technology in the Carolinas: Discovery Place Science Center

I recently visited the Discovery Place science center in Charlotte, N.C.  It was my first visit without kids, and I thought it would be fun to explore all of the exhibits at my own pace. I was excited to play with the interactive applications created for exhibits running on Microsoft's Surface table-top computers. There were so many kids and teens at Discovery Place that every exhibit was in use. Fortunately, I obtained permission from parents to videotape/photograph some of the action.

Next time, I'll make sure that I visit at a less-busy time!

The following displays were developed by the Microsoft Surface team at Quatrefoil.  Quatrefoil is a company located in Maryland that develops immersive interactive experiences, primarily for museum exhibits and related projects.

Midwife Toad App on a Microsoft Surface

Project Build Exhibit video, from the Quatrefoil YouTube website, helps people understand the architectural design process:

THEM exhibit, from the Quatrefoil YouTube site:

"This health-related exhibition at Discovery Place in Charlotte, NC, explores how the human body is an ecosystem with a myriad of flora and fauna. Visitors are presented with an exciting and educational experience. The content is delivered in a way that carefully walks the line between gross-out information and the need to keep the context within the human body...Quatrefoil Associates designed the exhibit and produced creative media including Attack of the Superbugs, a video about antibiotic-resistant bacteria." -Quatrefoil Associates

The Reactable at Discovery Place

Collaborative Travel Planning App for Microsoft Surface, by Object Consulting

Information from the Microsoft Surface YouTube Channel:
"Object Explore is a collaborative travel planner for use by travel consultants and consumers on Microsoft Surface. Explore deep levels of interactive content through intuitive navigation, ensuring the customer doesn't get lost in the process. All content is tailored to the current client and can be taken away through mobile or email. Object Explore is built upon Object Consulting's Object Zoom framework, which brings intuitive Zoom exploration to sectors including retail, finance and museums." - Object Consulting


SOMEWHAT RELATED
I worked on a collaborative travel planning application a few years ago for an HCI class project- before the Surface was unveiled by Microsoft.  It would have been fun to implement it in a Surface environment, since applications on the Surface can easily interface with mobile devices.

Below is a screenshot of a working prototype of "navSmart", a mash-up using photo-overlays linking to travel related information, including YouTube videos of related travel videos and information. You spin the globe around to explore possible destinations and vacation activities.   This concept worked best on a large touch-screen display.

AquaLux 3D: Text, video, images, and even Tetris on a multi-layered water display

I recently came across the INAVATE website, and I've found several articles on topics that I'm sure will interest my blog readers. The article that intrigued me today was about the AquaLux 3D project by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. In the videos, you can see how text, video, and images can be created with light and water droplets. The researchers used this technology to create a multi-dimensional Tetris game!

A Multi-Layered Display with Water Drops (non-technical version)

"Using a projector and rows of water drop emitters, we create a multi-layer display that can be used for text, videos, and interactive games."

How the Water-drop Multi-display Works: SIGGRAPH 2010 Submission:

RELATED
Projecting Onto Water for 3D Show
INAVATE 7/8/2010
Peter Barnum, Ph.D. Student (AquaLux 3D researcher)

Carnegie Mellon Illumination & Imaging Website

A Multi-layered Display with Water Drops(pdf)
Peter C. Barnum, Srinivasa G. Narasimhan and Takeo Kanade
ACM Transactions on Graphics (SIGGRAPH), July 2010.

"A Projector-Camera System for Creating a Display with Water Drops"
P. C. Barnum, S. G. Narasimhan, and T. Kanade
Workshop on Projector-Camera Systems (PROCAMS), in conjunction with CVPR, June 2009. (Best paper award)
[PDF] [Slides with videos]

YouTube's Move to Slower Media: Leanback - in HD, full screen, minimal clicks, merges with your other online "stuff".

The details are demonstrated in the video below:

My hunch?
One motivation behind Leanback is to prepare us for the next wave of online 3D HDTV, which is a "slow media" experience, best viewed from a comfy sofa or recliner.  This is the "10-foot experience".

RELATED

YouTube Leanback offers effortless viewing

Broadcasting Ourselves ;): The Official YouTube Blog, 7/7/10

YouTube Leanback Formats Videos for TVs and Second Monitors

Kevin Purdy, Lifehacker, 7/8/10

YouTube Leanback is live. It's time to get chilled

Brad NcCartym, thenextweb, 7/8/10

YouTube Leanback caters to the lazy: The video service automatically strams HD content based on your prefs Wilson Rothman, msnbc.com, 7/7/10

YouTube Leanback Actively Wants Your Passive Attention

Brian Barrett, Gizmodo, 7/7/10
YouTube launches Leanback, mobile site gets HTML5 revamp (video)

Ross Miller, Engadget, 7/7/10
YouTube tries for the TV again with Leanback
Tom Krazit, CNET, 7/7/10

SOMEWHAT RELATED

Slow Media Manifesto