VISNET demonstrates the formation of a critical mass by putting
together 15 leading organisations across Europe in the field of networked AV
systems and home platforms. The consortium consists of 9 universities, 3
research institutes and 3 industrial Telecom companies, 2 of which are major
network operators in their respective states. All members are known for their
proven track record in audiovisual information and networking technologies and
enjoy a national and international reputation in the field. VISNET integrates a
number of researchers who have made significant contributions to the advance of
this field through standardisation activities, books and paper publications,
patents and spin-off SMEs, as well as many other academic and industrial
achievements. The table below shows the participants acronyms as well as their
respective numbers used in this proposal.
Partners
VISNET has 15 partners in 9 countries and integrates over 100 researchers
University of Surrey, UK
Multimedia Communications Research Group, Centre for
Communication Systems Research (CCSR)
Visnet will be coordinated by
CCSR, a part of an academic school at the
University of Surrey which is one of the two only universities in the UK
which have achieved a 5*A ranking (highest research ranking given to an
academic university in the UK) in the last RAE (Research Assessment Exercise,
2001) in the Electronic Engineering discipline. CCSR is a large academic
research centre with over 100 personnel divided into 3 main research groups,
one of which is the multimedia communication research group.
The Multimedia
group is largely involved in research activities covering speech, image
and video compression algorithms, AV transmissions over networks, media
adaptation for AV transmissions over heterogeneous networks, QoS control and
security. The group also contributes extensively to the joint programme of
activities of Visnet and makes use of its new high-end lab facilities
(I-lab) that consists of a multi-disciplinary mixed reality media lab
environment. The I-lab facilities along with the campus-wide wireless network
testbed (WNT) are used in several activities related to the creation of 3D AV
material as well as the performance evaluation of the proposed coding and
transcoding algorithms under real network conditions.
The group has also experience in the set-up of spin-out SME
companies. This experience will be vital for supporting the dissemination
activities and durability plans beyond the budgeted period of the Commission.
Fraunhofer Institute for
Telecommunications, Heinrich-Hertz Institute, Germany
Image Processing Department
The Fraunhofer
Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich-Hertz-Institute (HHI) is a
German research institute in the field of communications, located in Berlin.
Our activities are financed by both institutional funding from the Federal
Government and the State of Berlin, and external funding from industry and
research organisations. About 280 people work on solutions to problems related
image processing, multimedia, human factors, photonic networks, and mobile
broadband communication. The focus of the Image Processing Department with more
than 50 employees is on digital signal, image, and video processing. In more
than 20 research projects, new algorithms and applications are developed,
ranging from very low bit-rate video coding for mobile and Internet
applications, immersive video conferencing, video surveillance, face tracking
and mimic analysis, and 3D-TV. In the past, the HHI participated in several
EUREKA projects (EU95, ADDT, VADIS, MEDEA), RACE-projects (FLASH, TRANSIT,
DISTIMA, HAMLET), ACTS projects (CINENET, EMPHASIS, PANORAMA, MOMUSYS,
CustomTV), IST-projects (DRIVE, SAMBITS), and the ESPRIT project NEMESIS.
Currently, the HHI is member of the IST projects ATTEST, MASCOT and VIRTUE.
Nationally, the HHI was leading the joint BMBF research projects HDTV-T, MINT,
and INVINET and is currently involved in BBI, KOKON, ITI, and VisionIC. The HHI
is a competence center for video coding and processing which is reflected in
leading activities and contributions to standardisation efforts of the ITU-T
and MPEG. Substantial know-how also exists in the fields of 3D signal
processing, image analysis and synthesis, computer vision, and porting of
signal processing algorithms to hardware architectures. Especially the work on
facial expression analysis and animation, 3D object geometry estimation,
image-based rendering, and coding and streaming of image sequences can
beneficially be integrated into the VISNET activities.
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de
Lausanne, Switzerland
The TV group of Signal
Processing Institute of EPFL will be involved in this network. The group
is active in research and teaching in the field of visual information
processing and coding, in many areas directly relevant to the objectives of the
proposed network. TV group currently has 8 researchers, mostly pursuing Ph.D.
theses, 4 post-doctoral researcher, and many undergraduate students.
Undergraduate students are EPFL students or full-time visiting students from
other universities, each staying for a period of around 6 months and involved
in one of the research projects of the group. The research topics span through
three highly interconnected disciplines of imaging, namely, compression,
processing/interpretation, and security. Compression includes still image,
video and 3D image coding. Processing/interpretation includes image and video
analysis such as change detection, feature point extraction and tracking,
object segmentation and tracking, compressed domain processing, and multi-modal
man-machine interface for interactive communication. Security activity includes
development of algorithms for copyright protection, conditional access and
authentication of images, video as well as 3D models. The research activities
are carried out in the framework of various projects coming from different
sources. These sources include fundamental research grants from the Swiss
authorities (FNRS- Swiss National Foundation for Scientific Research),
Academia-industry cooperation program (CTI), European Projects (IST), and
direct industrial contracts. In the last years, the team has been involved in
more than a dozen of such frameworks. Current research projects include, one
FNRS project: interactive video systems; five European projects: Interface on
man-machine interaction through audio-visual analysis, Art.Live on new media
creation and experience, Certimark on evaluation of watermarking techniques and
new algorithms; Perseo on universal multimedia access, and 2Kan on JPEG 2000
advanced networking. In addition to the above, the team is very active in
standardization activities MPEG-4, MPEG-7 and MPEG-21, as well as JPEG 2000,
where it contributes both at technical and leadership levels.
Instituto Superior Técnico, Portugal
Instituto Superior Técnico (IST) is part of Technical University of
Lisbon. The IST Image Group research interests cover the areas of visual
information analysis, modeling, processing, manipulation, representation,
coding and description. IST has developed, in the last years, intense research
and development activities in image processing and coding, from still pictures
to mobile videotelephony, digital TV, and advanced interactive systems. These
activities, often developed in collaboration with international partners
(universities, industries, telecommunication operators and research
institutes), allowed the preparation of many M.Sc. and Ph.D. thesis, leading to
a significant experience in multimedia processing and representation
technologies. IST has been active in international research and standardisation
groups, such as COST 211, ISO/JPEG, and mainly ISO/MPEG. IST was partner of
RACE MAVT (which developed the first hardware demonstrator of a low bitrate
mobile audiovisual terminal), ACTS MOMUSYS (which developed an MPEG-4 hardware
demonstrator), and ACTS DICEMAN (which provided important inputs to MPEG-7
standardisation). IST was involved in launching the MPEG-4 and MPEG-7
standardisation efforts. IST participation in MPEG-4, focused in requirements
and profiles specification, shape coding, error resilience, video rate control,
3D facial animation. IST was involved in several proposals that become the
basis of MPEG-7 image and video description schemes. IST is also involved in
the development of the MPEG-21 standard, especially in terms of usage
environment description and scalable video coding. IST experts have chaired
many MPEG Ad Hoc Groups and the Requirements Group. The interest of IST in the
VISNET project follows its interest on networked AV technologies. More
precisely, IST wil l bring to VISNET technical knowledge and experience to
provide adequate solutions for: Video analysis, notably segmentation and
evaluation of segmentation algorithms and results, video description for
efficient retrieval, browsing, filtering and summarization, advanced video
coding, notably targeting improved efficiency, scalability and error
resilience, specially in view of improved mobile and Internet video
communications. Due to its experience in standardisation bodies, IST is also
determined to play a central role in the connection between MPEG and VISNET.
IST has the necessary equipment and resources to fulfil with success the tasks
it will be in charge in the context of the VISNET NoE.
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Artificial Intelligence & Information Analysis Laboratory, Computer Vision
and Image Processing Group, Department of Informatics
The computer vision and digital image processing group at theDepartment of
Informatics, Aristotle University of
Thessaloniki is an active research group working for more than fifteen
years in multimedia and digital video/image/signal processing and analysis as
well as several related areas. Its topics of interest and current research span
the areas of digital image/video processing and analysis, computer vision,
watermarking and IPR protection, biometrics, 3D image processing, virtual
reality, speech processing, statistical language engineering, multimedia
indexing and retrieval, fusion from different modalities, etc. The group has
strong cooperation with other Universities, research centres and industrial
partners in the areas of its interests through projects mainly funded by the
European community. It has participated in a number of projects dealing with
topics adjacent to those that will be addressed within the framework of the
VISNET proposal: WORLDSTUDIO (3D graphics/VR, IST, EU), HYPERGEO (Mobile
tourist geographical information systems, IST, EU), CAROUSSO (3D audio/video
environments, IST, EU), MOUMIR (multimedia retrieval, RTN, IST, EU), MUHCI
(multimodal human-computer interaction, RTN, EU), PENED99 (3D medical imaging,
GSRT, Greece), CERTIMARK (benchmarking of watermark methods, IST, EU), INSPECT
(Chaotic signal processing for watermarking, LTR, EU), OKAPI (Access control
for multimedia systems, ACTS, EU), M2VTS (Multimodal person verification, ACTS,
EU), ACCOPI (Access control and copyright protection RACE, EU), DISTIMA
(Stereoscopic HDTV, RACE, EU), NOBLESSE (Nonlinear image analysis, LTR, EU),
NAT (Nonlinear and adaptive techniques in digital image processing, analysis
and computer vision, ESPRIT, EU), MAVI (Model based analysis of video
information, HCM, EU), Image sequence processing and analysis (GSRT, Greece),
Parallel color image processing and multi-channel signal processing (GSRT,
Greece). As a result of this research, more than 420 publications in
international scientific journals, and conference proceedings, 16 book chapters
and 7 books have been published. Within VISNET, AUTH will deal with topics that
include shot cut detection, face detection and tracking, speech analysis and
watermarking. Through its involvement in the Joint Program of Activities, AUTH
will benefit from the exchange of research results, joint research and the
sharing of tools, databases, common platforms etc that will be created within
the network AUTH is workpackage leader in WP4.2.2 "Semantic Video
Segmentation and Tracking
Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya, Spain
Audio Visual Technologies Group
The members of the Group of Audio Visual
Technologies of the Universitat Politécnica de Catalunya, UPC,
have been working for more than 15 years in audio and video coding, image and
video analysis and mobile communications. Members of the group have developed
in particular a number of low-level tools for image segmentation, object
tracking and motion estimation. More recently, the group has focussed on video
indexing, face detection and recognition and metadata based-coding. This
research activity has been the basis for collaborations within international
projects and for contributions to MPEG-4. Members of the group have been
responsible of the organization of the International Conference on Image
Processing, ICIP, which was held in Barcelona in September 2003. With regards
to European projects, a member of the group has been the prime contractor of
the RACE II MORPHECO project (development of region-based codec based on
mathematical morphology). Moreover, there has been a strong contribution to IST
project VIDAS (video codec assisted by audio information), IST project
HYPERMEDIA (broadcast service of MPEG-2 sequences supported by MPEG), and IST
project MASCOT "Metadata for Advanced Scalable Video Coding Tools".
The experience and technical inputs provided in these projects, along with many
related publications constitute a good background for our work in VISNET
regarding new paradigms in video coding using Wyner-Ziv approaches, the use of
metadata information to improve coding, and the fusion of multimodal
information for face detection and recognition.
Joint Research Centre, Italy
The Joint Research Centre (JRC) is the
European Commission's own research centre. IPSC, the Institute for the
Protection and Security of the Citizen, is one of the institutes of the JRC, is
located at Ispra, Italy and has a permanent staff of about 350 people. The
SIR sector (Surveillance and Information Retrieval) within the
NPNS Unit (Non-Proliferation and Nuclear Safeguards) is involved in
research in the VISNET related areas: 3-D reconstruction of small objects and
environments "as-built" and Internet-based control, integration and
visualisation of remote sensory data. Research is done within the framework of
the Nuclear Safeguards programme and is applied to the Remote Verification of
Fissile Material Storage Areas. The sector has very good links with many
European Universities, and hosted many researchers and students doing final
year projects, Master and PhD research work. The JRC-Ispra provides an
intellectually stimulating international and multi-disciplinary environment,
with a highly qualified staff of about 1800 people from more than 30
nationalities. NPNS-SIR's laboratories have the equipment and software tools to
support research projects including the VISNET network. The main contribution
to VISNET is the research related to the creation of 3D photo-realistic,
dimensionally accurate, reconstructed models from the reality "as-built". These
models range from very small objects (centimetre scale) to buildings (tens of
meters scale) and large scenes (kilometre scale). Such models can be used as
the spatial framework to embed all other types of dynamic and static visual and
audio data. Some examples of specialist equipment are:
-
Six laser range finders; computer controlled Pan-and-Tilt units.
-
Fast laser range scanner, capable of acquiring “distance” images in the range
1m-200m.
-
Very high accuracy laser range scanner capable of acquiring distance images up
to 50m with millimetre accuracy.
-
3 laser striping (triangulation based) range scanners for modelling objects in
the range 5cm to 1.5m.
-
3 Mobile platforms (one of them piloted by the Internet); Large Robotic arm;
force-feedback input device;
-
Diversified Vision equipment;
-
Various position sensors for Augmented Reality applications (eg, InterSense,
Flock-of-Birds, Faro arm)
NPNS-SIR has been (is) involved in the following European projects and research
networks: RESOLV (DGXIII-ACTS) project aiming at the creation of
photo-realistic 3-D reconstructed models of the reality "as-built" [JRC's role
was to acquire, and develop all the 3-D-reconstruction algorithms, as well as
to investigate new methods and applications for 3-D reconstruction]; INFOBOY
(DGXIII-ESPRIT) 3-D technologies for Internet tourist advertisement of
farmhouse holidays in Bavaria; ABI (DG-XIII ESPRIT) Long Term Research aiming
at developing a brain actuated interface (e.g., mouse); SMART2 and CAMERA (DG
RESEARCH TMR) research networks, dealing with robotics and 3D technologies
respectively; TEST (DGXIII-ESPRIT) aiming at Tele-presence for Entertainment,
Surveillance and Training using Virtual Reality and real-time Internet
standards; NESTOR (DG ENTR) aiming at developing an autonomous mobile courier
for transporting small goods inside hospitals and health centres.
Thales Research and Technology, UK
Network Systems Group
Thales Research & Technology (UK) [TRT (UK)] is the UK arm of the Thales
corporate research centre and provides close support to the various Thales
operating companies. Thales designs, develops and implements advanced
electronic solutions, which meet the communications, information and security
of people in countries throughout the world. Its activities cover three major
markets: Information Technology and Services, Aerospace and Defence. Thales has
global revenues of €8.6b and employs 65,000 people, 12,000 of whom are employed
in the UK. TRT (UK) employs approximately 120 staff of which some 80% are
science, maths or engineering graduates. The activities within TRT(UK) are
subdivided into 3 main areas; Navigation, Sensors & Signal Processing and
Network Systems. The Network Systems Group specialises in technologies
associated with modern communication networks, security and vision processing.
The group has a network test bed facility, which can be used to generate the
various network performance scenarios, and security architectures that will be
needed for VISNET. Members of the Network Systems Group are also active
participants in the UK’s Mobile Virtual Centre of Excellence (VCE), which
sponsors university research into mobile radio systems, networks & security
beyond 3G. Apart from internally funded programmes, members of the Networks
Systems Group have, within the last 12 months, been working on the following
domestic and European projects relevant to the activities embraced by VISNET
proposal:
-
PRO-NET (UK-LINK), IP based transport of real-time audio & video.
-
SIBIS (UK-LINK), Secure content delivery
-
TEQUILA (IST), Traffic engineering for QoS in the Internet
-
ADVISOR (IST), Annotated digital video for intelligent surveillance & optimised
retrieval
-
MESCAL (IST), Interdomain QoS across the Internet
TRT(UK) will bring to VISNET expertise to the Joint Programme of Activity in
the following areas: Networking, specifically for QoS in IP networks, security,
specifically in security architectures and PKI, Image Processing, specifically
in automating camera calibration systems and 3D-secene understanding. In
addition to providing support for Thales business objectives, Thales Research &
Technology (UK) offers a wide range of consultancy and development services to
European Government Agencies and to industry throughout the world, examples
include EC, NATO, ESA, INMARSAT, DERA, DTI, Aerospatiale, Alcatel, GMV and
others. Since 1983, innovative products have resulted in Thales companies being
awarded nine Queen’s Awards for Technological Achievement. For many of these
products Thales Research & Technology (UK) has provided the key technology that
has led to market success.
Technical University Berlin, Germany
Communications Department
TUB is one of the largest technical universities in Germany, home to excellent
researchers in every area of science and technology. Two outstanding
researchers head the communications department (Fachgebiet
Nachrichtenuebertragung), Professors Peter Noll and Thomas Sikora. Whilst Prof.
Noll is world renowned for his work in coding, compression and representation
of audio signals and data, Prof. Sikora is equally famous for his contributions
to video data compression and representation. Both have been heavily involved
in numerous standardisation activities within e.g. ITU-T and ISO/IEC MPEG.
Moreover, Prof. Sikora has been involved in several EU-FP5 projects. Currently,
the communications department research covers many different topics connected
to audiovisual communications. Segmentation, classification and interpretation
of AV sensor data for use in immersive communications, security applications
and others are carried out. Furthermore, automatic annotation and metadata
generation schemes for AV data are being developed in combination with
efficient search and data-mining schemes. Moreover, AV data compression and
robust representation techniques are being investigated under numerous aspects
such as lossless compression, transmission over hostile channels, joint
source-channel coding. 18 researchers and PhD students work on these topics and
are supported by 4 secretarial and technical staff.
Vodafone Ltd, UK
Vodafone is one of the world's largest mobile telecommunications network
companies. We have interests in mobile networks throughout the world and we
serve over 112.5 million proportionate customers. The primary role of Vodafone
Group Research and Development is seen as giving Vodafone the ability to
deliver on it’s business strategy, which is heavily dependant on not only
having an in-depth understanding of what is possible today but on having a
clear vision of the future and what can effect its outcome. Current areas of
research within R&D which are focussed on multimedia applications are:
Evaluation of compression techniques (DCT, VQ, wavelet) and assessment of
future video encoding technologies (e.g., H.26L), which will reduce bitrate
requirements thereby improving efficiency and increasing capacity.
Investigation of synthetic photo-realistic imaging technology, which can be
used for realistic avatar-type applications, or replacing simple
‘head-and-shoulders’ video sequences using half the bandwidth. Demonstration of
2D and 3D vector graphics as a means of generating graphics on the device
rather than downloading pre-rendered material encoded in one of the bitmap
graphic formats and in the case of 3D allowing applications to become more
immersive. Additionally, audio compression technologies and audio synthesis
techniques in support of a range of applications, i.e. speech, background music
and music delivery. Technologies that enable audio spatialisation (i.e., the
generation of phantom audio sources), and the use of these techniques to
enhance mono-aural signals, increase the immersiveness of games and assist
speaker identification in video conferencing applications. Furthermore,
implementation configurations of streaming protocols (collaboration with
infrastructure vendors and streaming solution vendors; co-ordination within
Standards (3GPP) to highlight deficiencies in the current PSS specifications
and identify means of improving quality). Work also includes monitoring and
participation (where appropriate) in the various Standards bodies and Industry
fora involved in the definition, testing or licensing of media technologies,
such as 3GPP, IETF, W3C, ITU-T, ISO MPEG, MMA, IMTC and JCP. Other activities
include: Consideration of the Digital Rights Management requirements and
implementation issues for the delivery of multimedia content, discussion with
terminal and streaming solution providers of the options for testing and
ensuring interoperability between PSS-compliant components from different
suppliers (in conjunction with the Global Streaming Media Project) and tracking
the status of MPEG-4 visual, AAC and H.26L licensing development.
France Telecom R&D, France
Europe's leading telecommunications R&D center, France Télécom
R&D contributes to creating value for the Group. Its transversal, decentralized
structure facilitates coordination between France Télécom's market strategy and
the products developed. France Télécom's R&D activities underlie the Group
development strategy based on stimulating growth in usage, Internet, mobiles,
and international operations. By developing the services of tomorrow, France
Télécom R&D contributes to creating value for the Group. Its missions include
anticipating technological breakthroughs and radically new patterns of use.
France Télécom R&D innovates to offer our customers the best in
telecommunications today and in the future. Areas of research include human
interactions (man-machine interfaces), mobility, network architecture,
fixed/mobile/Internet convergence, and very high throughput transmission and
access networks. And for the past fifty-five years, France Télécom R&D has been
a major player in this world of telecommunications and information
technologies. In its laboratories, some 3000 engineers, scientists, and
technicians are working to develop the innovations which will soon be used by
France Télécom's customers. Yet, before these products are actually used, how
do they really work? What scientific and technical principles govern telephone
service, Internet, access, transmission, higher bit rates, network
infrastructure etc. Staff are located at 8 different sites in France, and a
laboratory which was set up recently in California and Japan. France Télécom
R&D is very actively running internal experiments in areas related to the scope
of VISNET such as automated 3D modelling tools (laser or video based), using
neural networks for still or moving 3D objects. FTRD has also vast expertise
and contributions to new leading standards such as XML, X3D, MPEG4, and also
with associated partners (Leading edge companies, and "Cultural Heritage"
partners such as: Ministere de la Culture Paris, and Museums). Experiments have
been done on outstanding objects and monuments such as: Mont Saint Michel, Arc
de Triomphe, Avenue des Champs Elysées, Place Vendôme, Notre Dame de Paris,
Saint Germain Church Great Organ, and Palais of Versailles. FranceTelecom R&D
recently built a research team dealing with "haptic" interfaces and their uses
within the new telecommunications services such as "haptic" remote ultra-sound
examination, haptic network games or virtual reality objects manipulation.
Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain
Multimedia Applications Group (DMAG) - Technology Department
The Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF) is an only 12 years old University, but with
already high reputation in lecturing and research. The UPF has 4 years old
technical studies and research in IT, but with experienced researchers coming
from other Universities or industry. The DMAG is a research group in the
Technology Department, with members having more than 15 years experience in the
field, including many European and national research projects (Multimediator,
TRADE, MobiHealth, etc.). The main Research skills of DMAG include:
-
Electronic Commerce: Multimedia content, Modelling, Architecture, Negotiation,
Service provision (Workflow, ...), …
-
Digital Rights Management (DRM): Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) information
representation, Negotiation and contracting, Control, Protection, Business
models, …
-
Metadata and advanced web search: Interoperability, Security, MPEG, …
-
Security in communications: Mobile applications, XML signature, …
-
Semantic Web & Knowledge management
-
Intelligent and Mobile Agents
The UPF role in the network will be related to its skills and knowledge in the
area of metadata and security, that will be applied to new environments, such
as real time distribution of audiovisual content. The experience in electronic
commerce of multimedia content will be also key to contribute to the network
objectives. Another reason for the UPF to participate in the network is the
existence of previous collaboration with some of the partners. This NoE will be
a perfect opportunity to increase and formalise these relationships and to
establish new ones with other partners. Finally, the experience of some of the
DMAG members in international standardisation will be offered to the Consortium
to cooperate in existing and future work items in the context of networked
audiovisual systems, not only in the MPEG standardisation area, but also in
others at different levels (CEN, ISO/IEC, …).
Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione
With more than 39,000 engineering students enrolled, the Politecnico di Milano
is the largest Technical University in Italy, as it graduates about 20% of the
Italian engineers. The Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione (DEI) is
among the largest ones of PdM, as it has about 160 professors. The main
research activities of DEI are in the fields of telecommunications, multimedia
signal processing, computer science, automation, robotics and artificial
intelligence. The Image and Sound Processing Group of DEI-PdM, involved in the
VISNET proposal, has a long-standing experience in the fields of image
analysis, computer vision, audio-video processing, multimedia coding and
compression. In particular, ISPG's expertise concerns geometric 3D
reconstruction from multiple images acquired with calibrated and uncalibrated
systems; motion analysis from image sequences; video coding (MPEG4, H264,
etc.); sound synthesis based on physical modelling; fast geometry-based
algorithms for sound spatialization, video analysis for tele-surveillance
applications. ISPG-PdM is currently involved or has been involved in a number
of national or international projects. In particular, among the EC-sponsored
project involvements that are close in spirit to this proposal, it is worth
mentioning:
-
IST-2000-33059, “ALMA”, ALgorithms for the Modelling of Acoustic interactions
(project coordinator)
-
IST-2000-28436, “ORIGAMI” - A new paradigm for high-quality mixing of real and
virtual (project coordinator)
-
IST-1999-11443, "OCCAMM" - Open Components for Controlled Access to Multimedia
Material
-
IST-1999-11288, "NexTV'' - New media consumption in Extended interactive
TeleVision environment
-
ESPRIT PROJECT No. 23191, "MPEG-4 PC" - MPEG-4 System Implementation and Tools
for Personal Computers
-
ACTS-AC092, "PANORAMA" - Package for New Operational Autostereoscopic Multiview
Systems and Applications
The expertise and research interests of ISPG-PdM are perfectly matched with the
areas covered by the VISNET Network of Excellence. The contribution that ISPG
will give to the VISNET Consortium is in, particular, in the areas of sound
generation and rendering, scalable video coding based on spatio-temporal
wavelets and face detection and recognition. In all such areas, ISPG-PdM has
already played an active role within several EC projects, and it foresees a
tremendous potential benefit from the cooperation of the other partners of this
Network of Excellence. Such benefit will be in terms of shared knowledge, tool
development and exchange, joint software library development, etc.
Warsaw University of Technology, Poland
Faculty of Electronics and Information Technology
Warsaw University
of Technology is the largest technical university in Poland, top ranked
for teaching and research in almost every field of technology.
Faculty of Electronics and Information Technology, the largest faculty of
Warsaw University of Technology, carry on educational, scientific and research
activities covering almost the whole spectrum of relevant fields - from
microelectronics and optoelectronics, biomedical engineering, through
instrumentation, measurement, control and robotics, to computer engineering and
networks, multimedia techniques and telecommunication. The university is
represented in VISNET by Multimedia Group (IPW) headed by Professor Skarbek
known for his contributions in the fields of image compression, analysis,
indexing, and recognition. He is author of more than 100 scientific papers,
three monographs, and chapters in Springer books. Significant part of his works
had been developed while his stay abroad, in Japan and England. He chaired the
9-th international conference on Computer Analysis and Patterns CAIP’2003 and
is the member of several conference and journal scientific boards. His group
actively contributes to MPEG-7 visual subgroup for which it received special
thanks in resolutions of Pattaya and Klagenfurt meetings in 2002. IPW group
took part in many successful research projects for instance: CRIT2 – EU project
on compression of medical images; multimedia monitoring and surveillance;
multimedia home platform; H26L decoder. Beside Professor Skarbek, two Associate
Professors, one Assistant Professor, and four doctoral level students will take
part in integration projects of the VISNET consortium. IPW will coordinate WP1
on content creation and actively contribute to WP2 and WP4. Similarly to all
VISNET partners, IPW will also make a contribution to the integration
activities of WP0 and the dissemination activities of WP6.
Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores do
Porto, Portugal
INESC Porto - Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores do Porto is a
private, non-profit distributing association, whose partners are INESC, the
University of Porto and its School of Engineering. INESC Porto acts as an
interface between the academic world and the Information Technology and
Electronics sector, carrying out scientific research and development as well as
technology transfer and advanced professional training. The activities of INESC
Porto are carried out by five R&D Units (Telecommunications and Multimedia,
Optoelectronics and Electronic Systems, Power Systems, Manufacturing Systems
Engineering, Information and Communication Systems), under contract with
industry and services and in research projects funded by National Agencies and
EC R&D programmes.
The Telecommunications and Multimedia Unit is composed of about 60 researchers
(20 PhDs and 18 MScs) and has a large experience of working cooperatively in
R&D projects both at national and international level. Over the past 15
years its members actively participated in various projects in the framework of
EC programmes, in particular ESPRIT, RACE, EUREKA, ACTS and IST and have been
involved in standardisation groups such as the IETF, ITU-T and MPEG. Important
contributions have been given to many of the specifications already produced by
MPEG or currently under development, such as MPEG-7 and MPEG-21.
The areas of expertise relevant to VISNET include signal processing (audio and
video coding and transmission), distributed systems and multimedia
applications, digital television systems, content and resource management,
communication networks and services. Important results have been achieved in
past European projects (ATLANTIC, SCALAR, G-FORS and ARROWS), and in recently
finished or still on-going IST projects (CONTESSA, METAVISION, ASSET and
NUGGETS). CONTESSA (IST-2000-28567) has used distributed technologies and
MPEG-21 concepts to allow the access to remote and heterogeneous repositories
of multimedia content promoting interoperability among distinct data models. In
G-FORS (IST-1999-11238), INESC Porto was one of the partners responsible for
the development of the MXF (Media eXchange Format) specification, which is an
open format standardised by the SMPTE to transfer multimedia content and
metadata in an integrated manner. INESC Porto also participated in MOUMIR
(MOdels for Unified Multimedia Information Retrieval), a Research Training
Network, and led the work in database interface and contributed to the work in
video analysis and MPEG-7 descriptions. Also relevant were the results achieved
in ORBIT (Object Re-configurable Broadcast using IT), a project funded by the
BBC to develop a pilot demonstrator that integrated all the equipment of a
digital TV production chain, using open, low cost IT systems and networks and a
distributed middleware platform; the basic concept had been developed and
proved in ATLANTIC (AC078).
|