Virtual 3D building models, as key elements of virtual 3D city models, are used in a growing number of application domains, such as geoanalysis, disaster management and architectural planning. Visualization systems for such building models often rely on perspective or orthogonal projections using a single viewpoint. Therefore, the exploration of a complete model requires a user to change the vi...

Listeners tend to gaze at objects to which they resolve referring expressions. We show that this remains true even when these objects are presented in a virtual 3D environment in which listeners can move freely. We further show that an automated speech generation system that uses eyetracking information to monitor listener’s understanding of referring expressions outperforms comparable systems ...

This paper describes a 2D realistic talking face. The facial appearance model is constructed with a parameterised 2D sample based model. This representation supports moderated head movements, facial gestures and emotional expressions. Two main contributions for talking heads applications are proposed. First, the image of the lips is synthesized by means of shape and texture information. Secondl...

This paper presents a novel method for synthesizing a novel view from two sets of differently focused images taken by an aperture camera array for a scene of two approximately constant depths. The proposed method consists of two steps. The first step is a view interpolation to reconstruct an all in-focus dense light field of the scene. The second step is to synthesize a novel view by light fiel...

A depth image provides partial geometric information of a 3D scene, namely the shapes of physical objects as observed from a particular viewpoint. This information is important when synthesizing images of different virtual camera viewpoints via depth-image-based rendering (DIBR). It has been shown that depth images can be efficiently coded using contour-adaptive codecs that preserve edge sharpn...

Previous research suggests that people are rather poor at perceiving auditory-visual (AV) speech asynchrony, especially when the visual signal occurs first. However, estimates of AV synchrony detection depend on many factors and previous measures may have underestimated its precision. Here we used a synchrony-driven search task to examine how accurately an observer could detect AV speech synchr...

While virtual humans are proven tools for training, education and research, they are far from realizing their full potential. Advances are needed in individual capabilities, such as character animation and speech synthesis, but perhaps more importantly, fundamental questions remain as to how best to integrate these capabilities into a single framework that allows us to efficiently create charac...

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In this paper it is shown how to obtain a three-dimensional, textured object model by relying exclusively on image warping 2D-2D transformations. To achieve this goal, a dual (laser and natural light) illumination of the scene is exploited. Shape reconstruction is not based on triangulation, but on the planar rectification and collation of laser profiles. Texture sampling uses laser profile war...

Virtual Reality (VR) is gaining in popularity and its added value for learning is being recognized. However, its richness in representation and manipulation possibilities may also become one of its weaknesses, as some learners may be overwhelmed and be easily lost in a virtual world. Therefore, being able to dynamically adapt the virtual world to the personal preferences, knowledge, skills and ...