Sample records for quality video transmission

  1. An Energy-Efficient and High-Quality Video Transmission Architecture in Wireless Video-Based Sensor Networks.

    PubMed

    Aghdasi, Hadi S; Abbaspour, Maghsoud; Moghadam, Mohsen Ebrahimi; Samei, Yasaman

    2008-08-04

    Technological progress in the fields of Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) and wireless communications and also the availability of CMOS cameras, microphones and small-scale array sensors, which may ubiquitously capture multimedia content from the field, have fostered the development of low-cost limited resources Wireless Video-based Sensor Networks (WVSN). With regards to the constraints of videobased sensor nodes and wireless sensor networks, a supporting video stream is not easy to implement with the present sensor network protocols. In this paper, a thorough architecture is presented for video transmission over WVSN called Energy-efficient and high-Quality Video transmission Architecture (EQV-Architecture). This architecture influences three layers of communication protocol stack and considers wireless video sensor nodes constraints like limited process and energy resources while video quality is preserved in the receiver side. Application, transport, and network layers are the layers in which the compression protocol, transport protocol, and routing protocol are proposed respectively, also a dropping scheme is presented in network layer. Simulation results over various environments with dissimilar conditions revealed the effectiveness of the architecture in improving the lifetime of the network as well as preserving the video quality.

  2. Prediction of transmission distortion for wireless video communication: analysis.

    PubMed

    Chen, Zhifeng; Wu, Dapeng

    2012-03-01

    Transmitting video over wireless is a challenging problem since video may be seriously distorted due to packet errors caused by wireless channels. The capability of predicting transmission distortion (i.e., video distortion caused by packet errors) can assist in designing video encoding and transmission schemes that achieve maximum video quality or minimum end-to-end video distortion. This paper is aimed at deriving formulas for predicting transmission distortion. The contribution of this paper is twofold. First, we identify the governing law that describes how the transmission distortion process evolves over time and analytically derive the transmission distortion formula as a closed-form function of video frame statistics, channel error statistics, and system parameters. Second, we identify, for the first time, two important properties of transmission distortion. The first property is that the clipping noise, which is produced by nonlinear clipping, causes decay of propagated error. The second property is that the correlation between motion-vector concealment error and propagated error is negative and has dominant impact on transmission distortion, compared with other correlations. Due to these two properties and elegant error/distortion decomposition, our formula provides not only more accurate prediction but also lower complexity than the existing methods.

  3. Adaptive UEP and Packet Size Assignment for Scalable Video Transmission over Burst-Error Channels

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lee, Chen-Wei; Yang, Chu-Sing; Su, Yih-Ching

    2006-12-01

    This work proposes an adaptive unequal error protection (UEP) and packet size assignment scheme for scalable video transmission over a burst-error channel. An analytic model is developed to evaluate the impact of channel bit error rate on the quality of streaming scalable video. A video transmission scheme, which combines the adaptive assignment of packet size with unequal error protection to increase the end-to-end video quality, is proposed. Several distinct scalable video transmission schemes over burst-error channel have been compared, and the simulation results reveal that the proposed transmission schemes can react to varying channel conditions with less and smoother quality degradation.

  4. CUQI: cardiac ultrasound video quality index

    PubMed Central

    Razaak, Manzoor; Martini, Maria G.

    2016-01-01

    Abstract. Medical images and videos are now increasingly part of modern telecommunication applications, including telemedicinal applications, favored by advancements in video compression and communication technologies. Medical video quality evaluation is essential for modern applications since compression and transmission processes often compromise the video quality. Several state-of-the-art video quality metrics used for quality evaluation assess the perceptual quality of the video. For a medical video, assessing quality in terms of “diagnostic” value rather than “perceptual” quality is more important. We present a diagnostic-quality–oriented video quality metric for quality evaluation of cardiac ultrasound videos. Cardiac ultrasound videos are characterized by rapid repetitive cardiac motions and distinct structural information characteristics that are explored by the proposed metric. Cardiac ultrasound video quality index, the proposed metric, is a full reference metric and uses the motion and edge information of the cardiac ultrasound video to evaluate the video quality. The metric was evaluated for its performance in approximating the quality of cardiac ultrasound videos by testing its correlation with the subjective scores of medical experts. The results of our tests showed that the metric has high correlation with medical expert opinions and in several cases outperforms the state-of-the-art video quality metrics considered in our tests. PMID:27014715

  5. Video Transmission for Third Generation Wireless Communication Systems

    PubMed Central

    Gharavi, H.; Alamouti, S. M.

    2001-01-01

    This paper presents a twin-class unequal protected video transmission system over wireless channels. Video partitioning based on a separation of the Variable Length Coded (VLC) Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) coefficients within each block is considered for constant bitrate transmission (CBR). In the splitting process the fraction of bits assigned to each of the two partitions is adjusted according to the requirements of the unequal error protection scheme employed. Subsequently, partitioning is applied to the ITU-T H.263 coding standard. As a transport vehicle, we have considered one of the leading third generation cellular radio standards known as WCDMA. A dual-priority transmission system is then invoked on the WCDMA system where the video data, after being broken into two streams, is unequally protected. We use a very simple error correction coding scheme for illustration and then propose more sophisticated forms of unequal protection of the digitized video signals. We show that this strategy results in a significantly higher quality of the reconstructed video data when it is transmitted over time-varying multipath fading channels. PMID:27500033

  6. Simultaneous compression and encryption for secure real-time secure transmission of sensitive video transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Al-Hayani, Nazar; Al-Jawad, Naseer; Jassim, Sabah A.

    2014-05-01

    Video compression and encryption became very essential in a secured real time video transmission. Applying both techniques simultaneously is one of the challenges where the size and the quality are important in multimedia transmission. In this paper we proposed a new technique for video compression and encryption. Both encryption and compression are based on edges extracted from the high frequency sub-bands of wavelet decomposition. The compression algorithm based on hybrid of: discrete wavelet transforms, discrete cosine transform, vector quantization, wavelet based edge detection, and phase sensing. The compression encoding algorithm treats the video reference and non-reference frames in two different ways. The encryption algorithm utilized A5 cipher combined with chaotic logistic map to encrypt the significant parameters and wavelet coefficients. Both algorithms can be applied simultaneously after applying the discrete wavelet transform on each individual frame. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithms have the following features: high compression, acceptable quality, and resistance to the statistical and bruteforce attack with low computational processing.

  7. Video transmission on ATM networks. Ph.D. Thesis

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chen, Yun-Chung

    1993-01-01

    The broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN) is expected to provide high-speed and flexible multimedia applications. Multimedia includes data, graphics, image, voice, and video. Asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) is the adopted transport techniques for B-ISDN and has the potential for providing a more efficient and integrated environment for multimedia. It is believed that most broadband applications will make heavy use of visual information. The prospect of wide spread use of image and video communication has led to interest in coding algorithms for reducing bandwidth requirements and improving image quality. The major results of a study on the bridging of network transmission performance and video coding are: Using two representative video sequences, several video source models are developed. The fitness of these models are validated through the use of statistical tests and network queuing performance. A dual leaky bucket algorithm is proposed as an effective network policing function. The concept of the dual leaky bucket algorithm can be applied to a prioritized coding approach to achieve transmission efficiency. A mapping of the performance/control parameters at the network level into equivalent parameters at the video coding level is developed. Based on that, a complete set of principles for the design of video codecs for network transmission is proposed.

  8. Quality optimization of H.264/AVC video transmission over noisy environments using a sparse regression framework

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pandremmenou, K.; Tziortziotis, N.; Paluri, S.; Zhang, W.; Blekas, K.; Kondi, L. P.; Kumar, S.

    2015-03-01

    We propose the use of the Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) regression method in order to predict the Cumulative Mean Squared Error (CMSE), incurred by the loss of individual slices in video transmission. We extract a number of quality-relevant features from the H.264/AVC video sequences, which are given as input to the LASSO. This method has the benefit of not only keeping a subset of the features that have the strongest effects towards video quality, but also produces accurate CMSE predictions. Particularly, we study the LASSO regression through two different architectures; the Global LASSO (G.LASSO) and Local LASSO (L.LASSO). In G.LASSO, a single regression model is trained for all slice types together, while in L.LASSO, motivated by the fact that the values for some features are closely dependent on the considered slice type, each slice type has its own regression model, in an e ort to improve LASSO's prediction capability. Based on the predicted CMSE values, we group the video slices into four priority classes. Additionally, we consider a video transmission scenario over a noisy channel, where Unequal Error Protection (UEP) is applied to all prioritized slices. The provided results demonstrate the efficiency of LASSO in estimating CMSE with high accuracy, using only a few features. les that typically contain high-entropy data, producing a footprint that is far less conspicuous than existing methods. The system uses a local web server to provide a le system, user interface and applications through an web architecture.

  9. 47 CFR 25.212 - Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-10-01

    ... transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed-Satellite Service. 25.212 Section 25.212... Technical Standards § 25.212 Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions... narrowband and/or wideband digital services, including digital video services, if the maximum input spectral...

  10. 47 CFR 25.212 - Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-10-01

    ... transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed-Satellite Service. 25.212 Section 25.212... Technical Standards § 25.212 Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions... narrowband and/or wideband digital services, including digital video services, if the maximum input spectral...

  11. 47 CFR 25.212 - Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed...

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-10-01

    ... transmissions, and video transmissions in the GSO Fixed-Satellite Service. 25.212 Section 25.212... Technical Standards § 25.212 Narrowband analog transmissions, digital transmissions, and video transmissions... narrowband and/or wideband digital services, including digital video services, if the maximum input spectral...

  12. Video quality pooling adaptive to perceptual distortion severity.

    PubMed

    Park, Jincheol; Seshadrinathan, Kalpana; Lee, Sanghoon; Bovik, Alan Conrad

    2013-02-01

    It is generally recognized that severe video distortions that are transient in space and/or time have a large effect on overall perceived video quality. In order to understand this phenomena, we study the distribution of spatio-temporally local quality scores obtained from several video quality assessment (VQA) algorithms on videos suffering from compression and lossy transmission over communication channels. We propose a content adaptive spatial and temporal pooling strategy based on the observed distribution. Our method adaptively emphasizes "worst" scores along both the spatial and temporal dimensions of a video sequence and also considers the perceptual effect of large-area cohesive motion flow such as egomotion. We demonstrate the efficacy of the method by testing it using three different VQA algorithms on the LIVE Video Quality database and the EPFL-PoliMI video quality database.

  13. No-reference video quality measurement: added value of machine learning

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mocanu, Decebal Constantin; Pokhrel, Jeevan; Garella, Juan Pablo; Seppänen, Janne; Liotou, Eirini; Narwaria, Manish

    2015-11-01

    Video quality measurement is an important component in the end-to-end video delivery chain. Video quality is, however, subjective, and thus, there will always be interobserver differences in the subjective opinion about the visual quality of the same video. Despite this, most existing works on objective quality measurement typically focus only on predicting a single score and evaluate their prediction accuracies based on how close it is to the mean opinion scores (or similar average based ratings). Clearly, such an approach ignores the underlying diversities in the subjective scoring process and, as a result, does not allow further analysis on how reliable the objective prediction is in terms of subjective variability. Consequently, the aim of this paper is to analyze this issue and present a machine-learning based solution to address it. We demonstrate the utility of our ideas by considering the practical scenario of video broadcast transmissions with focus on digital terrestrial television (DTT) and proposing a no-reference objective video quality estimator for such application. We conducted meaningful verification studies on different video content (including video clips recorded from real DTT broadcast transmissions) in order to verify the performance of the proposed solution.

  14. Flexible Macroblock Ordering for Context-Aware Ultrasound Video Transmission over Mobile WiMAX

    PubMed Central

    Martini, Maria G.; Hewage, Chaminda T. E. R.

    2010-01-01

    The most recent network technologies are enabling a variety of new applications, thanks to the provision of increased bandwidth and better management of Quality of Service. Nevertheless, telemedical services involving multimedia data are still lagging behind, due to the concern of the end users, that is, clinicians and also patients, about the low quality provided. Indeed, emerging network technologies should be appropriately exploited by designing the transmission strategy focusing on quality provision for end users. Stemming from this principle, we propose here a context-aware transmission strategy for medical video transmission over WiMAX systems. Context, in terms of regions of interest (ROI) in a specific session, is taken into account for the identification of multiple regions of interest, and compression/transmission strategies are tailored to such context information. We present a methodology based on H.264 medical video compression and Flexible Macroblock Ordering (FMO) for ROI identification. Two different unequal error protection methodologies, providing higher protection to the most diagnostically relevant data, are presented. PMID:20827292

  15. Research on quality metrics of wireless adaptive video streaming

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Xuefei

    2018-04-01

    With the development of wireless networks and intelligent terminals, video traffic has increased dramatically. Adaptive video streaming has become one of the most promising video transmission technologies. For this type of service, a good QoS (Quality of Service) of wireless network does not always guarantee that all customers have good experience. Thus, new quality metrics have been widely studies recently. Taking this into account, the objective of this paper is to investigate the quality metrics of wireless adaptive video streaming. In this paper, a wireless video streaming simulation platform with DASH mechanism and multi-rate video generator is established. Based on this platform, PSNR model, SSIM model and Quality Level model are implemented. Quality Level Model considers the QoE (Quality of Experience) factors such as image quality, stalling and switching frequency while PSNR Model and SSIM Model mainly consider the quality of the video. To evaluate the performance of these QoE models, three performance metrics (SROCC, PLCC and RMSE) which are used to make a comparison of subjective and predicted MOS (Mean Opinion Score) are calculated. From these performance metrics, the monotonicity, linearity and accuracy of these quality metrics can be observed.

  16. Feasibility study of transmission of OTV camera control information in the video vertical blanking interval

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    White, Preston A., III

    1994-01-01

    The Operational Television system at Kennedy Space Center operates hundreds of video cameras, many remotely controllable, in support of the operations at the center. This study was undertaken to determine if commercial NABTS (North American Basic Teletext System) teletext transmission in the vertical blanking interval of the genlock signals distributed to the cameras could be used to send remote control commands to the cameras and the associated pan and tilt platforms. Wavelength division multiplexed fiberoptic links are being installed in the OTV system to obtain RS-250 short-haul quality. It was demonstrated that the NABTS transmission could be sent over the fiberoptic cable plant without excessive video quality degradation and that video cameras could be controlled using NABTS transmissions over multimode fiberoptic paths as long as 1.2 km.

  17. 47 CFR 25.281 - Transmitter identification requirements for video uplink transmissions.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-10-01

    ... video uplink transmissions. 25.281 Section 25.281 Telecommunication FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION... identification requirements for video uplink transmissions. (a) Earth-to-space transmissions carrying video..., transmissions of fixed-frequency, digitally modulated video signals with a symbol rate of 128,000/s or more from...

  18. 13 point video tape quality guidelines

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Gaunt, R.

    1997-05-01

    Until high definition television (ATV) arrives, in the U.S. we must still contend with the National Television Systems Committee (NTSC) video standard (or PAL or SECAM-depending on your country). NTSC, a 40-year old standard designed for transmission of color video camera images over a small bandwidth, is not well suited for the sharp, full-color images that todays computers are capable of producing. PAL and SECAM also suffers from many of NTSC`s problems, but to varying degrees. Video professionals, when working with computer graphic (CG) images, use two monitors: a computer monitor for producing CGs and an NTSC monitor to viewmore » how a CG will look on video. More often than not, the NTSC image will differ significantly from the CG image, and outputting it to NTSC as an artist works enables the him or her to see the images as others will see it. Below are thirteen guidelines designed to increase the quality of computer graphics recorded onto video tape. Viewing your work in NTSC and attempting to follow the below tips will enable you to create higher quality videos. No video is perfect, so don`t expect to abide by every guideline every time.« less

  19. Two-Level Scheduling for Video Transmission over Downlink OFDMA Networks

    PubMed Central

    Tham, Mau-Luen

    2016-01-01

    This paper presents a two-level scheduling scheme for video transmission over downlink orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA) networks. It aims to maximize the aggregate quality of the video users subject to the playback delay and resource constraints, by exploiting the multiuser diversity and the video characteristics. The upper level schedules the transmission of video packets among multiple users based on an overall target bit-error-rate (BER), the importance level of packet and resource consumption efficiency factor. Instead, the lower level renders unequal error protection (UEP) in terms of target BER among the scheduled packets by solving a weighted sum distortion minimization problem, where each user weight reflects the total importance level of the packets that has been scheduled for that user. Frequency-selective power is then water-filled over all the assigned subcarriers in order to leverage the potential channel coding gain. Realistic simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art scheduling scheme by up to 6.8 dB in terms of peak-signal-to-noise-ratio (PSNR). Further test evaluates the suitability of equal power allocation which is the common assumption in the literature. PMID:26906398

  20. A low delay transmission method of multi-channel video based on FPGA

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Fu, Weijian; Wei, Baozhi; Li, Xiaobin; Wang, Quan; Hu, Xiaofei

    2018-03-01

    In order to guarantee the fluency of multi-channel video transmission in video monitoring scenarios, we designed a kind of video format conversion method based on FPGA and its DMA scheduling for video data, reduces the overall video transmission delay.In order to sace the time in the conversion process, the parallel ability of FPGA is used to video format conversion. In order to improve the direct memory access (DMA) writing transmission rate of PCIe bus, a DMA scheduling method based on asynchronous command buffer is proposed. The experimental results show that this paper designs a low delay transmission method based on FPGA, which increases the DMA writing transmission rate by 34% compared with the existing method, and then the video overall delay is reduced to 23.6ms.

  1. 47 CFR 25.211 - Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

    2011-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 2 2011-10-01 2011-10-01 false Analog video transmissions in the Fixed...) COMMON CARRIER SERVICES SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS Technical Standards § 25.211 Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services. (a) Downlink analog video transmissions in the band 3700-4200 MHz...

  2. 47 CFR 25.211 - Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

    2013-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 2 2013-10-01 2013-10-01 false Analog video transmissions in the Fixed...) COMMON CARRIER SERVICES SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS Technical Standards § 25.211 Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services. (a) Downlink analog video transmissions in the band 3700-4200 MHz...

  3. 47 CFR 25.211 - Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 2 2014-10-01 2014-10-01 false Analog video transmissions in the Fixed...) COMMON CARRIER SERVICES SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS Technical Standards § 25.211 Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services. (a) Downlink analog video transmissions in the band 3700-4200 MHz...

  4. 47 CFR 25.211 - Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

    2012-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 2 2012-10-01 2012-10-01 false Analog video transmissions in the Fixed...) COMMON CARRIER SERVICES SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS Technical Standards § 25.211 Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services. (a) Downlink analog video transmissions in the band 3700-4200 MHz...

  5. 47 CFR 25.211 - Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-10-01

    ... 47 Telecommunication 2 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Analog video transmissions in the Fixed...) COMMON CARRIER SERVICES SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS Technical Standards § 25.211 Analog video transmissions in the Fixed-Satellite Services. (a) Downlink analog video transmissions in the band 3700-4200 MHz...

  6. Mixture block coding with progressive transmission in packet video. Appendix 1: Item 2. M.S. Thesis

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chen, Yun-Chung

    1989-01-01

    Video transmission will become an important part of future multimedia communication because of dramatically increasing user demand for video, and rapid evolution of coding algorithm and VLSI technology. Video transmission will be part of the broadband-integrated services digital network (B-ISDN). Asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) is a viable candidate for implementation of B-ISDN due to its inherent flexibility, service independency, and high performance. According to the characteristics of ATM, the information has to be coded into discrete cells which travel independently in the packet switching network. A practical realization of an ATM video codec called Mixture Block Coding with Progressive Transmission (MBCPT) is presented. This variable bit rate coding algorithm shows how a constant quality performance can be obtained according to user demand. Interactions between codec and network are emphasized including packetization, service synchronization, flow control, and error recovery. Finally, some simulation results based on MBCPT coding with error recovery are presented.

  7. Weighted-MSE based on saliency map for assessing video quality of H.264 video streams

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Boujut, H.; Benois-Pineau, J.; Hadar, O.; Ahmed, T.; Bonnet, P.

    2011-01-01

    Human vision system is very complex and has been studied for many years specifically for purposes of efficient encoding of visual, e.g. video content from digital TV. There have been physiological and psychological evidences which indicate that viewers do not pay equal attention to all exposed visual information, but only focus on certain areas known as focus of attention (FOA) or saliency regions. In this work, we propose a novel based objective quality assessment metric, for assessing the perceptual quality of decoded video sequences affected by transmission errors and packed loses. The proposed method weights the Mean Square Error (MSE), Weighted-MSE (WMSE), according to the calculated saliency map at each pixel. Our method was validated trough subjective quality experiments.

  8. Quality of experience enhancement of high efficiency video coding video streaming in wireless packet networks using multiple description coding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Boumehrez, Farouk; Brai, Radhia; Doghmane, Noureddine; Mansouri, Khaled

    2018-01-01

    Recently, video streaming has attracted much attention and interest due to its capability to process and transmit large data. We propose a quality of experience (QoE) model relying on high efficiency video coding (HEVC) encoder adaptation scheme, in turn based on the multiple description coding (MDC) for video streaming. The main contributions of the paper are (1) a performance evaluation of the new and emerging video coding standard HEVC/H.265, which is based on the variation of quantization parameter (QP) values depending on different video contents to deduce their influence on the sequence to be transmitted, (2) QoE support multimedia applications in wireless networks are investigated, so we inspect the packet loss impact on the QoE of transmitted video sequences, (3) HEVC encoder parameter adaptation scheme based on MDC is modeled with the encoder parameter and objective QoE model. A comparative study revealed that the proposed MDC approach is effective for improving the transmission with a peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) gain of about 2 to 3 dB. Results show that a good choice of QP value can compensate for transmission channel effects and improve received video quality, although HEVC/H.265 is also sensitive to packet loss. The obtained results show the efficiency of our proposed method in terms of PSNR and mean-opinion-score.

  9. Scalable video transmission over Rayleigh fading channels using LDPC codes

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bansal, Manu; Kondi, Lisimachos P.

    2005-03-01

    In this paper, we investigate an important problem of efficiently utilizing the available resources for video transmission over wireless channels while maintaining a good decoded video quality and resilience to channel impairments. Our system consists of the video codec based on 3-D set partitioning in hierarchical trees (3-D SPIHT) algorithm and employs two different schemes using low-density parity check (LDPC) codes for channel error protection. The first method uses the serial concatenation of the constant-rate LDPC code and rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes. Cyclic redundancy check (CRC) is used to detect transmission errors. In the other scheme, we use the product code structure consisting of a constant rate LDPC/CRC code across the rows of the `blocks' of source data and an erasure-correction systematic Reed-Solomon (RS) code as the column code. In both the schemes introduced here, we use fixed-length source packets protected with unequal forward error correction coding ensuring a strictly decreasing protection across the bitstream. A Rayleigh flat-fading channel with additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) is modeled for the transmission. The rate-distortion optimization algorithm is developed and carried out for the selection of source coding and channel coding rates using Lagrangian optimization. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of this system under different wireless channel conditions and both the proposed methods (LDPC+RCPC/CRC and RS+LDPC/CRC) outperform the more conventional schemes such as those employing RCPC/CRC.

  10. Transmission of multiplexed video signals in multimode optical fiber systems

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    White, Preston, III

    1988-01-01

    Kennedy Space Center has the need for economical transmission of two multiplexed video signals along multimode fiberoptic systems. These systems must span unusual distances and must meet RS-250B short-haul standards after reception. Bandwidth is a major problem and studies of the installed fibers, available LEDs and PINFETs led to the choice of 100 MHz as the upper limit for the system bandwidth. Optical multiplexing and digital transmission were deemed inappropriate. Three electrical multiplexing schemes were chosen for further study. Each of the multiplexing schemes included an FM stage to help meet the stringent S/N specification. Both FM and AM frequency division multiplexing methods were investigated theoretically and these results were validated with laboratory tests. The novel application of quadrature amplitude multiplexing was also considered. Frequency division multiplexing of two wideband FM video signal appears the most promising scheme although this application requires high power highly linear LED transmitters. Futher studies are necessary to determine if LEDs of appropriate quality exist and to better quantify performance of QAM in this application.

  11. Real-time video quality monitoring

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Liu, Tao; Narvekar, Niranjan; Wang, Beibei; Ding, Ran; Zou, Dekun; Cash, Glenn; Bhagavathy, Sitaram; Bloom, Jeffrey

    2011-12-01

    The ITU-T Recommendation G.1070 is a standardized opinion model for video telephony applications that uses video bitrate, frame rate, and packet-loss rate to measure the video quality. However, this model was original designed as an offline quality planning tool. It cannot be directly used for quality monitoring since the above three input parameters are not readily available within a network or at the decoder. And there is a great room for the performance improvement of this quality metric. In this article, we present a real-time video quality monitoring solution based on this Recommendation. We first propose a scheme to efficiently estimate the three parameters from video bitstreams, so that it can be used as a real-time video quality monitoring tool. Furthermore, an enhanced algorithm based on the G.1070 model that provides more accurate quality prediction is proposed. Finally, to use this metric in real-world applications, we present an example emerging application of real-time quality measurement to the management of transmitted videos, especially those delivered to mobile devices.

  12. Video quality assesment using M-SVD

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Tao, Peining; Eskicioglu, Ahmet M.

    2007-01-01

    Objective video quality measurement is a challenging problem in a variety of video processing application ranging from lossy compression to printing. An ideal video quality measure should be able to mimic the human observer. We present a new video quality measure, M-SVD, to evaluate distorted video sequences based on singular value decomposition. A computationally efficient approach is developed for full-reference (FR) video quality assessment. This measure is tested on the Video Quality Experts Group (VQEG) phase I FR-TV test data set. Our experiments show the graphical measure displays the amount of distortion as well as the distribution of error in all frames of the video sequence while the numerical measure has a good correlation with perceived video quality outperforms PSNR and other objective measures by a clear margin.

  13. Region of interest video coding for low bit-rate transmission of carotid ultrasound videos over 3G wireless networks.

    PubMed

    Tsapatsoulis, Nicolas; Loizou, Christos; Pattichis, Constantinos

    2007-01-01

    Efficient medical video transmission over 3G wireless is of great importance for fast diagnosis and on site medical staff training purposes. In this paper we present a region of interest based ultrasound video compression study which shows that significant reduction of the required, for transmission, bit rate can be achieved without altering the design of existing video codecs. Simple preprocessing of the original videos to define visually and clinically important areas is the only requirement.

  14. Objective Video Quality Assessment Based on Machine Learning for Underwater Scientific Applications

    PubMed Central

    Moreno-Roldán, José-Miguel; Luque-Nieto, Miguel-Ángel; Poncela, Javier; Otero, Pablo

    2017-01-01

    Video services are meant to be a fundamental tool in the development of oceanic research. The current technology for underwater networks (UWNs) imposes strong constraints in the transmission capacity since only a severely limited bitrate is available. However, previous studies have shown that the quality of experience (QoE) is enough for ocean scientists to consider the service useful, although the perceived quality can change significantly for small ranges of variation of video parameters. In this context, objective video quality assessment (VQA) methods become essential in network planning and real time quality adaptation fields. This paper presents two specialized models for objective VQA, designed to match the special requirements of UWNs. The models are built upon machine learning techniques and trained with actual user data gathered from subjective tests. Our performance analysis shows how both of them can successfully estimate quality as a mean opinion score (MOS) value and, for the second model, even compute a distribution function for user scores. PMID:28333123

  15. Evaluating the effectiveness of SW-only video coding for real-time video transmission over low-rate wireless networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bartolini, Franco; Pasquini, Cristina; Piva, Alessandro

    2001-04-01

    The recent development of video compression algorithms allowed the diffusion of systems for the transmission of video sequences over data networks. However, the transmission over error prone mobile communication channels is yet an open issue. In this paper, a system developed for the real time transmission of H263 video coded sequences over TETRA mobile networks is presented. TETRA is an open digital trunked radio standard defined by the European Telecommunications Standardization Institute developed for professional mobile radio users, providing full integration of voice and data services. Experimental tests demonstrate that, in spite of the low frame rate allowed by the SW only implementation of the decoder and by the low channel rate a video compression technique such as that complying with the H263 standard, is still preferable to a simpler but less effective frame based compression system.

  16. Blind prediction of natural video quality.

    PubMed

    Saad, Michele A; Bovik, Alan C; Charrier, Christophe

    2014-03-01

    We propose a blind (no reference or NR) video quality evaluation model that is nondistortion specific. The approach relies on a spatio-temporal model of video scenes in the discrete cosine transform domain, and on a model that characterizes the type of motion occurring in the scenes, to predict video quality. We use the models to define video statistics and perceptual features that are the basis of a video quality assessment (VQA) algorithm that does not require the presence of a pristine video to compare against in order to predict a perceptual quality score. The contributions of this paper are threefold. 1) We propose a spatio-temporal natural scene statistics (NSS) model for videos. 2) We propose a motion model that quantifies motion coherency in video scenes. 3) We show that the proposed NSS and motion coherency models are appropriate for quality assessment of videos, and we utilize them to design a blind VQA algorithm that correlates highly with human judgments of quality. The proposed algorithm, called video BLIINDS, is tested on the LIVE VQA database and on the EPFL-PoliMi video database and shown to perform close to the level of top performing reduced and full reference VQA algorithms.

  17. Real-time transmission of digital video using variable-length coding

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Bizon, Thomas P.; Shalkhauser, Mary JO; Whyte, Wayne A., Jr.

    1993-01-01

    Huffman coding is a variable-length lossless compression technique where data with a high probability of occurrence is represented with short codewords, while 'not-so-likely' data is assigned longer codewords. Compression is achieved when the high-probability levels occur so frequently that their benefit outweighs any penalty paid when a less likely input occurs. One instance where Huffman coding is extremely effective occurs when data is highly predictable and differential coding can be applied (as with a digital video signal). For that reason, it is desirable to apply this compression technique to digital video transmission; however, special care must be taken in order to implement a communication protocol utilizing Huffman coding. This paper addresses several of the issues relating to the real-time transmission of Huffman-coded digital video over a constant-rate serial channel. Topics discussed include data rate conversion (from variable to a fixed rate), efficient data buffering, channel coding, recovery from communication errors, decoder synchronization, and decoder architectures. A description of the hardware developed to execute Huffman coding and serial transmission is also included. Although this paper focuses on matters relating to Huffman-coded digital video, the techniques discussed can easily be generalized for a variety of applications which require transmission of variable-length data.

  18. Interactive Video Coding and Transmission over Heterogeneous Wired-to-Wireless IP Networks Using an Edge Proxy

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pei, Yong; Modestino, James W.

    2004-12-01

    Digital video delivered over wired-to-wireless networks is expected to suffer quality degradation from both packet loss and bit errors in the payload. In this paper, the quality degradation due to packet loss and bit errors in the payload are quantitatively evaluated and their effects are assessed. We propose the use of a concatenated forward error correction (FEC) coding scheme employing Reed-Solomon (RS) codes and rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes to protect the video data from packet loss and bit errors, respectively. Furthermore, the performance of a joint source-channel coding (JSCC) approach employing this concatenated FEC coding scheme for video transmission is studied. Finally, we describe an improved end-to-end architecture using an edge proxy in a mobile support station to implement differential error protection for the corresponding channel impairments expected on the two networks. Results indicate that with an appropriate JSCC approach and the use of an edge proxy, FEC-based error-control techniques together with passive error-recovery techniques can significantly improve the effective video throughput and lead to acceptable video delivery quality over time-varying heterogeneous wired-to-wireless IP networks.

  19. A novel multiple description scalable coding scheme for mobile wireless video transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zheng, Haifeng; Yu, Lun; Chen, Chang Wen

    2005-03-01

    We proposed in this paper a novel multiple description scalable coding (MDSC) scheme based on in-band motion compensation temporal filtering (IBMCTF) technique in order to achieve high video coding performance and robust video transmission. The input video sequence is first split into equal-sized groups of frames (GOFs). Within a GOF, each frame is hierarchically decomposed by discrete wavelet transform. Since there is a direct relationship between wavelet coefficients and what they represent in the image content after wavelet decomposition, we are able to reorganize the spatial orientation trees to generate multiple bit-streams and employed SPIHT algorithm to achieve high coding efficiency. We have shown that multiple bit-stream transmission is very effective in combating error propagation in both Internet video streaming and mobile wireless video. Furthermore, we adopt the IBMCTF scheme to remove the redundancy for inter-frames along the temporal direction using motion compensated temporal filtering, thus high coding performance and flexible scalability can be provided in this scheme. In order to make compressed video resilient to channel error and to guarantee robust video transmission over mobile wireless channels, we add redundancy to each bit-stream and apply error concealment strategy for lost motion vectors. Unlike traditional multiple description schemes, the integration of these techniques enable us to generate more than two bit-streams that may be more appropriate for multiple antenna transmission of compressed video. Simulate results on standard video sequences have shown that the proposed scheme provides flexible tradeoff between coding efficiency and error resilience.

  20. Video conference quality assessment based on cooperative sensing of video and audio

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wang, Junxi; Chen, Jialin; Tian, Xin; Zhou, Cheng; Zhou, Zheng; Ye, Lu

    2015-12-01

    This paper presents a method to video conference quality assessment, which is based on cooperative sensing of video and audio. In this method, a proposed video quality evaluation method is used to assess the video frame quality. The video frame is divided into noise image and filtered image by the bilateral filters. It is similar to the characteristic of human visual, which could also be seen as a low-pass filtering. The audio frames are evaluated by the PEAQ algorithm. The two results are integrated to evaluate the video conference quality. A video conference database is built to test the performance of the proposed method. It could be found that the objective results correlate well with MOS. Then we can conclude that the proposed method is efficiency in assessing video conference quality.

  1. Subjective video quality evaluation of different content types under different impairments

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pozueco, Laura; Álvarez, Alberto; García, Xabiel; García, Roberto; Melendi, David; Díaz, Gabriel

    2017-01-01

    Nowadays, access to multimedia content is one of the most demanded services on the Internet. However, the transmission of audio and video over these networks is not free of problems that negatively affect user experience. Factors such as low image quality, cuts during playback or losses of audio or video, among others, can occur and there is no clear idea about the level of distortion introduced in the perceived quality. For that reason, different impairments should be evaluated based on user opinions, with the aim of analyzing the impact in the perceived quality. In this work, we carried out a subjective evaluation of different types of impairments with different types of contents, including news, cartoons, sports and action movies. A total of 100 individuals, between the ages of 20 and 68, participated in the subjective study. Results show that short-term rebuffering events negatively affect the quality of experience and that desynchronization between audio and video is the least annoying impairment. Moreover, we found that the content type determines the subjective results according to the impairment present during the playback.

  2. Reliable video transmission over fading channels via channel state estimation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kumwilaisak, Wuttipong; Kim, JongWon; Kuo, C.-C. Jay

    2000-04-01

    Transmission of continuous media such as video over time- varying wireless communication channels can benefit from the use of adaptation techniques in both source and channel coding. An adaptive feedback-based wireless video transmission scheme is investigated in this research with special emphasis on feedback-based adaptation. To be more specific, an interactive adaptive transmission scheme is developed by letting the receiver estimate the channel state information and send it back to the transmitter. By utilizing the feedback information, the transmitter is capable of adapting the level of protection by changing the flexible RCPC (rate-compatible punctured convolutional) code ratio depending on the instantaneous channel condition. The wireless channel is modeled as a fading channel, where the long-term and short- term fading effects are modeled as the log-normal fading and the Rayleigh flat fading, respectively. Then, its state (mainly the long term fading portion) is tracked and predicted by using an adaptive LMS (least mean squares) algorithm. By utilizing the delayed feedback on the channel condition, the adaptation performance of the proposed scheme is first evaluated in terms of the error probability and the throughput. It is then extended to incorporate variable size packets of ITU-T H.263+ video with the error resilience option. Finally, the end-to-end performance of wireless video transmission is compared against several non-adaptive protection schemes.

  3. Optimal bit allocation for hybrid scalable/multiple-description video transmission over wireless channels

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jubran, Mohammad K.; Bansal, Manu; Kondi, Lisimachos P.

    2006-01-01

    In this paper, we consider the problem of optimal bit allocation for wireless video transmission over fading channels. We use a newly developed hybrid scalable/multiple-description codec that combines the functionality of both scalable and multiple-description codecs. It produces a base layer and multiple-description enhancement layers. Any of the enhancement layers can be decoded (in a non-hierarchical manner) with the base layer to improve the reconstructed video quality. Two different channel coding schemes (Rate-Compatible Punctured Convolutional (RCPC)/Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) coding and, product code Reed Solomon (RS)+RCPC/CRC coding) are used for unequal error protection of the layered bitstream. Optimal allocation of the bitrate between source and channel coding is performed for discrete sets of source coding rates and channel coding rates. Experimental results are presented for a wide range of channel conditions. Also, comparisons with classical scalable coding show the effectiveness of using hybrid scalable/multiple-description coding for wireless transmission.

  4. Perceptual tools for quality-aware video networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bovik, A. C.

    2014-01-01

    Monitoring and controlling the quality of the viewing experience of videos transmitted over increasingly congested networks (especially wireless networks) is a pressing problem owing to rapid advances in video-centric mobile communication and display devices that are straining the capacity of the network infrastructure. New developments in automatic perceptual video quality models offer tools that have the potential to be used to perceptually optimize wireless video, leading to more efficient video data delivery and better received quality. In this talk I will review key perceptual principles that are, or could be used to create effective video quality prediction models, and leading quality prediction models that utilize these principles. The goal is to be able to monitor and perceptually optimize video networks by making them "quality-aware."

  5. Data compression for full motion video transmission

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Whyte, Wayne A., Jr.; Sayood, Khalid

    1991-01-01

    Clearly transmission of visual information will be a major, if not dominant, factor in determining the requirements for, and assessing the performance of the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) communications systems. Projected image/video requirements which are currently anticipated for SEI mission scenarios are presented. Based on this information and projected link performance figures, the image/video data compression requirements which would allow link closure are identified. Finally several approaches which could satisfy some of the compression requirements are presented and possible future approaches which show promise for more substantial compression performance improvement are discussed.

  6. Robust video transmission with distributed source coded auxiliary channel.

    PubMed

    Wang, Jiajun; Majumdar, Abhik; Ramchandran, Kannan

    2009-12-01

    We propose a novel solution to the problem of robust, low-latency video transmission over lossy channels. Predictive video codecs, such as MPEG and H.26x, are very susceptible to prediction mismatch between encoder and decoder or "drift" when there are packet losses. These mismatches lead to a significant degradation in the decoded quality. To address this problem, we propose an auxiliary codec system that sends additional information alongside an MPEG or H.26x compressed video stream to correct for errors in decoded frames and mitigate drift. The proposed system is based on the principles of distributed source coding and uses the (possibly erroneous) MPEG/H.26x decoder reconstruction as side information at the auxiliary decoder. The distributed source coding framework depends upon knowing the statistical dependency (or correlation) between the source and the side information. We propose a recursive algorithm to analytically track the correlation between the original source frame and the erroneous MPEG/H.26x decoded frame. Finally, we propose a rate-distortion optimization scheme to allocate the rate used by the auxiliary encoder among the encoding blocks within a video frame. We implement the proposed system and present extensive simulation results that demonstrate significant gains in performance both visually and objectively (on the order of 2 dB in PSNR over forward error correction based solutions and 1.5 dB in PSNR over intrarefresh based solutions for typical scenarios) under tight latency constraints.

  7. A method of mobile video transmission based on J2ee

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Guo, Jian-xin; Zhao, Ji-chun; Gong, Jing; Chun, Yang

    2013-03-01

    As 3G (3rd-generation) networks evolve worldwide, the rising demand for mobile video services and the enormous growth of video on the internet is creating major new revenue opportunities for mobile network operators and application developers. The text introduced a method of mobile video transmission based on J2ME, giving the method of video compressing, then describing the video compressing standard, and then describing the software design. The proposed mobile video method based on J2EE is a typical mobile multimedia application, which has a higher availability and a wide range of applications. The users can get the video through terminal devices such as phone.

  8. Display device-adapted video quality-of-experience assessment

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Rehman, Abdul; Zeng, Kai; Wang, Zhou

    2015-03-01

    Today's viewers consume video content from a variety of connected devices, including smart phones, tablets, notebooks, TVs, and PCs. This imposes significant challenges for managing video traffic efficiently to ensure an acceptable quality-of-experience (QoE) for the end users as the perceptual quality of video content strongly depends on the properties of the display device and the viewing conditions. State-of-the-art full-reference objective video quality assessment algorithms do not take into account the combined impact of display device properties, viewing conditions, and video resolution while performing video quality assessment. We performed a subjective study in order to understand the impact of aforementioned factors on perceptual video QoE. We also propose a full reference video QoE measure, named SSIMplus, that provides real-time prediction of the perceptual quality of a video based on human visual system behaviors, video content characteristics (such as spatial and temporal complexity, and video resolution), display device properties (such as screen size, resolution, and brightness), and viewing conditions (such as viewing distance and angle). Experimental results have shown that the proposed algorithm outperforms state-of-the-art video quality measures in terms of accuracy and speed.

  9. Perceptual video quality assessment in H.264 video coding standard using objective modeling.

    PubMed

    Karthikeyan, Ramasamy; Sainarayanan, Gopalakrishnan; Deepa, Subramaniam Nachimuthu

    2014-01-01

    Since usage of digital video is wide spread nowadays, quality considerations have become essential, and industry demand for video quality measurement is rising. This proposal provides a method of perceptual quality assessment in H.264 standard encoder using objective modeling. For this purpose, quality impairments are calculated and a model is developed to compute the perceptual video quality metric based on no reference method. Because of the shuttle difference between the original video and the encoded video the quality of the encoded picture gets degraded, this quality difference is introduced by the encoding process like Intra and Inter prediction. The proposed model takes into account of the artifacts introduced by these spatial and temporal activities in the hybrid block based coding methods and an objective modeling of these artifacts into subjective quality estimation is proposed. The proposed model calculates the objective quality metric using subjective impairments; blockiness, blur and jerkiness compared to the existing bitrate only calculation defined in the ITU G 1070 model. The accuracy of the proposed perceptual video quality metrics is compared against popular full reference objective methods as defined by VQEG.

  10. Encryption for confidentiality of the network and influence of this to the quality of streaming video through network

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Sevcik, L.; Uhrin, D.; Frnda, J.; Voznak, M.; Toral-Cruz, Homer; Mikulec, M.; Jakovlev, Sergej

    2015-05-01

    Nowadays, the interest in real-time services, like audio and video, is growing. These services are mostly transmitted over packet networks, which are based on IP protocol. It leads to analyses of these services and their behavior in such networks which are becoming more frequent. Video has become the significant part of all data traffic sent via IP networks. In general, a video service is one-way service (except e.g. video calls) and network delay is not such an important factor as in a voice service. Dominant network factors that influence the final video quality are especially packet loss, delay variation and the capacity of the transmission links. Analysis of video quality concentrates on the resistance of video codecs to packet loss in the network, which causes artefacts in the video. IPsec provides confidentiality in terms of safety, integrity and non-repudiation (using HMAC-SHA1 and 3DES encryption for confidentiality and AES in CBC mode) with an authentication header and ESP (Encapsulating Security Payload). The paper brings a detailed view of the performance of video streaming over an IP-based network. We compared quality of video with packet loss and encryption as well. The measured results demonstrated the relation between the video codec type and bitrate to the final video quality.

  11. Hybrid digital-analog video transmission in wireless multicast and multiple-input multiple-output system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Liu, Yu; Lin, Xiaocheng; Fan, Nianfei; Zhang, Lin

    2016-01-01

    Wireless video multicast has become one of the key technologies in wireless applications. But the main challenge of conventional wireless video multicast, i.e., the cliff effect, remains unsolved. To overcome the cliff effect, a hybrid digital-analog (HDA) video transmission framework based on SoftCast, which transmits the digital bitstream with the quantization residuals, is proposed. With an effective power allocation algorithm and appropriate parameter settings, the residual gains can be maximized; meanwhile, the digital bitstream can assure transmission of a basic video to the multicast receiver group. In the multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system, since nonuniform noise interference on different antennas can be regarded as the cliff effect problem, ParCast, which is a variation of SoftCast, is also applied to video transmission to solve it. The HDA scheme with corresponding power allocation algorithms is also applied to improve video performance. Simulations show that the proposed HDA scheme can overcome the cliff effect completely with the transmission of residuals. What is more, it outperforms the compared WSVC scheme by more than 2 dB when transmitting under the same bandwidth, and it can further improve performance by nearly 8 dB in MIMO when compared with the ParCast scheme.

  12. Audiovisual quality evaluation of low-bitrate video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Winkler, Stefan; Faller, Christof

    2005-03-01

    Audiovisual quality assessment is a relatively unexplored topic. We designed subjective experiments for audio, video, and audiovisual quality using content and encoding parameters representative of video for mobile applications. Our focus were the MPEG-4 AVC (a.k.a. H.264) and AAC coding standards. Our goals in this study are two-fold: we want to understand the interactions between audio and video in terms of perceived audiovisual quality, and we use the subjective data to evaluate the prediction performance of our non-reference video and audio quality metrics.

  13. Energy Efficient Image/Video Data Transmission on Commercial Multi-Core Processors

    PubMed Central

    Lee, Sungju; Kim, Heegon; Chung, Yongwha; Park, Daihee

    2012-01-01

    In transmitting image/video data over Video Sensor Networks (VSNs), energy consumption must be minimized while maintaining high image/video quality. Although image/video compression is well known for its efficiency and usefulness in VSNs, the excessive costs associated with encoding computation and complexity still hinder its adoption for practical use. However, it is anticipated that high-performance handheld multi-core devices will be used as VSN processing nodes in the near future. In this paper, we propose a way to improve the energy efficiency of image and video compression with multi-core processors while maintaining the image/video quality. We improve the compression efficiency at the algorithmic level or derive the optimal parameters for the combination of a machine and compression based on the tradeoff between the energy consumption and the image/video quality. Based on experimental results, we confirm that the proposed approach can improve the energy efficiency of the straightforward approach by a factor of 2∼5 without compromising image/video quality. PMID:23202181

  14. Automated Video Quality Assessment for Deep-Sea Video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pirenne, B.; Hoeberechts, M.; Kalmbach, A.; Sadhu, T.; Branzan Albu, A.; Glotin, H.; Jeffries, M. A.; Bui, A. O. V.

    2015-12-01

    Video provides a rich source of data for geophysical analysis, often supplying detailed information about the environment when other instruments may not. This is especially true of deep-sea environments, where direct visual observations cannot be made. As computer vision techniques improve and volumes of video data increase, automated video analysis is emerging as a practical alternative to labor-intensive manual analysis. Automated techniques can be much more sensitive to video quality than their manual counterparts, so performing quality assessment before doing full analysis is critical to producing valid results.Ocean Networks Canada (ONC), an initiative of the University of Victoria, operates cabled ocean observatories that supply continuous power and Internet connectivity to a broad suite of subsea instruments from the coast to the deep sea, including video and still cameras. This network of ocean observatories has produced almost 20,000 hours of video (about 38 hours are recorded each day) and an additional 8,000 hours of logs from remotely operated vehicle (ROV) dives. We begin by surveying some ways in which deep-sea video poses challenges for automated analysis, including: 1. Non-uniform lighting: Single, directional, light sources produce uneven luminance distributions and shadows; remotely operated lighting equipment are also susceptible to technical failures. 2. Particulate noise: Turbidity and marine snow are often present in underwater video; particles in the water column can have sharper focus and higher contrast than the objects of interest due to their proximity to the light source and can also influence the camera's autofocus and auto white-balance routines. 3. Color distortion (low contrast): The rate of absorption of light in water varies by wavelength, and is higher overall than in air, altering apparent colors and lowering the contrast of objects at a distance.We also describe measures under development at ONC for detecting and mitigating

  15. Toward a perceptual video-quality metric

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Watson, Andrew B.

    1998-07-01

    The advent of widespread distribution of digital video creates a need for automated methods for evaluating the visual quality of digital video. This is particularly so since most digital video is compressed using lossy methods, which involve the controlled introduction of potentially visible artifacts. Compounding the problem is the bursty nature of digital video, which requires adaptive bit allocation based on visual quality metrics, and the economic need to reduce bit-rate to the lowest level that yields acceptable quality. In previous work, we have developed visual quality metrics for evaluating, controlling,a nd optimizing the quality of compressed still images. These metrics incorporate simplified models of human visual sensitivity to spatial and chromatic visual signals. Here I describe a new video quality metric that is an extension of these still image metrics into the time domain. Like the still image metrics, it is based on the Discrete Cosine Transform. An effort has been made to minimize the amount of memory and computation required by the metric, in order that might be applied in the widest range of applications. To calibrate the basic sensitivity of this metric to spatial and temporal signals we have made measurements of visual thresholds for temporally varying samples of DCT quantization noise.

  16. Digital CODEC for real-time processing of broadcast quality video signals at 1.8 bits/pixel

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Shalkhauser, Mary JO; Whyte, Wayne A.

    1991-01-01

    Advances in very large scale integration and recent work in the field of bandwidth efficient digital modulation techniques have combined to make digital video processing technically feasible an potentially cost competitive for broadcast quality television transmission. A hardware implementation was developed for DPCM (differential pulse code midulation)-based digital television bandwidth compression algorithm which processes standard NTSC composite color television signals and produces broadcast quality video in real time at an average of 1.8 bits/pixel. The data compression algorithm and the hardware implementation of the codec are described, and performance results are provided.

  17. Digital CODEC for real-time processing of broadcast quality video signals at 1.8 bits/pixel

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Shalkhauser, Mary JO; Whyte, Wayne A., Jr.

    1989-01-01

    Advances in very large-scale integration and recent work in the field of bandwidth efficient digital modulation techniques have combined to make digital video processing technically feasible and potentially cost competitive for broadcast quality television transmission. A hardware implementation was developed for a DPCM-based digital television bandwidth compression algorithm which processes standard NTSC composite color television signals and produces broadcast quality video in real time at an average of 1.8 bits/pixel. The data compression algorithm and the hardware implementation of the CODEC are described, and performance results are provided.

  18. EBLAST: an efficient high-compression image transformation 3. application to Internet image and video transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Schmalz, Mark S.; Ritter, Gerhard X.; Caimi, Frank M.

    2001-12-01

    A wide variety of digital image compression transforms developed for still imaging and broadcast video transmission are unsuitable for Internet video applications due to insufficient compression ratio, poor reconstruction fidelity, or excessive computational requirements. Examples include hierarchical transforms that require all, or large portion of, a source image to reside in memory at one time, transforms that induce significant locking effect at operationally salient compression ratios, and algorithms that require large amounts of floating-point computation. The latter constraint holds especially for video compression by small mobile imaging devices for transmission to, and compression on, platforms such as palmtop computers or personal digital assistants (PDAs). As Internet video requirements for frame rate and resolution increase to produce more detailed, less discontinuous motion sequences, a new class of compression transforms will be needed, especially for small memory models and displays such as those found on PDAs. In this, the third series of papers, we discuss the EBLAST compression transform and its application to Internet communication. Leading transforms for compression of Internet video and still imagery are reviewed and analyzed, including GIF, JPEG, AWIC (wavelet-based), wavelet packets, and SPIHT, whose performance is compared with EBLAST. Performance analysis criteria include time and space complexity and quality of the decompressed image. The latter is determined by rate-distortion data obtained from a database of realistic test images. Discussion also includes issues such as robustness of the compressed format to channel noise. EBLAST has been shown to perform superiorly to JPEG and, unlike current wavelet compression transforms, supports fast implementation on embedded processors with small memory models.

  19. Objectification of perceptual image quality for mobile video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lee, Seon-Oh; Sim, Dong-Gyu

    2011-06-01

    This paper presents an objective video quality evaluation method for quantifying the subjective quality of digital mobile video. The proposed method aims to objectify the subjective quality by extracting edgeness and blockiness parameters. To evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithms, we carried out subjective video quality tests with the double-stimulus continuous quality scale method and obtained differential mean opinion score values for 120 mobile video clips. We then compared the performance of the proposed methods with that of existing methods in terms of the differential mean opinion score with 120 mobile video clips. Experimental results showed that the proposed methods were approximately 10% better than the edge peak signal-to-noise ratio of the J.247 method in terms of the Pearson correlation.

  20. Layered video transmission over multirate DS-CDMA wireless systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kondi, Lisimachos P.; Srinivasan, Deepika; Pados, Dimitris A.; Batalama, Stella N.

    2003-05-01

    n this paper, we consider the transmission of video over wireless direct-sequence code-division multiple access (DS-CDMA) channels. A layered (scalable) video source codec is used and each layer is transmitted over a different CDMA channel. Spreading codes with different lengths are allowed for each CDMA channel (multirate CDMA). Thus, a different number of chips per bit can be used for the transmission of each scalable layer. For a given fixed energy value per chip and chip rate, the selection of a spreading code length affects the transmitted energy per bit and bit rate for each scalable layer. An MPEG-4 source encoder is used to provide a two-layer SNR scalable bitstream. Each of the two layers is channel-coded using Rate-Compatible Punctured Convolutional (RCPC) codes. Then, the data are interleaved, spread, carrier-modulated and transmitted over the wireless channel. A multipath Rayleigh fading channel is assumed. At the other end, we assume the presence of an antenna array receiver. After carrier demodulation, multiple-access-interference suppressing despreading is performed using space-time auxiliary vector (AV) filtering. The choice of the AV receiver is dictated by realistic channel fading rates that limit the data record available for receiver adaptation and redesign. Indeed, AV filter short-data-record estimators have been shown to exhibit superior bit-error-rate performance in comparison with LMS, RLS, SMI, or 'multistage nested Wiener' adaptive filter implementations. Our experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of multirate DS-CDMA systems for wireless video transmission.

  1. Towards a Visual Quality Metric for Digital Video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Watson, Andrew B.

    1998-01-01

    The advent of widespread distribution of digital video creates a need for automated methods for evaluating visual quality of digital video. This is particularly so since most digital video is compressed using lossy methods, which involve the controlled introduction of potentially visible artifacts. Compounding the problem is the bursty nature of digital video, which requires adaptive bit allocation based on visual quality metrics. In previous work, we have developed visual quality metrics for evaluating, controlling, and optimizing the quality of compressed still images. These metrics incorporate simplified models of human visual sensitivity to spatial and chromatic visual signals. The challenge of video quality metrics is to extend these simplified models to temporal signals as well. In this presentation I will discuss a number of the issues that must be resolved in the design of effective video quality metrics. Among these are spatial, temporal, and chromatic sensitivity and their interactions, visual masking, and implementation complexity. I will also touch on the question of how to evaluate the performance of these metrics.

  2. Automated Assessment of Visual Quality of Digital Video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Watson, Andrew B.; Ellis, Stephen R. (Technical Monitor)

    1997-01-01

    The advent of widespread distribution of digital video creates a need for automated methods for evaluating visual quality of digital video. This is particularly so since most digital video is compressed using lossy methods, which involve the controlled introduction of potentially visible artifacts. Compounding the problem is the bursty nature of digital video, which requires adaptive bit allocation based on visual quality metrics. In previous work, we have developed visual quality metrics for evaluating, controlling, and optimizing the quality of compressed still images[1-4]. These metrics incorporate simplified models of human visual sensitivity to spatial and chromatic visual signals. The challenge of video quality metrics is to extend these simplified models to temporal signals as well. In this presentation I will discuss a number of the issues that must be resolved in the design of effective video quality metrics. Among these are spatial, temporal, and chromatic sensitivity and their interactions, visual masking, and implementation complexity. I will also touch on the question of how to evaluate the performance of these metrics.

  3. Objective assessment of MPEG-2 video quality

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gastaldo, Paolo; Zunino, Rodolfo; Rovetta, Stefano

    2002-07-01

    The increasing use of video compression standards in broadcasting television systems has required, in recent years, the development of video quality measurements that take into account artifacts specifically caused by digital compression techniques. In this paper we present a methodology for the objective quality assessment of MPEG video streams by using circular back-propagation feedforward neural networks. Mapping neural networks can render nonlinear relationships between objective features and subjective judgments, thus avoiding any simplifying assumption on the complexity of the model. The neural network processes an instantaneous set of input values, and yields an associated estimate of perceived quality. Therefore, the neural-network approach turns objective quality assessment into adaptive modeling of subjective perception. The objective features used for the estimate are chosen according to the assessed relevance to perceived quality and are continuously extracted in real time from compressed video streams. The overall system mimics perception but does not require any analytical model of the underlying physical phenomenon. The capability to process compressed video streams represents an important advantage over existing approaches, like avoiding the stream-decoding process greatly enhances real-time performance. Experimental results confirm that the system provides satisfactory, continuous-time approximations for actual scoring curves concerning real test videos.

  4. A no-reference bitstream-based perceptual model for video quality estimation of videos affected by coding artifacts and packet losses

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pandremmenou, K.; Shahid, M.; Kondi, L. P.; Lövström, B.

    2015-03-01

    In this work, we propose a No-Reference (NR) bitstream-based model for predicting the quality of H.264/AVC video sequences, affected by both compression artifacts and transmission impairments. The proposed model is based on a feature extraction procedure, where a large number of features are calculated from the packet-loss impaired bitstream. Many of the features are firstly proposed in this work, and the specific set of the features as a whole is applied for the first time for making NR video quality predictions. All feature observations are taken as input to the Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) regression method. LASSO indicates the most important features, and using only them, it is possible to estimate the Mean Opinion Score (MOS) with high accuracy. Indicatively, we point out that only 13 features are able to produce a Pearson Correlation Coefficient of 0.92 with the MOS. Interestingly, the performance statistics we computed in order to assess our method for predicting the Structural Similarity Index and the Video Quality Metric are equally good. Thus, the obtained experimental results verified the suitability of the features selected by LASSO as well as the ability of LASSO in making accurate predictions through sparse modeling.

  5. Video Compression

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1996-01-01

    Optivision developed two PC-compatible boards and associated software under a Goddard Space Flight Center Small Business Innovation Research grant for NASA applications in areas such as telerobotics, telesciences and spaceborne experimentation. From this technology, the company used its own funds to develop commercial products, the OPTIVideo MPEG Encoder and Decoder, which are used for realtime video compression and decompression. They are used in commercial applications including interactive video databases and video transmission. The encoder converts video source material to a compressed digital form that can be stored or transmitted, and the decoder decompresses bit streams to provide high quality playback.

  6. Quality and noise measurements in mobile phone video capture

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Petrescu, Doina; Pincenti, John

    2011-02-01

    The quality of videos captured with mobile phones has become increasingly important particularly since resolutions and formats have reached a level that rivals the capabilities available in the digital camcorder market, and since many mobile phones now allow direct playback on large HDTVs. The video quality is determined by the combined quality of the individual parts of the imaging system including the image sensor, the digital color processing, and the video compression, each of which has been studied independently. In this work, we study the combined effect of these elements on the overall video quality. We do this by evaluating the capture under various lighting, color processing, and video compression conditions. First, we measure full reference quality metrics between encoder input and the reconstructed sequence, where the encoder input changes with light and color processing modifications. Second, we introduce a system model which includes all elements that affect video quality, including a low light additive noise model, ISP color processing, as well as the video encoder. Our experiments show that in low light conditions and for certain choices of color processing the system level visual quality may not improve when the encoder becomes more capable or the compression ratio is reduced.

  7. Exploring the explaining quality of physics online explanatory videos

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kulgemeyer, Christoph; Peters, Cord H.

    2016-11-01

    Explaining skills are among the most important skills educators possess. Those skills have also been researched in recent years. During the same period, another medium has additionally emerged and become a popular source of information for learners: online explanatory videos, chiefly from the online video sharing website YouTube. Their content and explaining quality remain to this day mostly unmonitored, as well is their educational impact in formal contexts such as schools or universities. In this study, a framework for explaining quality, which has emerged from surveying explaining skills in expert-novice face-to-face dialogues, was used to explore the explaining quality of such videos (36 YouTube explanatory videos on Kepler’s laws and 15 videos on Newton’s third law). The framework consists of 45 categories derived from physics education research that deal with explanation techniques. YouTube provides its own ‘quality measures’ based on surface features including ‘likes’, views, and comments for each video. The question is whether or not these measures provide valid information for educators and students if they have to decide which video to use. We compared the explaining quality with those measures. Our results suggest that there is a correlation between explaining quality and only one of these measures: the number of content-related comments.

  8. Efficient Hybrid Watermarking Scheme for Security and Transmission Bit Rate Enhancement of 3D Color-Plus-Depth Video Communication

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    El-Shafai, W.; El-Rabaie, S.; El-Halawany, M.; Abd El-Samie, F. E.

    2018-03-01

    Three-Dimensional Video-plus-Depth (3DV + D) comprises diverse video streams captured by different cameras around an object. Therefore, there is a great need to fulfill efficient compression to transmit and store the 3DV + D content in compressed form to attain future resource bounds whilst preserving a decisive reception quality. Also, the security of the transmitted 3DV + D is a critical issue for protecting its copyright content. This paper proposes an efficient hybrid watermarking scheme for securing the 3DV + D transmission, which is the homomorphic transform based Singular Value Decomposition (SVD) in Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) domain. The objective of the proposed watermarking scheme is to increase the immunity of the watermarked 3DV + D to attacks and achieve adequate perceptual quality. Moreover, the proposed watermarking scheme reduces the transmission-bandwidth requirements for transmitting the color-plus-depth 3DV over limited-bandwidth wireless networks through embedding the depth frames into the color frames of the transmitted 3DV + D. Thus, it saves the transmission bit rate and subsequently it enhances the channel bandwidth-efficiency. The performance of the proposed watermarking scheme is compared with those of the state-of-the-art hybrid watermarking schemes. The comparisons depend on both the subjective visual results and the objective results; the Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR) of the watermarked frames and the Normalized Correlation (NC) of the extracted watermark frames. Extensive simulation results on standard 3DV + D sequences have been conducted in the presence of attacks. The obtained results confirm that the proposed hybrid watermarking scheme is robust in the presence of attacks. It achieves not only very good perceptual quality with appreciated PSNR values and saving in the transmission bit rate, but also high correlation coefficient values in the presence of attacks compared to the existing hybrid watermarking schemes.

  9. Real-time demonstration hardware for enhanced DPCM video compression algorithm

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Bizon, Thomas P.; Whyte, Wayne A., Jr.; Marcopoli, Vincent R.

    1992-01-01

    The lack of available wideband digital links as well as the complexity of implementation of bandwidth efficient digital video CODECs (encoder/decoder) has worked to keep the cost of digital television transmission too high to compete with analog methods. Terrestrial and satellite video service providers, however, are now recognizing the potential gains that digital video compression offers and are proposing to incorporate compression systems to increase the number of available program channels. NASA is similarly recognizing the benefits of and trend toward digital video compression techniques for transmission of high quality video from space and therefore, has developed a digital television bandwidth compression algorithm to process standard National Television Systems Committee (NTSC) composite color television signals. The algorithm is based on differential pulse code modulation (DPCM), but additionally utilizes a non-adaptive predictor, non-uniform quantizer and multilevel Huffman coder to reduce the data rate substantially below that achievable with straight DPCM. The non-adaptive predictor and multilevel Huffman coder combine to set this technique apart from other DPCM encoding algorithms. All processing is done on a intra-field basis to prevent motion degradation and minimize hardware complexity. Computer simulations have shown the algorithm will produce broadcast quality reconstructed video at an average transmission rate of 1.8 bits/pixel. Hardware implementation of the DPCM circuit, non-adaptive predictor and non-uniform quantizer has been completed, providing realtime demonstration of the image quality at full video rates. Video sampling/reconstruction circuits have also been constructed to accomplish the analog video processing necessary for the real-time demonstration. Performance results for the completed hardware compare favorably with simulation results. Hardware implementation of the multilevel Huffman encoder/decoder is currently under development

  10. A novel unbalanced multiple description coder for robust video transmission over ad hoc wireless networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Huang, Feng; Sun, Lifeng; Zhong, Yuzhuo

    2006-01-01

    Robust transmission of live video over ad hoc wireless networks presents new challenges: high bandwidth requirements are coupled with delay constraints; even a single packet loss causes error propagation until a complete video frame is coded in the intra-mode; ad hoc wireless networks suffer from bursty packet losses that drastically degrade the viewing experience. Accordingly, we propose a novel UMD coder capable of quickly recovering from losses and ensuring continuous playout. It uses 'peg' frames to prevent error propagation in the High-Resolution (HR) description and improve the robustness of key frames. The Low-Resolution (LR) coder works independent of the HR one, but they can also help each other recover from losses. Like many UMD coders, our UMD coder is drift-free, disruption-tolerant and able to make good use of the asymmetric available bandwidths of multiple paths. The simulation results under different conditions show that the proposed UMD coder has the highest decoded quality and lowest probability of pause when compared with concurrent UMDC techniques. The coder also has a comparable decoded quality, lower startup delay and lower probability of pause than a state-of-the-art FEC-based scheme. To provide robustness for video multicast applications, we propose non-end-to-end UMDC-based video distribution over a multi-tree multicast network. The multiplicity of parents decorrelates losses and the non-end-to-end feature increases the throughput of UMDC video data. We deploy an application-level service of LR description reconstruction in some intermediate nodes of the LR multicast tree. The principle behind this is to reconstruct the disrupted LR frames by the correctly received HR frames. As a result, the viewing experience at the downstream nodes benefits from the protection reconstruction at the upstream nodes.

  11. Colonoscopy video quality assessment using hidden Markov random fields

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Park, Sun Young; Sargent, Dusty; Spofford, Inbar; Vosburgh, Kirby

    2011-03-01

    With colonoscopy becoming a common procedure for individuals aged 50 or more who are at risk of developing colorectal cancer (CRC), colon video data is being accumulated at an ever increasing rate. However, the clinically valuable information contained in these videos is not being maximally exploited to improve patient care and accelerate the development of new screening methods. One of the well-known difficulties in colonoscopy video analysis is the abundance of frames with no diagnostic information. Approximately 40% - 50% of the frames in a colonoscopy video are contaminated by noise, acquisition errors, glare, blur, and uneven illumination. Therefore, filtering out low quality frames containing no diagnostic information can significantly improve the efficiency of colonoscopy video analysis. To address this challenge, we present a quality assessment algorithm to detect and remove low quality, uninformative frames. The goal of our algorithm is to discard low quality frames while retaining all diagnostically relevant information. Our algorithm is based on a hidden Markov model (HMM) in combination with two measures of data quality to filter out uninformative frames. Furthermore, we present a two-level framework based on an embedded hidden Markov model (EHHM) to incorporate the proposed quality assessment algorithm into a complete, automated diagnostic image analysis system for colonoscopy video.

  12. Real-Time Transmission and Storage of Video, Audio, and Health Data in Emergency and Home Care Situations

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Barbieri, Ivano; Lambruschini, Paolo; Raggio, Marco; Stagnaro, Riccardo

    2007-12-01

    The increase in the availability of bandwidth for wireless links, network integration, and the computational power on fixed and mobile platforms at affordable costs allows nowadays for the handling of audio and video data, their quality making them suitable for medical application. These information streams can support both continuous monitoring and emergency situations. According to this scenario, the authors have developed and implemented the mobile communication system which is described in this paper. The system is based on ITU-T H.323 multimedia terminal recommendation, suitable for real-time data/video/audio and telemedical applications. The audio and video codecs, respectively, H.264 and G723.1, were implemented and optimized in order to obtain high performance on the system target processors. Offline media streaming storage and retrieval functionalities were supported by integrating a relational database in the hospital central system. The system is based on low-cost consumer technologies such as general packet radio service (GPRS) and wireless local area network (WLAN or WiFi) for lowband data/video transmission. Implementation and testing were carried out for medical emergency and telemedicine application. In this paper, the emergency case study is described.

  13. High efficiency video coding for ultrasound video communication in m-health systems.

    PubMed

    Panayides, A; Antoniou, Z; Pattichis, M S; Pattichis, C S; Constantinides, A G

    2012-01-01

    Emerging high efficiency video compression methods and wider availability of wireless network infrastructure will significantly advance existing m-health applications. For medical video communications, the emerging video compression and network standards support low-delay and high-resolution video transmission, at the clinically acquired resolution and frame rates. Such advances are expected to further promote the adoption of m-health systems for remote diagnosis and emergency incidents in daily clinical practice. This paper compares the performance of the emerging high efficiency video coding (HEVC) standard to the current state-of-the-art H.264/AVC standard. The experimental evaluation, based on five atherosclerotic plaque ultrasound videos encoded at QCIF, CIF, and 4CIF resolutions demonstrates that 50% reductions in bitrate requirements is possible for equivalent clinical quality.

  14. Innovative Video Diagnostic Equipment for Material Science

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Capuano, G.; Titomanlio, D.; Soellner, W.; Seidel, A.

    2012-01-01

    Materials science experiments under microgravity increasingly rely on advanced optical systems to determine the physical properties of the samples under investigation. This includes video systems with high spatial and temporal resolution. The acquisition, handling, storage and transmission to ground of the resulting video data are very challenging. Since the available downlink data rate is limited, the capability to compress the video data significantly without compromising the data quality is essential. We report on the development of a Digital Video System (DVS) for EML (Electro Magnetic Levitator) which provides real-time video acquisition, high compression using advanced Wavelet algorithms, storage and transmission of a continuous flow of video with different characteristics in terms of image dimensions and frame rates. The DVS is able to operate with the latest generation of high-performance cameras acquiring high resolution video images up to 4Mpixels@60 fps or high frame rate video images up to about 1000 fps@512x512pixels.

  15. CVD2014-A Database for Evaluating No-Reference Video Quality Assessment Algorithms.

    PubMed

    Nuutinen, Mikko; Virtanen, Toni; Vaahteranoksa, Mikko; Vuori, Tero; Oittinen, Pirkko; Hakkinen, Jukka

    2016-07-01

    In this paper, we present a new video database: CVD2014-Camera Video Database. In contrast to previous video databases, this database uses real cameras rather than introducing distortions via post-processing, which results in a complex distortion space in regard to the video acquisition process. CVD2014 contains a total of 234 videos that are recorded using 78 different cameras. Moreover, this database contains the observer-specific quality evaluation scores rather than only providing mean opinion scores. We have also collected open-ended quality descriptions that are provided by the observers. These descriptions were used to define the quality dimensions for the videos in CVD2014. The dimensions included sharpness, graininess, color balance, darkness, and jerkiness. At the end of this paper, a performance study of image and video quality algorithms for predicting the subjective video quality is reported. For this performance study, we proposed a new performance measure that accounts for observer variance. The performance study revealed that there is room for improvement regarding the video quality assessment algorithms. The CVD2014 video database has been made publicly available for the research community. All video sequences and corresponding subjective ratings can be obtained from the CVD2014 project page (http://www.helsinki.fi/psychology/groups/visualcognition/).

  16. A no-reference video quality assessment metric based on ROI

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jia, Lixiu; Zhong, Xuefei; Tu, Yan; Niu, Wenjuan

    2015-01-01

    A no reference video quality assessment metric based on the region of interest (ROI) was proposed in this paper. In the metric, objective video quality was evaluated by integrating the quality of two compressed artifacts, i.e. blurring distortion and blocking distortion. The Gaussian kernel function was used to extract the human density maps of the H.264 coding videos from the subjective eye tracking data. An objective bottom-up ROI extraction model based on magnitude discrepancy of discrete wavelet transform between two consecutive frames, center weighted color opponent model, luminance contrast model and frequency saliency model based on spectral residual was built. Then only the objective saliency maps were used to compute the objective blurring and blocking quality. The results indicate that the objective ROI extraction metric has a higher the area under the curve (AUC) value. Comparing with the conventional video quality assessment metrics which measured all the video quality frames, the metric proposed in this paper not only decreased the computation complexity, but improved the correlation between subjective mean opinion score (MOS) and objective scores.

  17. Audiovisual quality estimation of mobile phone video cameras with interpretation-based quality approach

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Radun, Jenni E.; Virtanen, Toni; Olives, Jean-Luc; Vaahteranoksa, Mikko; Vuori, Tero; Nyman, Göte

    2007-01-01

    We present an effective method for comparing subjective audiovisual quality and the features related to the quality changes of different video cameras. Both quantitative estimation of overall quality and qualitative description of critical quality features are achieved by the method. The aim was to combine two image quality evaluation methods, the quantitative Absolute Category Rating (ACR) method with hidden reference removal and the qualitative Interpretation- Based Quality (IBQ) method in order to see how they complement each other in audiovisual quality estimation tasks. 26 observers estimated the audiovisual quality of six different cameras, mainly mobile phone video cameras. In order to achieve an efficient subjective estimation of audiovisual quality, only two contents with different quality requirements were recorded with each camera. The results show that the subjectively important quality features were more related to the overall estimations of cameras' visual video quality than to the features related to sound. The data demonstrated two significant quality dimensions related to visual quality: darkness and sharpness. We conclude that the qualitative methodology can complement quantitative quality estimations also with audiovisual material. The IBQ approach is valuable especially, when the induced quality changes are multidimensional.

  18. Study of Temporal Effects on Subjective Video Quality of Experience.

    PubMed

    Bampis, Christos George; Zhi Li; Moorthy, Anush Krishna; Katsavounidis, Ioannis; Aaron, Anne; Bovik, Alan Conrad

    2017-11-01

    HTTP adaptive streaming is being increasingly deployed by network content providers, such as Netflix and YouTube. By dividing video content into data chunks encoded at different bitrates, a client is able to request the appropriate bitrate for the segment to be played next based on the estimated network conditions. However, this can introduce a number of impairments, including compression artifacts and rebuffering events, which can severely impact an end-user's quality of experience (QoE). We have recently created a new video quality database, which simulates a typical video streaming application, using long video sequences and interesting Netflix content. Going beyond previous efforts, the new database contains highly diverse and contemporary content, and it includes the subjective opinions of a sizable number of human subjects regarding the effects on QoE of both rebuffering and compression distortions. We observed that rebuffering is always obvious and unpleasant to subjects, while bitrate changes may be less obvious due to content-related dependencies. Transient bitrate drops were preferable over rebuffering only on low complexity video content, while consistently low bitrates were poorly tolerated. We evaluated different objective video quality assessment algorithms on our database and found that objective video quality models are unreliable for QoE prediction on videos suffering from both rebuffering events and bitrate changes. This implies the need for more general QoE models that take into account objective quality models, rebuffering-aware information, and memory. The publicly available video content as well as metadata for all of the videos in the new database can be found at http://live.ece.utexas.edu/research/LIVE_NFLXStudy/nflx_index.html.

  19. Video quality assessment method motivated by human visual perception

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    He, Meiling; Jiang, Gangyi; Yu, Mei; Song, Yang; Peng, Zongju; Shao, Feng

    2016-11-01

    Research on video quality assessment (VQA) plays a crucial role in improving the efficiency of video coding and the performance of video processing. It is well acknowledged that the motion energy model generates motion energy responses in a middle temporal area by simulating the receptive field of neurons in V1 for the motion perception of the human visual system. Motivated by the biological evidence for the visual motion perception, a VQA method is proposed in this paper, which comprises the motion perception quality index and the spatial index. To be more specific, the motion energy model is applied to evaluate the temporal distortion severity of each frequency component generated from the difference of Gaussian filter bank, which produces the motion perception quality index, and the gradient similarity measure is used to evaluate the spatial distortion of the video sequence to get the spatial quality index. The experimental results of the LIVE, CSIQ, and IVP video databases demonstrate that the random forests regression technique trained by the generated quality indices is highly correspondent to human visual perception and has many significant improvements than comparable well-performing methods. The proposed method has higher consistency with subjective perception and higher generalization capability.

  20. Task-oriented quality assessment and adaptation in real-time mission critical video streaming applications

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nightingale, James; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos

    2015-02-01

    In recent years video traffic has become the dominant application on the Internet with global year-on-year increases in video-oriented consumer services. Driven by improved bandwidth in both mobile and fixed networks, steadily reducing hardware costs and the development of new technologies, many existing and new classes of commercial and industrial video applications are now being upgraded or emerging. Some of the use cases for these applications include areas such as public and private security monitoring for loss prevention or intruder detection, industrial process monitoring and critical infrastructure monitoring. The use of video is becoming commonplace in defence, security, commercial, industrial, educational and health contexts. Towards optimal performances, the design or optimisation in each of these applications should be context aware and task oriented with the characteristics of the video stream (frame rate, spatial resolution, bandwidth etc.) chosen to match the use case requirements. For example, in the security domain, a task-oriented consideration may be that higher resolution video would be required to identify an intruder than to simply detect his presence. Whilst in the same case, contextual factors such as the requirement to transmit over a resource-limited wireless link, may impose constraints on the selection of optimum task-oriented parameters. This paper presents a novel, conceptually simple and easily implemented method of assessing video quality relative to its suitability for a particular task and dynamically adapting videos streams during transmission to ensure that the task can be successfully completed. Firstly we defined two principle classes of tasks: recognition tasks and event detection tasks. These task classes are further subdivided into a set of task-related profiles, each of which is associated with a set of taskoriented attributes (minimum spatial resolution, minimum frame rate etc.). For example, in the detection class

  1. Is perception of quality more important than technical quality in patient video cases?

    PubMed

    Roland, Damian; Matheson, David; Taub, Nick; Coats, Tim; Lakhanpaul, Monica

    2015-08-13

    The use of video cases to demonstrate key signs and symptoms in patients (patient video cases or PVCs) is a rapidly expanding field. The aims of this study were to evaluate whether the technical quality, or judgement of quality, of a video clip influences a paediatrician's judgment on acuity of the case and assess the relationship between perception of quality and the technical quality of a selection of video clips. Participants (12 senior consultant paediatricians attending an examination workshop) individually categorised 28 PVCs into one of 3 possible acuities and then described the quality of the image seen. The PVCs had been converted into four different technical qualities (differing bit rates ranging from excellent to low quality). Participants' assessment of quality and the actual industry standard of the PVC were independent (333 distinct observations, spearmans rho = 0.0410, p = 0.4564). Agreement between actual acuity and participants' judgement was generally good at higher acuities but moderate at medium/low acuities of illness (overall correlation 0.664). Perception of the quality of the clip was related to correct assignment of acuity regardless of the technical quality of the clip (number of obs = 330, z = 2.07, p = 0.038). It is important to benchmark PVCs prior to use in learning resources as experts may not agree on the information within, or quality of, the clip. It appears, although PVCs may be beneficial in a pedagogical context, the perception of quality of clip may be an important determinant of an expert's decision making.

  2. Video quality assessment using motion-compensated temporal filtering and manifold feature similarity

    PubMed Central

    Yu, Mei; Jiang, Gangyi; Shao, Feng; Peng, Zongju

    2017-01-01

    Well-performed Video quality assessment (VQA) method should be consistent with human visual systems for better prediction accuracy. In this paper, we propose a VQA method using motion-compensated temporal filtering (MCTF) and manifold feature similarity. To be more specific, a group of frames (GoF) is first decomposed into a temporal high-pass component (HPC) and a temporal low-pass component (LPC) by MCTF. Following this, manifold feature learning (MFL) and phase congruency (PC) are used to predict the quality of temporal LPC and temporal HPC respectively. The quality measures of the LPC and the HPC are then combined as GoF quality. A temporal pooling strategy is subsequently used to integrate GoF qualities into an overall video quality. The proposed VQA method appropriately processes temporal information in video by MCTF and temporal pooling strategy, and simulate human visual perception by MFL. Experiments on publicly available video quality database showed that in comparison with several state-of-the-art VQA methods, the proposed VQA method achieves better consistency with subjective video quality and can predict video quality more accurately. PMID:28445489

  3. Adaptive Video Streaming Using Bandwidth Estimation for 3.5G Mobile Network

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nam, Hyeong-Min; Park, Chun-Su; Jung, Seung-Won; Ko, Sung-Jea

    Currently deployed mobile networks including High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) offer only best-effort Quality of Service (QoS). In wireless best effort networks, the bandwidth variation is a critical problem, especially, for mobile devices with small buffers. This is because the bandwidth variation leads to packet losses caused by buffer overflow as well as picture freezing due to high transmission delay or buffer underflow. In this paper, in order to provide seamless video streaming over HSDPA, we propose an efficient real-time video streaming method that consists of the available bandwidth (AB) estimation for the HSDPA network and the transmission rate control to prevent buffer overflows/underflows. In the proposed method, the client estimates the AB and the estimated AB is fed back to the server through real-time transport control protocol (RTCP) packets. Then, the server adaptively adjusts the transmission rate according to the estimated AB and the buffer state obtained from the RTCP feedback information. Experimental results show that the proposed method achieves seamless video streaming over the HSDPA network providing higher video quality and lower transmission delay.

  4. Subjective Quality Assessment of Underwater Video for Scientific Applications.

    PubMed

    Moreno-Roldán, José-Miguel; Luque-Nieto, Miguel-Ángel; Poncela, Javier; Díaz-del-Río, Víctor; Otero, Pablo

    2015-12-15

    Underwater video services could be a key application in the better scientific knowledge of the vast oceanic resources in our planet. However, limitations in the capacity of current available technology for underwater networks (UWSNs) raise the question of the feasibility of these services. When transmitting video, the main constraints are the limited bandwidth and the high propagation delays. At the same time the service performance depends on the needs of the target group. This paper considers the problems of estimations for the Mean Opinion Score (a standard quality measure) in UWSNs based on objective methods and addresses the topic of quality assessment in potential underwater video services from a subjective point of view. The experimental design and the results of a test planned according standardized psychometric methods are presented. The subjects used in the quality assessment test were ocean scientists. Video sequences were recorded in actual exploration expeditions and were processed to simulate conditions similar to those that might be found in UWSNs. Our experimental results show how videos are considered to be useful for scientific purposes even in very low bitrate conditions.

  5. MATIN: a random network coding based framework for high quality peer-to-peer live video streaming.

    PubMed

    Barekatain, Behrang; Khezrimotlagh, Dariush; Aizaini Maarof, Mohd; Ghaeini, Hamid Reza; Salleh, Shaharuddin; Quintana, Alfonso Ariza; Akbari, Behzad; Cabrera, Alicia Triviño

    2013-01-01

    In recent years, Random Network Coding (RNC) has emerged as a promising solution for efficient Peer-to-Peer (P2P) video multicasting over the Internet. This probably refers to this fact that RNC noticeably increases the error resiliency and throughput of the network. However, high transmission overhead arising from sending large coefficients vector as header has been the most important challenge of the RNC. Moreover, due to employing the Gauss-Jordan elimination method, considerable computational complexity can be imposed on peers in decoding the encoded blocks and checking linear dependency among the coefficients vectors. In order to address these challenges, this study introduces MATIN which is a random network coding based framework for efficient P2P video streaming. The MATIN includes a novel coefficients matrix generation method so that there is no linear dependency in the generated coefficients matrix. Using the proposed framework, each peer encapsulates one instead of n coefficients entries into the generated encoded packet which results in very low transmission overhead. It is also possible to obtain the inverted coefficients matrix using a bit number of simple arithmetic operations. In this regard, peers sustain very low computational complexities. As a result, the MATIN permits random network coding to be more efficient in P2P video streaming systems. The results obtained from simulation using OMNET++ show that it substantially outperforms the RNC which uses the Gauss-Jordan elimination method by providing better video quality on peers in terms of the four important performance metrics including video distortion, dependency distortion, End-to-End delay and Initial Startup delay.

  6. Low-complexity video encoding method for wireless image transmission in capsule endoscope.

    PubMed

    Takizawa, Kenichi; Hamaguchi, Kiyoshi

    2010-01-01

    This paper presents a low-complexity video encoding method applicable for wireless image transmission in capsule endoscopes. This encoding method is based on Wyner-Ziv theory, in which side information available at a transmitter is treated as side information at its receiver. Therefore complex processes in video encoding, such as estimation of the motion vector, are moved to the receiver side, which has a larger-capacity battery. As a result, the encoding process is only to decimate coded original data through channel coding. We provide a performance evaluation for a low-density parity check (LDPC) coding method in the AWGN channel.

  7. Video quality assessment using a statistical model of human visual speed perception.

    PubMed

    Wang, Zhou; Li, Qiang

    2007-12-01

    Motion is one of the most important types of information contained in natural video, but direct use of motion information in the design of video quality assessment algorithms has not been deeply investigated. Here we propose to incorporate a recent model of human visual speed perception [Nat. Neurosci. 9, 578 (2006)] and model visual perception in an information communication framework. This allows us to estimate both the motion information content and the perceptual uncertainty in video signals. Improved video quality assessment algorithms are obtained by incorporating the model as spatiotemporal weighting factors, where the weight increases with the information content and decreases with the perceptual uncertainty. Consistent improvement over existing video quality assessment algorithms is observed in our validation with the video quality experts group Phase I test data set.

  8. Application aware approach to compression and transmission of H.264 encoded video for automated and centralized transportation surveillance.

    DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

    2012-10-01

    In this report we present a transportation video coding and wireless transmission system specically tailored to automated : vehicle tracking applications. By taking into account the video characteristics and the lossy nature of the wireless channe...

  9. Quality versus intelligibility: studying human preferences for American Sign Language video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ciaramello, Frank M.; Hemami, Sheila S.

    2011-03-01

    Real-time videoconferencing using cellular devices provides natural communication to the Deaf community. For this application, compressed American Sign Language (ASL) video must be evaluated in terms of the intelligibility of the conversation and not in terms of the overall aesthetic quality of the video. This work presents a paired comparison experiment to determine the subjective preferences of ASL users in terms of the trade-off between intelligibility and quality when varying the proportion of the bitrate allocated explicitly to the regions of the video containing the signer. A rate-distortion optimization technique, which jointly optimizes a quality criteria and an intelligibility criteria according to a user-specified parameter, generates test video pairs for the subjective experiment. Experimental results suggest that at sufficiently high bitrates, all users prefer videos in which the non-signer regions in the video are encoded with some nominal rate. As the total encoding bitrate decreases, users generally prefer video in which a greater proportion of the rate is allocated to the signer. The specific operating points preferred in the quality-intelligibility trade-off vary with the demographics of the users.

  10. Remote stereoscopic video play platform for naked eyes based on the Android system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jia, Changxin; Sang, Xinzhu; Liu, Jing; Cheng, Mingsheng

    2014-11-01

    As people's life quality have been improved significantly, the traditional 2D video technology can not meet people's urgent desire for a better video quality, which leads to the rapid development of 3D video technology. Simultaneously people want to watch 3D video in portable devices,. For achieving the above purpose, we set up a remote stereoscopic video play platform. The platform consists of a server and clients. The server is used for transmission of different formats of video and the client is responsible for receiving remote video for the next decoding and pixel restructuring. We utilize and improve Live555 as video transmission server. Live555 is a cross-platform open source project which provides solutions for streaming media such as RTSP protocol and supports transmission of multiple video formats. At the receiving end, we use our laboratory own player. The player for Android, which is with all the basic functions as the ordinary players do and able to play normal 2D video, is the basic structure for redevelopment. Also RTSP is implemented into this structure for telecommunication. In order to achieve stereoscopic display, we need to make pixel rearrangement in this player's decoding part. The decoding part is the local code which JNI interface calls so that we can extract video frames more effectively. The video formats that we process are left and right, up and down and nine grids. In the design and development, a large number of key technologies from Android application development have been employed, including a variety of wireless transmission, pixel restructuring and JNI call. By employing these key technologies, the design plan has been finally completed. After some updates and optimizations, the video player can play remote 3D video well anytime and anywhere and meet people's requirement.

  11. The compressed average image intensity metric for stereoscopic video quality assessment

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wilczewski, Grzegorz

    2016-09-01

    The following article depicts insights towards design, creation and testing of a genuine metric designed for a 3DTV video quality evaluation. The Compressed Average Image Intensity (CAII) mechanism is based upon stereoscopic video content analysis, setting its core feature and functionality to serve as a versatile tool for an effective 3DTV service quality assessment. Being an objective type of quality metric it may be utilized as a reliable source of information about the actual performance of a given 3DTV system, under strict providers evaluation. Concerning testing and the overall performance analysis of the CAII metric, the following paper presents comprehensive study of results gathered across several testing routines among selected set of samples of stereoscopic video content. As a result, the designed method for stereoscopic video quality evaluation is investigated across the range of synthetic visual impairments injected into the original video stream.

  12. Survey of WBSNs for Pre-Hospital Assistance: Trends to Maximize the Network Lifetime and Video Transmission Techniques

    PubMed Central

    Gonzalez, Enrique; Peña, Raul; Vargas-Rosales, Cesar; Avila, Alfonso; Perez-Diaz de Cerio, David

    2015-01-01

    This survey aims to encourage the multidisciplinary communities to join forces for innovation in the mobile health monitoring area. Specifically, multidisciplinary innovations in medical emergency scenarios can have a significant impact on the effectiveness and quality of the procedures and practices in the delivery of medical care. Wireless body sensor networks (WBSNs) are a promising technology capable of improving the existing practices in condition assessment and care delivery for a patient in a medical emergency. This technology can also facilitate the early interventions of a specialist physician during the pre-hospital period. WBSNs make possible these early interventions by establishing remote communication links with video/audio support and by providing medical information such as vital signs, electrocardiograms, etc. in real time. This survey focuses on relevant issues needed to understand how to setup a WBSN for medical emergencies. These issues are: monitoring vital signs and video transmission, energy efficient protocols, scheduling, optimization and energy consumption on a WBSN. PMID:26007741

  13. Subjective Quality Assessment of Underwater Video for Scientific Applications

    PubMed Central

    Moreno-Roldán, José-Miguel; Luque-Nieto, Miguel-Ángel; Poncela, Javier; Díaz-del-Río, Víctor; Otero, Pablo

    2015-01-01

    Underwater video services could be a key application in the better scientific knowledge of the vast oceanic resources in our planet. However, limitations in the capacity of current available technology for underwater networks (UWSNs) raise the question of the feasibility of these services. When transmitting video, the main constraints are the limited bandwidth and the high propagation delays. At the same time the service performance depends on the needs of the target group. This paper considers the problems of estimations for the Mean Opinion Score (a standard quality measure) in UWSNs based on objective methods and addresses the topic of quality assessment in potential underwater video services from a subjective point of view. The experimental design and the results of a test planned according standardized psychometric methods are presented. The subjects used in the quality assessment test were ocean scientists. Video sequences were recorded in actual exploration expeditions and were processed to simulate conditions similar to those that might be found in UWSNs. Our experimental results show how videos are considered to be useful for scientific purposes even in very low bitrate conditions. PMID:26694400

  14. Quality of YouTube TM videos on dental implants.

    PubMed

    Abukaraky, A; Hamdan, A-A; Ameera, M-N; Nasief, M; Hassona, Y

    2018-07-01

    Patients search YouTube for health-care information. To examine what YouTube offers patients seeking information on dental implants, and to evaluate the quality of provided information. A systematic search of YouTube for videos containing information on dental implants was performed using the key words Dental implant and Tooth replacement. Videos were examined by two senior Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery residents who were trained and calibrated to perform the search. Initial assessment was performed to exclude non- English language videos, duplicate videos, conference lectures, and irrelevant videos. Included videos were analyzed with regard to demographics and content's usefulness. Information for patients available from the American Academy of Implant Dentistry, European Association of Osseointegration, and British Society of Restorative Dentistry were used for benchmarking. A total of 117 videos were analyzed. The most commonly discussed topics were related to procedures involved in dental implantology (76.1%, n=89), and to the indications for dental implants (58.1%, n=78). The mean usefulness score of videos was poor (6.02 ±4.7 [range 0-21]), and misleading content was common (30.1% of videos); mainly in topics related to prognosis and maintenance of dental implants. Most videos (83.1%, n=97) failed to mention the source of information presented in the video or where to find more about dental implants. Information about dental implants on YouTube is limited in quality and quantity. YouTube videos can have a potentially important role in modulating patients attitude and treatment decision regarding dental implants.

  15. Packetized video on MAGNET

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lazar, Aurel A.; White, John S.

    1986-11-01

    Theoretical analysis of an ILAN model of MAGNET, an integrated network testbed developed at Columbia University, shows that the bandwidth freed up by video and voice calls during periods of little movement in the images and silence periods in the speech signals could be utilized efficiently for graphics and data transmission. Based on these investigations, an architecture supporting adaptive protocols that are dynamically controlled by the requirements of a fluctuating load and changing user environment has been advanced. To further analyze the behavior of the network, a real-time packetized video system has been implemented. This system is embedded in the real time multimedia workstation EDDY that integrates video, voice and data traffic flows. Protocols supporting variable bandwidth, constant quality packetized video transport are descibed in detail.

  16. MATIN: A Random Network Coding Based Framework for High Quality Peer-to-Peer Live Video Streaming

    PubMed Central

    Barekatain, Behrang; Khezrimotlagh, Dariush; Aizaini Maarof, Mohd; Ghaeini, Hamid Reza; Salleh, Shaharuddin; Quintana, Alfonso Ariza; Akbari, Behzad; Cabrera, Alicia Triviño

    2013-01-01

    In recent years, Random Network Coding (RNC) has emerged as a promising solution for efficient Peer-to-Peer (P2P) video multicasting over the Internet. This probably refers to this fact that RNC noticeably increases the error resiliency and throughput of the network. However, high transmission overhead arising from sending large coefficients vector as header has been the most important challenge of the RNC. Moreover, due to employing the Gauss-Jordan elimination method, considerable computational complexity can be imposed on peers in decoding the encoded blocks and checking linear dependency among the coefficients vectors. In order to address these challenges, this study introduces MATIN which is a random network coding based framework for efficient P2P video streaming. The MATIN includes a novel coefficients matrix generation method so that there is no linear dependency in the generated coefficients matrix. Using the proposed framework, each peer encapsulates one instead of n coefficients entries into the generated encoded packet which results in very low transmission overhead. It is also possible to obtain the inverted coefficients matrix using a bit number of simple arithmetic operations. In this regard, peers sustain very low computational complexities. As a result, the MATIN permits random network coding to be more efficient in P2P video streaming systems. The results obtained from simulation using OMNET++ show that it substantially outperforms the RNC which uses the Gauss-Jordan elimination method by providing better video quality on peers in terms of the four important performance metrics including video distortion, dependency distortion, End-to-End delay and Initial Startup delay. PMID:23940530

  17. Packetized Video On MAGNET

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lazar, Aurel A.; White, John S.

    1987-07-01

    Theoretical analysis of integrated local area network model of MAGNET, an integrated network testbed developed at Columbia University, shows that the bandwidth freed up during video and voice calls during periods of little movement in the images and periods of silence in the speech signals could be utilized efficiently for graphics and data transmission. Based on these investigations, an architecture supporting adaptive protocols that are dynamicaly controlled by the requirements of a fluctuating load and changing user environment has been advanced. To further analyze the behavior of the network, a real-time packetized video system has been implemented. This system is embedded in the real-time multimedia workstation EDDY, which integrates video, voice, and data traffic flows. Protocols supporting variable-bandwidth, fixed-quality packetized video transport are described in detail.

  18. Teaching Surgical Procedures with Movies: Tips for High-quality Video Clips

    PubMed Central

    Jacquemart, Mathieu; Bouletreau, Pierre; Breton, Pierre; Mojallal, Ali

    2016-01-01

    Summary: Video must now be considered as a precious tool for learning surgery. However, the medium does present production challenges, and currently, quality movies are not always accessible. We developed a series of 7 surgical videos and made them available on a publicly accessible internet website. Our videos have been viewed by thousands of people worldwide. High-quality educational movies must respect strategic and technical points to be reliable. PMID:27757342

  19. Teaching Surgical Procedures with Movies: Tips for High-quality Video Clips.

    PubMed

    Jacquemart, Mathieu; Bouletreau, Pierre; Breton, Pierre; Mojallal, Ali; Sigaux, Nicolas

    2016-09-01

    Video must now be considered as a precious tool for learning surgery. However, the medium does present production challenges, and currently, quality movies are not always accessible. We developed a series of 7 surgical videos and made them available on a publicly accessible internet website. Our videos have been viewed by thousands of people worldwide. High-quality educational movies must respect strategic and technical points to be reliable.

  20. Thin-slice vision: inference of confidence measure from perceptual video quality

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hameed, Abdul; Balas, Benjamin; Dai, Rui

    2016-11-01

    There has been considerable research on thin-slice judgments, but no study has demonstrated the predictive validity of confidence measures when assessors watch videos acquired from communication systems, in which the perceptual quality of videos could be degraded by limited bandwidth and unreliable network conditions. This paper studies the relationship between high-level thin-slice judgments of human behavior and factors that contribute to perceptual video quality. Based on a large number of subjective test results, it has been found that the confidence of a single individual present in all the videos, called speaker's confidence (SC), could be predicted by a list of features that contribute to perceptual video quality. Two prediction models, one based on artificial neural network and the other based on a decision tree, were built to predict SC. Experimental results have shown that both prediction models can result in high correlation measures.

  1. Dynamic quality of service model for improving performance of multimedia real-time transmission in industrial networks.

    PubMed

    Gopalakrishnan, Ravichandran C; Karunakaran, Manivannan

    2014-01-01

    Nowadays, quality of service (QoS) is very popular in various research areas like distributed systems, multimedia real-time applications and networking. The requirements of these systems are to satisfy reliability, uptime, security constraints and throughput as well as application specific requirements. The real-time multimedia applications are commonly distributed over the network and meet various time constraints across networks without creating any intervention over control flows. In particular, video compressors make variable bit-rate streams that mismatch the constant-bit-rate channels typically provided by classical real-time protocols, severely reducing the efficiency of network utilization. Thus, it is necessary to enlarge the communication bandwidth to transfer the compressed multimedia streams using Flexible Time Triggered- Enhanced Switched Ethernet (FTT-ESE) protocol. FTT-ESE provides automation to calculate the compression level and change the bandwidth of the stream. This paper focuses on low-latency multimedia transmission over Ethernet with dynamic quality-of-service (QoS) management. This proposed framework deals with a dynamic QoS for multimedia transmission over Ethernet with FTT-ESE protocol. This paper also presents distinct QoS metrics based both on the image quality and network features. Some experiments with recorded and live video streams show the advantages of the proposed framework. To validate the solution we have designed and implemented a simulator based on the Matlab/Simulink, which is a tool to evaluate different network architecture using Simulink blocks.

  2. A portable wireless power transmission system for video capsule endoscopes.

    PubMed

    Shi, Yu; Yan, Guozheng; Zhu, Bingquan; Liu, Gang

    2015-01-01

    Wireless power transmission (WPT) technology can solve the energy shortage problem of the video capsule endoscope (VCE) powered by button batteries, but the fixed platform limited its clinical application. This paper presents a portable WPT system for VCE. Besides portability, power transfer efficiency and stability are considered as the main indexes of optimization design of the system, which consists of the transmitting coil structure, portable control box, operating frequency, magnetic core and winding of receiving coil. Upon the above principles, the correlation parameters are measured, compared and chosen. Finally, through experiments on the platform, the methods are tested and evaluated. In the gastrointestinal tract of small pig, the VCE is supplied with sufficient energy by the WPT system, and the energy conversion efficiency is 2.8%. The video obtained is clear with a resolution of 320×240 and a frame rate of 30 frames per second. The experiments verify the feasibility of design scheme, and further improvement direction is discussed.

  3. Operation quality assessment model for video conference system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Du, Bangshi; Qi, Feng; Shao, Sujie; Wang, Ying; Li, Weijian

    2018-01-01

    Video conference system has become an important support platform for smart grid operation and management, its operation quality is gradually concerning grid enterprise. First, the evaluation indicator system covering network, business and operation maintenance aspects was established on basis of video conference system's operation statistics. Then, the operation quality assessment model combining genetic algorithm with regularized BP neural network was proposed, which outputs operation quality level of the system within a time period and provides company manager with some optimization advice. The simulation results show that the proposed evaluation model offers the advantages of fast convergence and high prediction accuracy in contrast with regularized BP neural network, and its generalization ability is superior to LM-BP neural network and Bayesian BP neural network.

  4. Educational quality of YouTube videos on knee arthrocentesis.

    PubMed

    Fischer, Jonas; Geurts, Jeroen; Valderrabano, Victor; Hügle, Thomas

    2013-10-01

    Knee arthrocentesis is a commonly performed diagnostic and therapeutic procedure in rheumatology and orthopedic surgery. Classic teaching of arthrocentesis skills relies on hands-on practice under supervision. Video-based online teaching is an increasingly utilized educational tool in higher and clinical education. YouTube is a popular video-sharing Web site that can be accessed as a teaching source. The objective of this study was to assess the educational value of YouTube videos on knee arthrocentesis posted by health professionals and institutions during the period from 2008 to 2012. The YouTube video database was systematically searched using 5 search terms related to knee arthrocentesis. Two independent clinical reviewers assessed videos for procedural technique and educational value using a 5-point global score, ranging from 1 = poor quality to 5 = excellent educational quality. As validated international guidelines are lacking, we used the guidelines of the Swiss Society of Rheumatology as criterion standard for the procedure. Of more than thousand findings, 13 videos met the inclusion criteria. Of those, 2 contained additional animated video material: one was purely animated, and one was a check list. The average length was 3.31 ± 2.28 minutes. The most popular video had 1388 hits per month. Our mean global score for educational value was 3.1 ± 1.0. Eight videos (62 %) were considered useful for teaching purposes. Use of a "no-touch" procedure, meaning that once disinfected the skin remains untouched before needle penetration, was present in all videos. Six videos (46%) demonstrated full sterile conditions. There was no clear preference of a medial (n = 8) versus lateral (n = 5) approach. A discreet number of YouTube videos on knee arthrocentesis appeared to be suitable for application in a Web-based format for medical students, fellows, and residents. The low-average mean global score for overall educational value suggests an improvement of future video

  5. Enhanced protocol for real-time transmission of echocardiograms over wireless channels.

    PubMed

    Cavero, Eva; Alesanco, Alvaro; García, Jose

    2012-11-01

    This paper presents a methodology to transmit clinical video over wireless networks in real-time. A 3-D set partitioning in hierarchical trees compression prior to transmission is proposed. In order to guarantee the clinical quality of the compressed video, a clinical evaluation specific to each video modality has to be made. This evaluation indicates the minimal transmission rate necessary for an accurate diagnosis. However, the channel conditions produce errors and distort the video. A reliable application protocol is therefore proposed using a hybrid solution in which either retransmission or retransmission combined with forward error correction (FEC) techniques are used, depending on the channel conditions. In order to analyze the proposed methodology, the 2-D mode of an echocardiogram has been assessed. A bandwidth of 200 kbps is necessary to guarantee its clinical quality. The transmission using the proposed solution and retransmission and FEC techniques working separately have been simulated and compared in high-speed uplink packet access (HSUPA) and worldwide interoperability for microwave access (WiMAX) networks. The proposed protocol achieves guaranteed clinical quality for bit error rates higher than with the other protocols, being for a mobile speed of 60 km/h up to 3.3 times higher for HSUPA and 10 times for WiMAX.

  6. Design and Smartphone-Based Implementation of a Chaotic Video Communication Scheme via WAN Remote Transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lin, Zhuosheng; Yu, Simin; Li, Chengqing; Lü, Jinhu; Wang, Qianxue

    This paper proposes a chaotic secure video remote communication scheme that can perform on real WAN networks, and implements it on a smartphone hardware platform. First, a joint encryption and compression scheme is designed by embedding a chaotic encryption scheme into the MJPG-Streamer source codes. Then, multiuser smartphone communications between the sender and the receiver are implemented via WAN remote transmission. Finally, the transmitted video data are received with the given IP address and port in an Android smartphone. It should be noted that, this is the first time that chaotic video encryption schemes are implemented on such a hardware platform. The experimental results demonstrate that the technical challenges on hardware implementation of secure video communication are successfully solved, reaching a balance amongst sufficient security level, real-time processing of massive video data, and utilization of available resources in the hardware environment. The proposed scheme can serve as a good application example of chaotic secure communications for smartphone and other mobile facilities in the future.

  7. Research on compression performance of ultrahigh-definition videos

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Xiangqun; He, Xiaohai; Qing, Linbo; Tao, Qingchuan; Wu, Di

    2017-11-01

    With the popularization of high-definition (HD) images and videos (1920×1080 pixels and above), there are even 4K (3840×2160) television signals and 8 K (8192×4320) ultrahigh-definition videos. The demand for HD images and videos is increasing continuously, along with the increasing data volume. The storage and transmission cannot be properly solved only by virtue of the expansion capacity of hard disks and the update and improvement of transmission devices. Based on the full use of the coding standard high-efficiency video coding (HEVC), super-resolution reconstruction technology, and the correlation between the intra- and the interprediction, we first put forward a "division-compensation"-based strategy to further improve the compression performance of a single image and frame I. Then, by making use of the above thought and HEVC encoder and decoder, a video compression coding frame is designed. HEVC is used inside the frame. Last, with the super-resolution reconstruction technology, the reconstructed video quality is further improved. The experiment shows that by the proposed compression method for a single image (frame I) and video sequence here, the performance is superior to that of HEVC in a low bit rate environment.

  8. Design of multi-view stereoscopic HD video transmission system based on MPEG-21 digital item adaptation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lee, Seokhee; Lee, Kiyoung; Kim, Man Bae; Kim, JongWon

    2005-11-01

    In this paper, we propose a design of multi-view stereoscopic HD video transmission system based on MPEG-21 Digital Item Adaptation (DIA). It focuses on the compatibility and scalability to meet various user preferences and terminal capabilities. There exist a large variety of multi-view 3D HD video types according to the methods for acquisition, display, and processing. By following the MPEG-21 DIA framework, the multi-view stereoscopic HD video is adapted according to user feedback. A user can be served multi-view stereoscopic video which corresponds with his or her preferences and terminal capabilities. In our preliminary prototype, we verify that the proposed design can support two deferent types of display device (stereoscopic and auto-stereoscopic) and switching viewpoints between two available viewpoints.

  9. PSQM-based RR and NR video quality metrics

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lu, Zhongkang; Lin, Weisi; Ong, Eeping; Yang, Xiaokang; Yao, Susu

    2003-06-01

    This paper presents a new and general concept, PQSM (Perceptual Quality Significance Map), to be used in measuring the visual distortion. It makes use of the selectivity characteristic of HVS (Human Visual System) that it pays more attention to certain area/regions of visual signal due to one or more of the following factors: salient features in image/video, cues from domain knowledge, and association of other media (e.g., speech or audio). PQSM is an array whose elements represent the relative perceptual-quality significance levels for the corresponding area/regions for images or video. Due to its generality, PQSM can be incorporated into any visual distortion metrics: to improve effectiveness or/and efficiency of perceptual metrics; or even to enhance a PSNR-based metric. A three-stage PQSM estimation method is also proposed in this paper, with an implementation of motion, texture, luminance, skin-color and face mapping. Experimental results show the scheme can improve the performance of current image/video distortion metrics.

  10. Modeling the time--varying subjective quality of HTTP video streams with rate adaptations.

    PubMed

    Chen, Chao; Choi, Lark Kwon; de Veciana, Gustavo; Caramanis, Constantine; Heath, Robert W; Bovik, Alan C

    2014-05-01

    Newly developed hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP)-based video streaming technologies enable flexible rate-adaptation under varying channel conditions. Accurately predicting the users' quality of experience (QoE) for rate-adaptive HTTP video streams is thus critical to achieve efficiency. An important aspect of understanding and modeling QoE is predicting the up-to-the-moment subjective quality of a video as it is played, which is difficult due to hysteresis effects and nonlinearities in human behavioral responses. This paper presents a Hammerstein-Wiener model for predicting the time-varying subjective quality (TVSQ) of rate-adaptive videos. To collect data for model parameterization and validation, a database of longer duration videos with time-varying distortions was built and the TVSQs of the videos were measured in a large-scale subjective study. The proposed method is able to reliably predict the TVSQ of rate adaptive videos. Since the Hammerstein-Wiener model has a very simple structure, the proposed method is suitable for online TVSQ prediction in HTTP-based streaming.

  11. The role of optical flow in automated quality assessment of full-motion video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Harguess, Josh; Shafer, Scott; Marez, Diego

    2017-09-01

    In real-world video data, such as full-motion-video (FMV) taken from unmanned vehicles, surveillance systems, and other sources, various corruptions to the raw data is inevitable. This can be due to the image acquisition process, noise, distortion, and compression artifacts, among other sources of error. However, we desire methods to analyze the quality of the video to determine whether the underlying content of the corrupted video can be analyzed by humans or machines and to what extent. Previous approaches have shown that motion estimation, or optical flow, can be an important cue in automating this video quality assessment. However, there are many different optical flow algorithms in the literature, each with their own advantages and disadvantages. We examine the effect of the choice of optical flow algorithm (including baseline and state-of-the-art), on motionbased automated video quality assessment algorithms.

  12. Subjective quality evaluation of low-bit-rate video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Masry, Mark; Hemami, Sheila S.; Osberger, Wilfried M.; Rohaly, Ann M.

    2001-06-01

    A subjective quality evaluation was performed to qualify vie4wre responses to visual defects that appear in low bit rate video at full and reduced frame rates. The stimuli were eight sequences compressed by three motion compensated encoders - Sorenson Video, H.263+ and a Wavelet based coder - operating at five bit/frame rate combinations. The stimulus sequences exhibited obvious coding artifacts whose nature differed across the three coders. The subjective evaluation was performed using the Single Stimulus Continuos Quality Evaluation method of UTI-R Rec. BT.500-8. Viewers watched concatenated coded test sequences and continuously registered the perceived quality using a slider device. Data form 19 viewers was colleted. An analysis of their responses to the presence of various artifacts across the range of possible coding conditions and content is presented. The effects of blockiness and blurriness on perceived quality are examined. The effects of changes in frame rate on perceived quality are found to be related to the nature of the motion in the sequence.

  13. Performance Evaluation of the NASA/KSC Transmission System

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Christensen, Kenneth J.

    2000-01-01

    NASA-KSC currently uses three bridged 100-Mbps FDDI segments as its backbone for data traffic. The FDDI Transmission System (FTXS) connects the KSC industrial area, KSC launch complex 39 area, and the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The report presents a performance modeling study of the FTXS and the proposed ATM Transmission System (ATXS). The focus of the study is on performance of MPEG video transmission on these networks. Commercial modeling tools - the CACI Predictor and Comnet tools - were used. In addition, custom software tools were developed to characterize conversation pairs in Sniffer trace (capture) files to use as input to these tools. A baseline study of both non-launch and launch day data traffic on the FTXS is presented. MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 video traffic was characterized and the shaping of it evaluated. It is shown that the characteristics of a video stream has a direct effect on its performance in a network. It is also shown that shaping of video streams is necessary to prevent overflow losses and resulting poor video quality. The developed models can be used to predict when the existing FTXS will 'run out of room' and for optimizing the parameters of ATM links used for transmission of MPEG video. Future work with these models can provide useful input and validation to set-top box projects within the Advanced Networks Development group in NASA-KSC Development Engineering.

  14. On the definition of adapted audio/video profiles for high-quality video calling services over LTE/4G

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ndiaye, Maty; Quinquis, Catherine; Larabi, Mohamed Chaker; Le Lay, Gwenael; Saadane, Hakim; Perrine, Clency

    2014-01-01

    During the last decade, the important advances and widespread availability of mobile technology (operating systems, GPUs, terminal resolution and so on) have encouraged a fast development of voice and video services like video-calling. While multimedia services have largely grown on mobile devices, the generated increase of data consumption is leading to the saturation of mobile networks. In order to provide data with high bit-rates and maintain performance as close as possible to traditional networks, the 3GPP (The 3rd Generation Partnership Project) worked on a high performance standard for mobile called Long Term Evolution (LTE). In this paper, we aim at expressing recommendations related to audio and video media profiles (selection of audio and video codecs, bit-rates, frame-rates, audio and video formats) for a typical video-calling services held over LTE/4G mobile networks. These profiles are defined according to targeted devices (smartphones, tablets), so as to ensure the best possible quality of experience (QoE). Obtained results indicate that for a CIF format (352 x 288 pixels) which is usually used for smartphones, the VP8 codec provides a better image quality than the H.264 codec for low bitrates (from 128 to 384 kbps). However sequences with high motion, H.264 in slow mode is preferred. Regarding audio, better results are globally achieved using wideband codecs offering good quality except for opus codec (at 12.2 kbps).

  15. An objective method for a video quality evaluation in a 3DTV service

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wilczewski, Grzegorz

    2015-09-01

    The following article describes proposed objective method for a 3DTV video quality evaluation, a Compressed Average Image Intensity (CAII) method. Identification of the 3DTV service's content chain nodes enables to design a versatile, objective video quality metric. It is based on an advanced approach to the stereoscopic videostream analysis. Insights towards designed metric mechanisms, as well as the evaluation of performance of the designed video quality metric, in the face of the simulated environmental conditions are herein discussed. As a result, created CAII metric might be effectively used in a variety of service quality assessment applications.

  16. A no-reference image and video visual quality metric based on machine learning

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Frantc, Vladimir; Voronin, Viacheslav; Semenishchev, Evgenii; Minkin, Maxim; Delov, Aliy

    2018-04-01

    The paper presents a novel visual quality metric for lossy compressed video quality assessment. High degree of correlation with subjective estimations of quality is due to using of a convolutional neural network trained on a large amount of pairs video sequence-subjective quality score. We demonstrate how our predicted no-reference quality metric correlates with qualitative opinion in a human observer study. Results are shown on the EVVQ dataset with comparison existing approaches.

  17. Evaluating the Accuracy and Quality of the Information in Kyphosis Videos Shared on YouTube.

    PubMed

    Erdem, Mehmet Nuri; Karaca, Sinan

    2018-04-16

    A quality-control YouTube-based study using the recognized quality scoring systems. In this study, our aim was to confirm the accuracy and quality of the information in kyphosis videos shared on YouTube. The Internet is a widely and increasingly used source for obtaining medical information both by patients and clinicians. YouTube, in particular, manifests itself as a leading source with its ease of access to information and visual advantage for Internet users. The first 50 videos returned by the YouTube search engine in response to 'kyphosis' keyword query were included in the study and categorized under seven and six groups, based on their source and content. The popularity of the videos were evaluated with a new index called the video power index (VPI). The quality, educational quality and accuracy of the source of information were measured using the JAMA score, Global Quality Score (GQS) and Kyphosis Specific Score (KSS). Videos had a mean duration of 397 seconds and a mean number of views of 131,644, with a total viewing number of 6,582,221. The source (uploader) in 36% of the videos was a trainer and the content in 46% of the videos was exercise training. 72% of the videos were about postural kyphosis. Videos had a mean JAMA score of 1.36 (range: 1 to 4), GQS of 1.68 (range: 1 to 5) and KSS of 3.02 (range:0 to 32). The academic group had the highest scores and the lowest VPIs. Online information on kyphosis is low quality and its contents are of unknown source and accuracy. In order to keep the balance in sharing the right information with the patient, clinicians should possess knowledge about the online information related to their field, and should contribute to the development of optimal medical videos. 3.

  18. Perceptual video quality comparison of 3DTV broadcasting using multimode service systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ok, Jiheon; Lee, Chulhee

    2015-05-01

    Multimode service (MMS) systems allow broadcasters to provide multichannel services using a single HD channel. Using these systems, it is possible to provide 3DTV programs that can be watched either in three-dimensional (3-D) or two-dimensional (2-D) modes with backward compatibility. In the MMS system for 3DTV broadcasting using the Advanced Television Systems Committee standards, the left and the right views are encoded using MPEG-2 and H.264, respectively, and then transmitted using a dual HD streaming format. The left view, encoded using MPEG-2, assures 2-D backward compatibility while the right view, encoded using H.264, can be optionally combined with the left view to generate stereoscopic 3-D views. We analyze 2-D and 3-D perceptual quality when using the MMS system by comparing items in the frame-compatible format (top-bottom), which is a conventional transmission scheme for 3-D broadcasting. We performed perceptual 2-D and 3-D video quality evaluation assuming 3DTV programs are encoded using the MMS system and top-bottom format. The results show that MMS systems can be preferable with regard to perceptual 2-D and 3-D quality and backward compatibility.

  19. Measuring perceived video quality of MPEG enhancement by people with impaired vision

    PubMed Central

    Fullerton, Matthew; Woods, Russell L.; Vera-Diaz, Fuensanta A.; Peli, Eli

    2007-01-01

    We used a new method to measure the perceived quality of contrast-enhanced motion video. Patients with impaired vision (n = 24) and normally-sighted subjects (n = 6) adjusted the level of MPEG-based enhancement of 8 videos (4 minutes each) drawn from 4 categories. They selected the level of enhancement that provided the preferred view of the videos, using a reducing-step-size staircase procedure. Most patients made consistent selections of the preferred level of enhancement, indicating an appreciation of and a perceived benefit from the MPEG-based enhancement. The selections varied between patients and were correlated with letter contrast sensitivity, but the selections were not affected by training, experience or video category. We measured just noticeable differences (JNDs) directly for videos, and mapped the image manipulation (enhancement in our case) onto an approximately linear perceptual space. These tools and approaches will be of value in other evaluations of the image quality of motion video manipulations. PMID:18059909

  20. Sleep quality is negatively related to video gaming volume in adults.

    PubMed

    Exelmans, Liese; Van den Bulck, Jan

    2015-04-01

    Most literature on the relationship between video gaming and sleep disturbances has looked at children and adolescents. There is little research on such a relationship in adult samples. The aim of the current study was to investigate the association of video game volume with sleep quality in adults via face-to-face interviews using standardized questionnaires. Adults (n = 844, 56.2% women), aged 18-94 years old, participated in the study. Sleep quality was measured using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, and gaming volume was assessed by asking the hours of gaming on a regular weekday (Mon-Thurs), Friday and weekend day (Sat-Sun). Adjusting for gender, age, educational level, exercise and perceived stress, results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that video gaming volume was a significant predictor of sleep quality (β = 0.145), fatigue (β = 0.109), insomnia (β = 0.120), bedtime (β = 0.100) and rise time (β = 0.168). Each additional hour of video gaming per day delayed bedtime by 6.9 min (95% confidence interval 2.0-11.9 min) and rise time by 13.8 min (95% confidence interval 7.8-19.7 min). Attributable risk for having poor sleep quality (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index > 5) due to gaming >1 h day was 30%. When examining the components of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index using multinomial regression analysis (odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals), gaming volume significantly predicted sleep latency, sleep efficiency and use of sleep medication. In general, findings support the conclusion that gaming volume is negatively related to the overall sleep quality of adults, which might be due to underlying mechanisms of screen exposure and arousal. © 2014 European Sleep Research Society.

  1. Open-source telemedicine platform for wireless medical video communication.

    PubMed

    Panayides, A; Eleftheriou, I; Pantziaris, M

    2013-01-01

    An m-health system for real-time wireless communication of medical video based on open-source software is presented. The objective is to deliver a low-cost telemedicine platform which will allow for reliable remote diagnosis m-health applications such as emergency incidents, mass population screening, and medical education purposes. The performance of the proposed system is demonstrated using five atherosclerotic plaque ultrasound videos. The videos are encoded at the clinically acquired resolution, in addition to lower, QCIF, and CIF resolutions, at different bitrates, and four different encoding structures. Commercially available wireless local area network (WLAN) and 3.5G high-speed packet access (HSPA) wireless channels are used to validate the developed platform. Objective video quality assessment is based on PSNR ratings, following calibration using the variable frame delay (VFD) algorithm that removes temporal mismatch between original and received videos. Clinical evaluation is based on atherosclerotic plaque ultrasound video assessment protocol. Experimental results show that adequate diagnostic quality wireless medical video communications are realized using the designed telemedicine platform. HSPA cellular networks provide for ultrasound video transmission at the acquired resolution, while VFD algorithm utilization bridges objective and subjective ratings.

  2. Open-Source Telemedicine Platform for Wireless Medical Video Communication

    PubMed Central

    Panayides, A.; Eleftheriou, I.; Pantziaris, M.

    2013-01-01

    An m-health system for real-time wireless communication of medical video based on open-source software is presented. The objective is to deliver a low-cost telemedicine platform which will allow for reliable remote diagnosis m-health applications such as emergency incidents, mass population screening, and medical education purposes. The performance of the proposed system is demonstrated using five atherosclerotic plaque ultrasound videos. The videos are encoded at the clinically acquired resolution, in addition to lower, QCIF, and CIF resolutions, at different bitrates, and four different encoding structures. Commercially available wireless local area network (WLAN) and 3.5G high-speed packet access (HSPA) wireless channels are used to validate the developed platform. Objective video quality assessment is based on PSNR ratings, following calibration using the variable frame delay (VFD) algorithm that removes temporal mismatch between original and received videos. Clinical evaluation is based on atherosclerotic plaque ultrasound video assessment protocol. Experimental results show that adequate diagnostic quality wireless medical video communications are realized using the designed telemedicine platform. HSPA cellular networks provide for ultrasound video transmission at the acquired resolution, while VFD algorithm utilization bridges objective and subjective ratings. PMID:23573082

  3. Quality metric for spherical panoramic video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zakharchenko, Vladyslav; Choi, Kwang Pyo; Park, Jeong Hoon

    2016-09-01

    Virtual reality (VR)/ augmented reality (AR) applications allow users to view artificial content of a surrounding space simulating presence effect with a help of special applications or devices. Synthetic contents production is well known process form computer graphics domain and pipeline has been already fixed in the industry. However emerging multimedia formats for immersive entertainment applications such as free-viewpoint television (FTV) or spherical panoramic video require different approaches in content management and quality assessment. The international standardization on FTV has been promoted by MPEG. This paper is dedicated to discussion of immersive media distribution format and quality estimation process. Accuracy and reliability of the proposed objective quality estimation method had been verified with spherical panoramic images demonstrating good correlation results with subjective quality estimation held by a group of experts.

  4. Source-Adaptation-Based Wireless Video Transport: A Cross-Layer Approach

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Qu, Qi; Pei, Yong; Modestino, James W.; Tian, Xusheng

    2006-12-01

    Real-time packet video transmission over wireless networks is expected to experience bursty packet losses that can cause substantial degradation to the transmitted video quality. In wireless networks, channel state information is hard to obtain in a reliable and timely manner due to the rapid change of wireless environments. However, the source motion information is always available and can be obtained easily and accurately from video sequences. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a novel cross-layer framework that exploits only the motion information inherent in video sequences and efficiently combines a packetization scheme, a cross-layer forward error correction (FEC)-based unequal error protection (UEP) scheme, an intracoding rate selection scheme as well as a novel intraframe interleaving scheme. Our objective and subjective results demonstrate that the proposed approach is very effective in dealing with the bursty packet losses occurring on wireless networks without incurring any additional implementation complexity or delay. Thus, the simplicity of our proposed system has important implications for the implementation of a practical real-time video transmission system.

  5. Investigating the quality of video consultations performed using fourth generation (4G) mobile telecommunications.

    PubMed

    Caffery, Liam J; Smith, Anthony C

    2015-09-01

    The use of fourth-generation (4G) mobile telecommunications to provide real-time video consultations were investigated in this study with the aims of determining if 4G is a suitable telecommunications technology; and secondly, to identify if variation in perceived audio and video quality were due to underlying network performance. Three patient end-points that used 4G Internet connections were evaluated. Consulting clinicians recorded their perception of audio and video quality using the International Telecommunications Union scales during clinics with these patient end-points. These scores were used to calculate a mean opinion score (MOS). The network performance metrics were obtained for each session and the relationships between these metrics and the session's quality scores were tested. Clinicians scored the quality of 50 hours of video consultations, involving 36 clinic sessions. The MOS for audio was 4.1 ± 0.62 and the MOS for video was 4.4 ± 0.22. Image impairment and effort to listen were also rated favourably. There was no correlation between audio or video quality and the network metrics of packet loss or jitter. These findings suggest that 4G networks are an appropriate telecommunication technology to deliver real-time video consultations. Variations in quality scores observed during this study were not explained by the packet loss and jitter in the underlying network. Before establishing a telemedicine service, the performance of the 4G network should be assessed at the location of the proposed service. This is due to known variability in performance of 4G networks. © The Author(s) 2015.

  6. The influence of motion quality on responses towards video playback stimuli.

    PubMed

    Ware, Emma; Saunders, Daniel R; Troje, Nikolaus F

    2015-05-11

    Visual motion, a critical cue in communication, can be manipulated and studied using video playback methods. A primary concern for the video playback researcher is the degree to which objects presented on video appear natural to the non-human subject. Here we argue that the quality of motion cues on video, as determined by the video's image presentation rate (IPR), are of particular importance in determining a subject's social response behaviour. We present an experiment testing the effect of variations in IPR on pigeon (Columbia livia) response behaviour towards video images of courting opposite sex partners. Male and female pigeons were presented with three video playback stimuli, each containing a different social partner. Each stimulus was then modified to appear at one of three IPRs: 15, 30 or 60 progressive (p) frames per second. The results showed that courtship behaviour became significantly longer in duration as IPR increased. This finding implies that the IPR significantly affects the perceived quality of motion cues impacting social behaviour. In males we found that the duration of courtship also depended on the social partner viewed and that this effect interacted with the effects of IPR on behaviour. Specifically, the effect of social partner reached statistical significance only when the stimuli were displayed at 60 p, demonstrating the potential for erroneous results when insufficient IPRs are used. In addition to demonstrating the importance of IPR in video playback experiments, these findings help to highlight and describe the role of visual motion processing in communication behaviour. © 2015. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd.

  7. Real-time video streaming of sonographic clips using domestic internet networks and free videoconferencing software.

    PubMed

    Liteplo, Andrew S; Noble, Vicki E; Attwood, Ben H C

    2011-11-01

    As the use of point-of-care sonography spreads, so too does the need for remote expert over-reading via telesonogrpahy. We sought to assess the feasibility of using familiar, widespread, and cost-effective existent technology to allow remote over-reading of sonograms in real time and to compare 4 different methods of transmission and communication for both the feasibility of transmission and image quality. Sonographic video clips were transmitted using 2 different connections (WiFi and 3G) and via 2 different videoconferencing modalities (iChat [Apple Inc, Cupertino, CA] and Skype [Skype Software Sàrl, Luxembourg]), for a total of 4 different permutations. The clips were received at a remote location and recorded and then scored by expert reviewers for image quality, resolution, and detail. Wireless transmission of sonographic clips was feasible in all cases when WiFi was used and when Skype was used over a 3G connection. Images transmitted via a WiFi connection were statistically superior to those transmitted via 3G in all parameters of quality (average P = .031), and those sent by iChat were superior to those sent by Skype but not statistically so (average P = .057). Wireless transmission of sonographic video clips using inexpensive hardware, free videoconferencing software, and domestic Internet networks is feasible with retention of image quality sufficient for interpretation. WiFi transmission results in greater image quality than transmission by a 3G network.

  8. Video quality of 3G videophones for telephone cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

    PubMed

    Tränkler, Uwe; Hagen, Oddvar; Horsch, Alexander

    2008-01-01

    We simulated a cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) scene with a manikin and used two 3G videophones on the caller's side to transmit video to a laptop PC. Five observers (two doctors with experience in emergency medicine and three paramedics) evaluated the video. They judged whether the manikin was breathing and whether they would give advice for CPR; they also graded the confidence of their decision-making. Breathing was only visible from certain orientations of the videophones, at distances below 150 cm with good illumination and a still background. Since the phones produced a degradation in colours and shadows, detection of breathing mainly depended on moving contours. Low camera positioning produced better results than having the camera high up. Darkness, shaking of the camera and a moving background made detection of breathing almost impossible. The video from the two 3G videophones that were tested was of sufficient quality for telephone CPR provided that camera orientation, distance, illumination and background were carefully chosen. Thus it seems possible to use 3G videophones for emergency calls involving CPR. However, further studies on the required video quality in different scenarios are necessary.

  9. Video error concealment using block matching and frequency selective extrapolation algorithms

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    P. K., Rajani; Khaparde, Arti

    2017-06-01

    Error Concealment (EC) is a technique at the decoder side to hide the transmission errors. It is done by analyzing the spatial or temporal information from available video frames. It is very important to recover distorted video because they are used for various applications such as video-telephone, video-conference, TV, DVD, internet video streaming, video games etc .Retransmission-based and resilient-based methods, are also used for error removal. But these methods add delay and redundant data. So error concealment is the best option for error hiding. In this paper, the error concealment methods such as Block Matching error concealment algorithm is compared with Frequency Selective Extrapolation algorithm. Both the works are based on concealment of manually error video frames as input. The parameter used for objective quality measurement was PSNR (Peak Signal to Noise Ratio) and SSIM(Structural Similarity Index). The original video frames along with error video frames are compared with both the Error concealment algorithms. According to simulation results, Frequency Selective Extrapolation is showing better quality measures such as 48% improved PSNR and 94% increased SSIM than Block Matching Algorithm.

  10. Study of efficient video compression algorithms for space shuttle applications

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Poo, Z.

    1975-01-01

    Results are presented of a study on video data compression techniques applicable to space flight communication. This study is directed towards monochrome (black and white) picture communication with special emphasis on feasibility of hardware implementation. The primary factors for such a communication system in space flight application are: picture quality, system reliability, power comsumption, and hardware weight. In terms of hardware implementation, these are directly related to hardware complexity, effectiveness of the hardware algorithm, immunity of the source code to channel noise, and data transmission rate (or transmission bandwidth). A system is recommended, and its hardware requirement summarized. Simulations of the study were performed on the improved LIM video controller which is computer-controlled by the META-4 CPU.

  11. Trans-Pacific tele-ultrasound image transmission of fetal central nervous system structures.

    PubMed

    Ferreira, Adilson Cunha; Araujo Júnior, Edward; Martins, Wellington P; Jordão, João Francisco; Oliani, Antônio Hélio; Meagher, Simon E; Da Silva Costa, Fabricio

    2015-01-01

    To assess the quality of images and video clips of fetal central nervous (CNS) structures obtained by ultrasound and transmitted via tele-ultrasound from Brazil to Australia. In this cross-sectional study, 15 normal singleton pregnant women between 20 and 26 weeks were selected. Fetal CNS structures were obtained by images and video clips. The exams were transmitted in real-time using a broadband internet and an inexpensive video streaming device. Four blinded examiners evaluated the quality of the exams using the Likert scale. We calculated the mean, standard deviation, mean difference, and p values were obtained from paired t tests. The quality of the original video clips was slightly better than that observed by the transmitted video clips; mean difference considering all observers = 0.23 points. In 47/60 comparisons (78.3%; 95% CI = 66.4-86.9%) the quality of the video clips were judged to be the same. In 182/240 still images (75.8%; 95% CI = 70.0-80.8%) the scores of transmitted image were considered the same as the original. We demonstrated that long distance tele-ultrasound transmission of fetal CNS structures using an inexpensive video streaming device provided images of subjective good quality.

  12. No-Reference Video Quality Assessment Based on Statistical Analysis in 3D-DCT Domain.

    PubMed

    Li, Xuelong; Guo, Qun; Lu, Xiaoqiang

    2016-05-13

    It is an important task to design models for universal no-reference video quality assessment (NR-VQA) in multiple video processing and computer vision applications. However, most existing NR-VQA metrics are designed for specific distortion types which are not often aware in practical applications. A further deficiency is that the spatial and temporal information of videos is hardly considered simultaneously. In this paper, we propose a new NR-VQA metric based on the spatiotemporal natural video statistics (NVS) in 3D discrete cosine transform (3D-DCT) domain. In the proposed method, a set of features are firstly extracted based on the statistical analysis of 3D-DCT coefficients to characterize the spatiotemporal statistics of videos in different views. These features are used to predict the perceived video quality via the efficient linear support vector regression (SVR) model afterwards. The contributions of this paper are: 1) we explore the spatiotemporal statistics of videos in 3DDCT domain which has the inherent spatiotemporal encoding advantage over other widely used 2D transformations; 2) we extract a small set of simple but effective statistical features for video visual quality prediction; 3) the proposed method is universal for multiple types of distortions and robust to different databases. The proposed method is tested on four widely used video databases. Extensive experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method is competitive with the state-of-art NR-VQA metrics and the top-performing FR-VQA and RR-VQA metrics.

  13. A time-varying subjective quality model for mobile streaming videos with stalling events

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ghadiyaram, Deepti; Pan, Janice; Bovik, Alan C.

    2015-09-01

    Over-the-top mobile video streaming is invariably influenced by volatile network conditions which cause playback interruptions (stalling events), thereby impairing users' quality of experience (QoE). Developing models that can accurately predict users' QoE could enable the more efficient design of quality-control protocols for video streaming networks that reduce network operational costs while still delivering high-quality video content to the customers. Existing objective models that predict QoE are based on global video features, such as the number of stall events and their lengths, and are trained and validated on a small pool of ad hoc video datasets, most of which are not publicly available. The model we propose in this work goes beyond previous models as it also accounts for the fundamental effect that a viewer's recent level of satisfaction or dissatisfaction has on their overall viewing experience. In other words, the proposed model accounts for and adapts to the recency, or hysteresis effect caused by a stall event in addition to accounting for the lengths, frequency of occurrence, and the positions of stall events - factors that interact in a complex way to affect a user's QoE. On the recently introduced LIVE-Avvasi Mobile Video Database, which consists of 180 distorted videos of varied content that are afflicted solely with over 25 unique realistic stalling events, we trained and validated our model to accurately predict the QoE, attaining standout QoE prediction performance.

  14. Home Telehealth Video Conferencing: Perceptions and Performance

    PubMed Central

    Morris, Greg; Pech, Joanne; Rechter, Stuart; Carati, Colin; Kidd, Michael R

    2015-01-01

    Background The Flinders Telehealth in the Home trial (FTH trial), conducted in South Australia, was an action research initiative to test and evaluate the inclusion of telehealth services and broadband access technologies for palliative care patients living in the community and home-based rehabilitation services for the elderly at home. Telehealth services at home were supported by video conferencing between a therapist, nurse or doctor, and a patient using the iPad tablet. Objective The aims of this study are to identify which technical factors influence the quality of video conferencing in the home setting and to assess the impact of these factors on the clinical perceptions and acceptance of video conferencing for health care delivery into the home. Finally, we aim to identify any relationships between technical factors and clinical acceptance of this technology. Methods An action research process developed several quantitative and qualitative procedures during the FTH trial to investigate technology performance and users perceptions of the technology including measurements of signal power, data transmission throughput, objective assessment of user perceptions of videoconference quality, and questionnaires administered to clinical users. Results The effectiveness of telehealth was judged by clinicians as equivalent to or better than a home visit on 192 (71.6%, 192/268) occasions, and clinicians rated the experience of conducting a telehealth session compared with a home visit as equivalent or better in 90.3% (489/540) of the sessions. It was found that the quality of video conferencing when using a third generation mobile data service (3G) in comparison to broadband fiber-based services was concerning as 23.5% (220/936) of the calls failed during the telehealth sessions. The experimental field tests indicated that video conferencing audio and video quality was worse when using mobile data services compared with fiber to the home services. As well, statistically

  15. 47 CFR 79.3 - Video description of video programming.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

    2014-10-01

    ... transmission by a video programming distributor. (8) Children's Programming. Television programming directed at children 16 years of age and under. (b) The following video programming distributors must provide... or on children's programming, on each programming stream on which they carry one of the top four...

  16. 21 CFR 26.43 - Transmission of quality system evaluation reports.

    Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

    2010-04-01

    ... QUALITY SYSTEM AUDIT REPORTS, AND CERTAIN MEDICAL DEVICE PRODUCT EVALUATION REPORTS: UNITED STATES AND THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITY Specific Sector Provisions for Medical Devices § 26.43 Transmission of quality system... 21 Food and Drugs 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Transmission of quality system evaluation reports...

  17. A randomized controlled trial of an educational video to improve quality of bowel preparation for colonoscopy.

    PubMed

    Park, Jin-Seok; Kim, Min Su; Kim, HyungKil; Kim, Shin Il; Shin, Chun Ho; Lee, Hyun Jung; Lee, Won Seop; Moon, Soyoung

    2016-06-17

    High-quality bowel preparation is necessary for colonoscopy. A few studies have been conducted to investigate improvement in bowel preparation quality through patient education. However, the effect of patient education on bowel preparation has not been well studied. A randomized and prospective study was conducted. All patients received regular instruction for bowel preparation during a pre-colonoscopy visit. Those scheduled for colonoscopy were randomly assigned to view an educational video instruction (video group) on the day before the colonoscopy, or to a non-video (control) group. Qualities of bowel preparation using the Ottawa Bowel Preparation Quality scale (Ottawa score) were compared between the video and non-video groups. In addition, factors associated with poor bowel preparation were investigated. A total of 502 patients were randomized, 250 to the video group and 252 to the non-video group. The video group exhibited better bowel preparation (mean Ottawa total score: 3.03 ± 1.9) than the non-video group (4.21 ± 1.9; P < 0.001) and had good bowel preparation for colonoscopy (total Ottawa score <6: 91.6 % vs. 78.5 %; P < 0.001). Multivariate analysis revealed that males (odds ratio [OR] = 1.95, P = 0.029), diabetes mellitus patients (OR = 2.79, P = 0.021), and non-use of visual aids (OR = 3.09, P < 0.001) were associated with poor bowel preparation. In the comparison of the colonoscopic outcomes between groups, the polyp detection rate was not significantly different between video group and non-video group (48/250, 19.2 % vs. 48/252, 19.0 %; P = 0.963), but insertion time was significantly short in video group (5.5 ± 3.2 min) than non-video group (6.1 ± 3.7 min; P = 0.043). The addition of an educational video could improve the quality of bowel preparation in comparison with standard preparation method. Clinical Research Information Service KCT0001836 . The date of registration: March, 08

  18. Concerns of Quality and Safety in Public Domain Surgical Education Videos: An Assessment of the Critical View of Safety in Frequently Used Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy Videos.

    PubMed

    Deal, Shanley B; Alseidi, Adnan A

    2017-12-01

    Online videos are among the most common resources for case preparation. Using crowd sourcing, we evaluated the relationship between operative quality and viewing characteristics of online laparoscopic cholecystectomy videos. We edited 160 online videos of laparoscopic cholecystectomy to 60 seconds or less. Crowd workers (CW) rated videos using Global Objective Assessment of Laparoscopic Skills (GOALS), the critical view of safety (CVS) criteria, and assigned overall pass/fail ratings if CVS was achieved; linear mixed effects models derived average ratings. Views, likes, dislikes, subscribers, and country were recorded for subset analysis of YouTube videos. Spearman correlation coefficient (SCC) assessed correlation between performance measures. One video (0.06%) achieved a passing CVS score of ≥5; 23%, ≥4; 44%, ≥3; 79%, ≥2; and 100% ≥1. Pass/fail ratings correlated to CVS, SCC 0.95 (p < 0.001) and to GOALS, SCC 0.79 (p < 0.001). YouTube videos (n = 139) with higher views, likes, or subscribers did not correlate with better quality. The average CVS and GOALS scores were no different for videos with >20,000 views (22%) compared with those with <20,000 (78%). There is an incredibly low frequency of CVS and average GOALS technical performance in frequently used online surgical videos of LC. Favorable characteristics, such as number of views or likes, do not translate to higher quality. Copyright © 2017 American College of Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  19. Digital compression algorithms for HDTV transmission

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Adkins, Kenneth C.; Shalkhauser, Mary JO; Bibyk, Steven B.

    1990-01-01

    Digital compression of video images is a possible avenue for high definition television (HDTV) transmission. Compression needs to be optimized while picture quality remains high. Two techniques for compression the digital images are explained and comparisons are drawn between the human vision system and artificial compression techniques. Suggestions for improving compression algorithms through the use of neural and analog circuitry are given.

  20. Video quality assessment based on correlation between spatiotemporal motion energies

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yan, Peng; Mou, Xuanqin

    2016-09-01

    Video quality assessment (VQA) has been a hot research topic because of rapid increase of huge demand of video communications. From the earliest PSNR metric to advanced models that are perceptual aware, researchers have made great progress in this field by introducing properties of human vision system (HVS) into VQA model design. Among various algorithms that model the property of HVS perceiving motion, the spatiotemporal energy model has been validated to be high consistent with psychophysical experiments. In this paper, we take the spatiotemporal energy model into VQA model design by the following steps. 1) According to the pristine spatiotemporal energy model proposed by Adelson et al, we apply the linear filters, which are oriented in space-time and tuned in spatial frequency, to filter the reference and test videos respectively. The outputs of quadrature pairs of above filters are then squared and summed to give two measures of motion energy, which are named rightward and leftward energy responses, respectively. 2) Based on the pristine model, we calculate summation of the rightward and leftward energy responses as spatiotemporal features to represent perceptual quality information for videos, named total spatiotemporal motion energy maps. 3) The proposed FR-VQA model, named STME, is calculated with statistics based on the pixel-wise correlation between the total spatiotemporal motion energy maps of the reference and distorted videos. The STME model was validated on the LIVE VQA Database by comparing with existing FR-VQA models. Experimental results show that STME performs with excellent prediction accuracy and stays in state-of-the-art VQA models.

  1. Interactional Quality Depicted in Infant and Toddler Videos: Where Are the Interactions?

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Fenstermacher, Susan K.; Barr, Rachel; Brey, Elizabeth; Pempek, Tiffany A.; Ryan, Maureen; Calvert, Sandra L.; Shwery, Clay E.; Linebarger, Deborah

    2010-01-01

    This study examined the social-emotional content and the quality of social interactions depicted in a sample of 58 DVDs marketed towards infants and toddlers. Infant-directed videos rarely used social interactions between caregiver and child or between peers to present content. Even when videos explicitly targeted social-emotional content,…

  2. High-quality and small-capacity e-learning video featuring lecturer-superimposing PC screen images

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nomura, Yoshihiko; Murakami, Michinobu; Sakamoto, Ryota; Sugiura, Tokuhiro; Matsui, Hirokazu; Kato, Norihiko

    2006-10-01

    Information processing and communication technology are progressing quickly, and are prevailing throughout various technological fields. Therefore, the development of such technology should respond to the needs for improvement of quality in the e-learning education system. The authors propose a new video-image compression processing system that ingeniously employs the features of the lecturing scene. While dynamic lecturing scene is shot by a digital video camera, screen images are electronically stored by a PC screen image capturing software in relatively long period at a practical class. Then, a lecturer and a lecture stick are extracted from the digital video images by pattern recognition techniques, and the extracted images are superimposed on the appropriate PC screen images by off-line processing. Thus, we have succeeded to create a high-quality and small-capacity (HQ/SC) video-on-demand educational content featuring the advantages: the high quality of image sharpness, the small electronic file capacity, and the realistic lecturer motion.

  3. Segment scheduling method for reducing 360° video streaming latency

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gudumasu, Srinivas; Asbun, Eduardo; He, Yong; Ye, Yan

    2017-09-01

    360° video is an emerging new format in the media industry enabled by the growing availability of virtual reality devices. It provides the viewer a new sense of presence and immersion. Compared to conventional rectilinear video (2D or 3D), 360° video poses a new and difficult set of engineering challenges on video processing and delivery. Enabling comfortable and immersive user experience requires very high video quality and very low latency, while the large video file size poses a challenge to delivering 360° video in a quality manner at scale. Conventionally, 360° video represented in equirectangular or other projection formats can be encoded as a single standards-compliant bitstream using existing video codecs such as H.264/AVC or H.265/HEVC. Such method usually needs very high bandwidth to provide an immersive user experience. While at the client side, much of such high bandwidth and the computational power used to decode the video are wasted because the user only watches a small portion (i.e., viewport) of the entire picture. Viewport dependent 360°video processing and delivery approaches spend more bandwidth on the viewport than on non-viewports and are therefore able to reduce the overall transmission bandwidth. This paper proposes a dual buffer segment scheduling algorithm for viewport adaptive streaming methods to reduce latency when switching between high quality viewports in 360° video streaming. The approach decouples the scheduling of viewport segments and non-viewport segments to ensure the viewport segment requested matches the latest user head orientation. A base layer buffer stores all lower quality segments, and a viewport buffer stores high quality viewport segments corresponding to the most recent viewer's head orientation. The scheduling scheme determines viewport requesting time based on the buffer status and the head orientation. This paper also discusses how to deploy the proposed scheduling design for various viewport adaptive video

  4. A model linking video gaming, sleep quality, sweet drinks consumption and obesity among children and youth.

    PubMed

    Turel, O; Romashkin, A; Morrison, K M

    2017-08-01

    There is a growing need to curb paediatric obesity. The aim of this study is to untangle associations between video-game-use attributes and obesity as a first step towards identifying and examining possible interventions. Cross-sectional time-lagged cohort study was employed using parent-child surveys (t1) and objective physical activity and physiological measures (t2) from 125 children/adolescents (mean age = 13.06, 9-17-year-olds) who play video games, recruited from two clinics at a Canadian academic children's hospital. Structural equation modelling and analysis of covariance were employed for inference. The results of the study are as follows: (i) self-reported video-game play duration in the 4-h window before bedtime is related to greater abdominal adiposity (waist-to-height ratio) and this association may be mediated through reduced sleep quality (measured with the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index); and (ii) self-reported average video-game session duration is associated with greater abdominal adiposity and this association may be mediated through higher self-reported sweet drinks consumption while playing video games and reduced sleep quality. Video-game play duration in the 4-h window before bedtime, typical video-game session duration, sweet drinks consumption while playing video games and poor sleep quality have aversive associations with abdominal adiposity. Paediatricians and researchers should further explore how these factors can be altered through behavioural or pharmacological interventions as a means to reduce paediatric obesity. © 2017 World Obesity Federation.

  5. RD Optimized, Adaptive, Error-Resilient Transmission of MJPEG2000-Coded Video over Multiple Time-Varying Channels

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bezan, Scott; Shirani, Shahram

    2006-12-01

    To reliably transmit video over error-prone channels, the data should be both source and channel coded. When multiple channels are available for transmission, the problem extends to that of partitioning the data across these channels. The condition of transmission channels, however, varies with time. Therefore, the error protection added to the data at one instant of time may not be optimal at the next. In this paper, we propose a method for adaptively adding error correction code in a rate-distortion (RD) optimized manner using rate-compatible punctured convolutional codes to an MJPEG2000 constant rate-coded frame of video. We perform an analysis on the rate-distortion tradeoff of each of the coding units (tiles and packets) in each frame and adapt the error correction code assigned to the unit taking into account the bandwidth and error characteristics of the channels. This method is applied to both single and multiple time-varying channel environments. We compare our method with a basic protection method in which data is either not transmitted, transmitted with no protection, or transmitted with a fixed amount of protection. Simulation results show promising performance for our proposed method.

  6. Video Monitoring a Simulation-Based Quality Improvement Program in Bihar, India.

    PubMed

    Dyer, Jessica; Spindler, Hilary; Christmas, Amelia; Shah, Malay Bharat; Morgan, Melissa; Cohen, Susanna R; Sterne, Jason; Mahapatra, Tanmay; Walker, Dilys

    2018-04-01

    Simulation-based training has become an accepted clinical training andragogy in high-resource settings with its use increasing in low-resource settings. Video recordings of simulated scenarios are commonly used by facilitators. Beyond using the videos during debrief sessions, researchers can also analyze the simulation videos to quantify technical and nontechnical skills during simulated scenarios over time. Little is known about the feasibility and use of large-scale systems to video record and analyze simulation and debriefing data for monitoring and evaluation in low-resource settings. This manuscript describes the process of designing and implementing a large-scale video monitoring system. Mentees and Mentors were consented and all simulations and debriefs conducted at 320 Primary Health Centers (PHCs) were video recorded. The system design, number of video recordings, and inter-rater reliability of the coded videos were assessed. The final dataset included a total of 11,278 videos. Overall, a total of 2,124 simulation videos were coded and 183 (12%) were blindly double-coded. For the double-coded sample, the average inter-rater reliability (IRR) scores were 80% for nontechnical skills, and 94% for clinical technical skills. Among 4,450 long debrief videos received, 216 were selected for coding and all were double-coded. Data quality of simulation videos was found to be very good in terms of recorded instances of "unable to see" and "unable to hear" in Phases 1 and 2. This study demonstrates that video monitoring systems can be effectively implemented at scale in resource limited settings. Further, video monitoring systems can play several vital roles within program implementation, including monitoring and evaluation, provision of actionable feedback to program implementers, and assurance of program fidelity.

  7. Progressive video coding for noisy channels

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kim, Beong-Jo; Xiong, Zixiang; Pearlman, William A.

    1998-10-01

    We extend the work of Sherwood and Zeger to progressive video coding for noisy channels. By utilizing a 3D extension of the set partitioning in hierarchical trees (SPIHT) algorithm, we cascade the resulting 3D SPIHT video coder with a rate-compatible punctured convolutional channel coder for transmission of video over a binary symmetric channel. Progressive coding is achieved by increasing the target rate of the 3D embedded SPIHT video coder as the channel condition improves. The performance of our proposed coding system is acceptable at low transmission rate and bad channel conditions. Its low complexity makes it suitable for emerging applications such as video over wireless channels.

  8. Compressed ultrasound video image-quality evaluation using a Likert scale and Kappa statistical analysis

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Stewart, Brent K.; Carter, Stephen J.; Langer, Steven G.; Andrew, Rex K.

    1998-06-01

    Experiments using NASA's Advanced Communications Technology Satellite were conducted to provide an estimate of the compressed video quality required for preservation of clinically relevant features for the detection of trauma. Bandwidth rates of 128, 256 and 384 kbps were used. A five point Likert scale (1 equals no useful information and 5 equals good diagnostic quality) was used for a subjective preference questionnaire to evaluate the quality of the compressed ultrasound imagery at the three compression rates for several anatomical regions of interest. At 384 kbps the Likert scores (mean plus or minus SD) were abdomen (4.45 plus or minus 0.71), carotid artery (4.70 plus or minus 0.36), kidney (5.0 plus or minus 0.0), liver (4.67 plus or minus 0.58) and thyroid (4.03 plus or minus 0.74). Due to the volatile nature of the H.320 compressed digital video stream, no statistically significant results can be derived through this methodology. As the MPEG standard has at its roots many of the same intraframe and motion vector compression algorithms as the H.261 (such as that used in the previous ACTS/AMT experiments), we are using the MPEG compressed video sequences to best gauge what minimum bandwidths are necessary for preservation of clinically relevant features for the detection of trauma. We have been using an MPEG codec board to collect losslessly compressed video clips from high quality S- VHS tapes and through direct digitization of S-video. Due to the large number of videoclips and questions to be presented to the radiologists and for ease of application, we have developed a web browser interface for this video visual perception study. Due to the large numbers of observations required to reach statistical significance in most ROC studies, Kappa statistical analysis is used to analyze the degree of agreement between observers and between viewing assessment. If the degree of agreement amongst readers is high, then there is a possibility that the ratings (i

  9. Educational Colonoscopy Video Enhances Bowel Preparation Quality and Comprehension in an Inner City Population.

    PubMed

    Pillai, Ajish; Menon, Radha; Oustecky, David; Ahmad, Asyia

    2017-07-24

    Quality of bowel preparation and patient knowledge remains a major barrier for completing colorectal cancer screening. Few studies have tested unique ways to impact patient understanding centering on interactive computer programs, pictures, and brochures. Two studies explored instructional videos but focused on patient compliance and anxiety as endpoints. Furthermore, excessive video length and content may limit their impact on a broad patient population. No study so far has studied a video's impact on preparation quality and patient understanding of the colonoscopy procedure. We conducted a single blinded prospective study of inner city patients presenting for a first time screening colonoscopy. During their initial visit patients were randomized to watch an instructional colonoscopy video or a video discussing gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). All patients watched a 6 minutes long video with the same spokesperson, completed a demographic questionnaire (Supplemental Digital Content 1, http://links.lww.com/JCG/A352) and were enrolled only if screened within 30 days of their visit. On the day of the colonoscopy, patients completed a 14 question quiz of their knowledge. Blinded endoscopist graded patient preparations based on the Ottawa scale. All authors had access to the study data and reviewed and approved the final manuscript. Among the 104 subjects enrolled in the study, 56 were in the colonoscopy video group, 48 were in GERD video group, and 12 were excluded. Overall, 48% were male and 52% female; 90% of patients had less than a high school education, 76% were African American, and 67% used a 4 L split-dose preparation. There were no differences between either video group with regard to any of the above categories. Comparisons between the 2 groups revealed that the colonoscopy video group had significantly better Ottawa bowel preparation score (4.77 vs. 6.85; P=0.01) than the GERD video group. The colonoscopy video group also had less-inadequate repeat

  10. POCIT portable optical communicators: VideoBeam and EtherBeam

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mecherle, G. Stephen; Holcomb, Terry L.

    1999-12-01

    LDSC is developing the POCITTM (Portable Optical Communication Integrated Transceiver) family of products which now includes VideoBeamTM and the latest addition, EtherBeamTM. Each is a full duplex portable laser communicator: VideoBeamTM providing near-broadcast- quality analog video and stereo audio, and EtherBeamTM providing standard Ethernet connectivity. Each POCITTM transceiver consists of a 3.5-pound unit with a binocular- type form factor, which can be manually pointed, tripod- mounted or gyro-stabilized. Both units have an operational range of over two miles (clear air) with excellent jam- resistance and low probability of interception characteristics. The transmission wavelength of 1550 nm enables Class I eyesafe operation (ANSI, IEC). The POCITTM units are ideally suited for numerous miliary scenarios, surveillance/espionage, industrial precious mineral exploration, and campus video teleconferencing applications.

  11. Layered Wyner-Ziv video coding.

    PubMed

    Xu, Qian; Xiong, Zixiang

    2006-12-01

    Following recent theoretical works on successive Wyner-Ziv coding (WZC), we propose a practical layered Wyner-Ziv video coder using the DCT, nested scalar quantization, and irregular LDPC code based Slepian-Wolf coding (or lossless source coding with side information at the decoder). Our main novelty is to use the base layer of a standard scalable video coder (e.g., MPEG-4/H.26L FGS or H.263+) as the decoder side information and perform layered WZC for quality enhancement. Similar to FGS coding, there is no performance difference between layered and monolithic WZC when the enhancement bitstream is generated in our proposed coder. Using an H.26L coded version as the base layer, experiments indicate that WZC gives slightly worse performance than FGS coding when the channel (for both the base and enhancement layers) is noiseless. However, when the channel is noisy, extensive simulations of video transmission over wireless networks conforming to the CDMA2000 1X standard show that H.26L base layer coding plus Wyner-Ziv enhancement layer coding are more robust against channel errors than H.26L FGS coding. These results demonstrate that layered Wyner-Ziv video coding is a promising new technique for video streaming over wireless networks.

  12. Sensor and Video Monitoring of Water Quality at Bristol Floating Harbour

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chen, Yiheng; Han, Dawei

    2017-04-01

    Water system is an essential component in a smart city for its sustainability and resilience. The harbourside is a focal area of​ ​Bristol with new buildings and features redeveloped in the last ten years, attracting numerous visitors by the diversity of attractions and beautiful views. There is a strong​ ​relationship between the satisfactory of the visitors and local people with the water quality in the Harbour. The freshness and beauty of the water body would please people as well as benefit the aquatic ecosystems. As we are entering a data-rich era, this pilot project aims to explore the concept of using​ ​ video cameras and smart sensors to collect and monitor water quality condition at the Bristol harbourside. The video cameras and smart sensors are connected to the Bristol Is Open network, an open programmable city platform. This will be the​ first​ attempt to collect water quality data in real time in the​ ​Bristol urban area with the wireless network. The videos and images of the water body collected by the cameras will be correlated with the in-situ water quality parameters for research​ ​purposes. The successful implementation of the sensors can attract more academic researchers and industrial partners to expand the sensor network to multiple locations​ ​around the city covering the other parts of the Harbour and River Avon, leading to a new generation of urban system infrastructure model.

  13. SCTP as scalable video coding transport

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ortiz, Jordi; Graciá, Eduardo Martínez; Skarmeta, Antonio F.

    2013-12-01

    This study presents an evaluation of the Stream Transmission Control Protocol (SCTP) for the transport of the scalable video codec (SVC), proposed by MPEG as an extension to H.264/AVC. Both technologies fit together properly. On the one hand, SVC permits to split easily the bitstream into substreams carrying different video layers, each with different importance for the reconstruction of the complete video sequence at the receiver end. On the other hand, SCTP includes features, such as the multi-streaming and multi-homing capabilities, that permit to transport robustly and efficiently the SVC layers. Several transmission strategies supported on baseline SCTP and its concurrent multipath transfer (CMT) extension are compared with the classical solutions based on the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Realtime Transmission Protocol (RTP). Using ns-2 simulations, it is shown that CMT-SCTP outperforms TCP and RTP in error-prone networking environments. The comparison is established according to several performance measurements, including delay, throughput, packet loss, and peak signal-to-noise ratio of the received video.

  14. The quality of video information on burn first aid available on YouTube.

    PubMed

    Butler, Daniel P; Perry, Fiona; Shah, Zameer; Leon-Villapalos, Jorge

    2013-08-01

    To evaluate the clinical accuracy and delivery of information on thermal burn first aid available on the leading video-streaming website, YouTube. YouTube was searched using four separate search terms. The first 20 videos identified for each search term were included in the study if their primary focus was on thermal burn first aid. Videos were scored by two independent reviewers using a standardised scoring system and the scores totalled to give each video an overall score out of 20. A total of 47 videos were analysed. The average video score was 8.5 out of a possible 20. No videos scored full-marks. A low correlation was found between the score given by the independent reviewers and the number of views the video received per month (Spearman's rank correlation co-efficient=0.03, p=0.86). The current standard of videos covering thermal burn first aid available on YouTube is unsatisfactory. In addition to this, viewers do not appear to be drawn to videos of higher quality. Organisations involved in managing burns and providing first aid care should be encouraged to produce clear, structured videos that can be made available on leading video streaming websites. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd and ISBI. All rights reserved.

  15. Quality evaluation of motion-compensated edge artifacts in compressed video.

    PubMed

    Leontaris, Athanasios; Cosman, Pamela C; Reibman, Amy R

    2007-04-01

    Little attention has been paid to an impairment common in motion-compensated video compression: the addition of high-frequency (HF) energy as motion compensation displaces blocking artifacts off block boundaries. In this paper, we employ an energy-based approach to measure this motion-compensated edge artifact, using both compressed bitstream information and decoded pixels. We evaluate the performance of our proposed metric, along with several blocking and blurring metrics, on compressed video in two ways. First, ordinal scales are evaluated through a series of expectations that a good quality metric should satisfy: the objective evaluation. Then, the best performing metrics are subjectively evaluated. The same subjective data set is finally used to obtain interval scales to gain more insight. Experimental results show that we accurately estimate the percentage of the added HF energy in compressed video.

  16. Wireless live streaming video of laparoscopic surgery: a bandwidth analysis for handheld computers.

    PubMed

    Gandsas, Alex; McIntire, Katherine; George, Ivan M; Witzke, Wayne; Hoskins, James D; Park, Adrian

    2002-01-01

    Over the last six years, streaming media has emerged as a powerful tool for delivering multimedia content over networks. Concurrently, wireless technology has evolved, freeing users from desktop boundaries and wired infrastructures. At the University of Kentucky Medical Center, we have integrated these technologies to develop a system that can wirelessly transmit live surgery from the operating room to a handheld computer. This study establishes the feasibility of using our system to view surgeries and describes the effect of bandwidth on image quality. A live laparoscopic ventral hernia repair was transmitted to a single handheld computer using five encoding speeds at a constant frame rate, and the quality of the resulting streaming images was evaluated. No video images were rendered when video data were encoded at 28.8 kilobytes per second (Kbps), the slowest encoding bitrate studied. The highest quality images were rendered at encoding speeds greater than or equal to 150 Kbps. Of note, a 15 second transmission delay was experienced using all four encoding schemes that rendered video images. We believe that the wireless transmission of streaming video to handheld computers has tremendous potential to enhance surgical education. For medical students and residents, the ability to view live surgeries, lectures, courses and seminars on handheld computers means a larger number of learning opportunities. In addition, we envision that wireless enabled devices may be used to telemonitor surgical procedures. However, bandwidth availability and streaming delay are major issues that must be addressed before wireless telementoring becomes a reality.

  17. High-resolution, low-delay, and error-resilient medical ultrasound video communication using H.264/AVC over mobile WiMAX networks.

    PubMed

    Panayides, Andreas; Antoniou, Zinonas C; Mylonas, Yiannos; Pattichis, Marios S; Pitsillides, Andreas; Pattichis, Constantinos S

    2013-05-01

    In this study, we describe an effective video communication framework for the wireless transmission of H.264/AVC medical ultrasound video over mobile WiMAX networks. Medical ultrasound video is encoded using diagnostically-driven, error resilient encoding, where quantization levels are varied as a function of the diagnostic significance of each image region. We demonstrate how our proposed system allows for the transmission of high-resolution clinical video that is encoded at the clinical acquisition resolution and can then be decoded with low-delay. To validate performance, we perform OPNET simulations of mobile WiMAX Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical (PHY) layers characteristics that include service prioritization classes, different modulation and coding schemes, fading channels conditions, and mobility. We encode the medical ultrasound videos at the 4CIF (704 × 576) resolution that can accommodate clinical acquisition that is typically performed at lower resolutions. Video quality assessment is based on both clinical (subjective) and objective evaluations.

  18. Transmission of live laparoscopic surgery over the Internet2.

    PubMed

    Damore, L J; Johnson, J A; Dixon, R S; Iverson, M A; Ellison, E C; Melvin, W S

    1999-11-01

    Video broadcasting of surgical procedures is an important tool for education, training, and consultation. Current video conferencing systems are expensive and time-consuming and require preplanning. Real-time Internet video is known for its poor quality and relies on the equipment and the speed of the connection. The Internet2, a new high-speed (up to 2,048 Mbps), large bandwidth data network presently connects more than 100 universities and corporations. We have successfully used the Internet2 to broadcast the first real-time, high-quality audio/video program from a live laparoscopic operation to distant points. Video output of the laparoscopic camera and audio from a wireless microphone were broadcast to distant sites using a proprietary, PC-based implementation of H.320 video conferencing over a TCP/IP network connected to the Internet2. The receiving sites participated in two-way, real-time video and audio communications and graded the quality of the signal they received. On August 25, 1998, a laparoscopic Nissen fundoplication was transmitted to Internet2 stations in Colorado, Pennsylvania, and to an Internet station in New York. On September 28 and 29, 1998, we broadcast laparoscopic operations throughout both days to the Internet2 Fall Conference in San Francisco, California. Most recently, on February 24, 1999, we transmitted a laparoscopic Heller myotomy to the Abilene Network Launch Event in Washington, DC. The Internet2 is currently able to provide the bandwidth needed for a turn-key video conferencing system with high-resolution, real-time transmission. The system could be used for a variety of teaching and educational programs for experienced surgeons, residents, and medical students.

  19. Video on Diet Before Outpatient Colonoscopy Does Not Improve Quality of Bowel Preparation: A Prospective, Randomized, Controlled Trial.

    PubMed

    Rice, Sean C; Higginbotham, Tina; Dean, Melanie J; Slaughter, James C; Yachimski, Patrick S; Obstein, Keith L

    2016-11-01

    Successful outpatient colonoscopy (CLS) depends on many factors including the quality of a patient's bowel preparation. Although education on consumption of the pre-CLS purgative can improve bowel preparation quality, no study has evaluated dietary education alone. We have created an educational video on pre-CLS dietary instructions to determine whether dietary education would improve outpatient bowel preparation quality. A prospective randomized, blinded, controlled study of patients undergoing outpatient CLS was performed. All patients received a 4 l polyethylene glycol-based split-dose bowel preparation and standard institutional pre-procedure instructions. Patients were then randomly assigned to an intervention arm or to a no intervention arm. A 4-min educational video detailing clear liquid diet restriction was made available to patients in the intervention arm, whereas those randomized to no intervention did not have access to the video. Patients randomized to the video were provided with the YouTube video link 48-72 h before CLS. An attending endoscopist blinded to randomization performed the CLS. Bowel preparation quality was scored using the Boston Bowel Preparation Scale (BBPS). Adequate preparation was defined as a BBPS total score of ≥6 with all segment scores ≥2. Wilcoxon rank-sum and Pearson's χ 2 -tests were performed to assess differences between groups. Ninety-two patients were randomized (video: n=42; control: n=50) with 47 total video views being tallied. There were no demographic differences between groups. There was no statistically significant difference in adequate preparation between groups (video=74%; control=68%; P=0.54). The availability of a supplementary patient educational video on clear liquid diet alone was insufficient to improve bowel preparation quality when compared with standard pre-procedure instruction at our institution.

  20. Update on POCIT portable optical communicators: VideoBeam and EtherBeam

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mecherle, G. Stephen; Holcomb, Terry L.

    2000-05-01

    LDSC is developing the POCITTM (Portable Optical Communication Integrated Transceiver) family of products which includes VideoBeamTM and the latest addition, EtherBeamTM. Each is a full duplex portable laser communicator: VideoBeamTM providing near-broadcast- quality analog video and stereo audio, and EtherBeamTM providing standard Ethernet connectivity. Each POCITTM transceiver consists of a 3.5-pound unit with a binocular- type form factor, which can be manually pointed, tripod- mounted or gyro-stabilized. Both units have an operational range of over two miles (clear air) with excellent jam- resistance and low probability of interception characteristics. The transmission wavelength of 1550 nm enables Class 1 eyesafe operation (ANSI, IEC). The POCITTM units are ideally suited for numerous military scenarios, surveillance/espionage, industrial precious mineral exploration, and campus video teleconferencing applications. VideoBeam will be available second quarter 2000, followed by EtherBeam in third quarter 2000.

  1. Quality of pharmaceutical care at the pharmacy counter: patients' experiences versus video observation.

    PubMed

    Koster, Ellen S; Blom, Lyda; Overbeeke, Marloes R; Philbert, Daphne; Vervloet, Marcia; Koopman, Laura; van Dijk, Liset

    2016-01-01

    Consumer Quality Index questionnaires are used to assess quality of care from patients' experiences. To provide insight into the agreement about quality of pharmaceutical care, measured both by a patient questionnaire and video observations. Pharmaceutical encounters in four pharmacies were video-recorded. Patients completed a questionnaire based upon the Consumer Quality Index Pharmaceutical Care after the encounter containing questions about patients' experiences regarding information provision, medication counseling, and pharmacy staff's communication style. An observation protocol was used to code the recorded encounters. Agreement between video observation and patients' experiences was calculated. In total, 109 encounters were included for analysis. For the domains "medication counseling" and "communication style", agreement between patients' experiences and observations was very high (>90%). Less agreement (45%) was found for "information provision", which was rated more positive by patients compared to the observations, especially for the topic, encouragement of patients' questioning behavior. A questionnaire is useful to assess the quality of medication counseling and pharmacy staff's communication style, but might be less suitable to evaluate information provision and pharmacy staff's encouragement of patients' questioning behavior. Although patients may believe that they have received all necessary information to use their new medicine, some information on specific instructions was not addressed during the encounter. When using questionnaires to get insight into information provision, observations of encounters are very informative to validate the patient questionnaires and make necessary adjustments.

  2. Degraded visual environment image/video quality metrics

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Baumgartner, Dustin D.; Brown, Jeremy B.; Jacobs, Eddie L.; Schachter, Bruce J.

    2014-06-01

    A number of image quality metrics (IQMs) and video quality metrics (VQMs) have been proposed in the literature for evaluating techniques and systems for mitigating degraded visual environments. Some require both pristine and corrupted imagery. Others require patterned target boards in the scene. None of these metrics relates well to the task of landing a helicopter in conditions such as a brownout dust cloud. We have developed and used a variety of IQMs and VQMs related to the pilot's ability to detect hazards in the scene and to maintain situational awareness. Some of these metrics can be made agnostic to sensor type. Not only are the metrics suitable for evaluating algorithm and sensor variation, they are also suitable for choosing the most cost effective solution to improve operating conditions in degraded visual environments.

  3. Power-Constrained Fuzzy Logic Control of Video Streaming over a Wireless Interconnect

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Razavi, Rouzbeh; Fleury, Martin; Ghanbari, Mohammed

    2008-12-01

    Wireless communication of video, with Bluetooth as an example, represents a compromise between channel conditions, display and decode deadlines, and energy constraints. This paper proposes fuzzy logic control (FLC) of automatic repeat request (ARQ) as a way of reconciling these factors, with a 40% saving in power in the worst channel conditions from economizing on transmissions when channel errors occur. Whatever the channel conditions are, FLC is shown to outperform the default Bluetooth scheme and an alternative Bluetooth-adaptive ARQ scheme in terms of reduced packet loss and delay, as well as improved video quality.

  4. "Can you see me now?" An objective metric for predicting intelligibility of compressed American Sign Language video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ciaramello, Francis M.; Hemami, Sheila S.

    2007-02-01

    For members of the Deaf Community in the United States, current communication tools include TTY/TTD services, video relay services, and text-based communication. With the growth of cellular technology, mobile sign language conversations are becoming a possibility. Proper coding techniques must be employed to compress American Sign Language (ASL) video for low-rate transmission while maintaining the quality of the conversation. In order to evaluate these techniques, an appropriate quality metric is needed. This paper demonstrates that traditional video quality metrics, such as PSNR, fail to predict subjective intelligibility scores. By considering the unique structure of ASL video, an appropriate objective metric is developed. Face and hand segmentation is performed using skin-color detection techniques. The distortions in the face and hand regions are optimally weighted and pooled across all frames to create an objective intelligibility score for a distorted sequence. The objective intelligibility metric performs significantly better than PSNR in terms of correlation with subjective responses.

  5. The Quality of Open-Access Video-Based Orthopaedic Instructional Content for the Shoulder Physical Exam is Inconsistent.

    PubMed

    Urch, Ekaterina; Taylor, Samuel A; Cody, Elizabeth; Fabricant, Peter D; Burket, Jayme C; O'Brien, Stephen J; Dines, David M; Dines, Joshua S

    2016-10-01

    The internet has an increasing role in both patient and physician education. While several recent studies critically appraised the quality and accuracy of web-based written information available to patients, no studies have evaluated such parameters for open-access video content designed for provider use. The primary goal of the study was to determine the accuracy of internet-based instructional videos featuring the shoulder physical examination. An assessment of quality and accuracy of said video content was performed using the basic shoulder examination as a surrogate for the "best-case scenario" due to its widely accepted components that are stable over time. Three search terms ("shoulder," "examination," and "shoulder exam") were entered into the four online video resources most commonly accessed by orthopaedic surgery residents (VuMedi, G9MD, Orthobullets, and YouTube). Videos were captured and independently reviewed by three orthopaedic surgeons. Quality and accuracy were assessed in accordance with previously published standards. Of the 39 video tutorials reviewed, 61% were rated as fair or poor. Specific maneuvers such as the Hawkins test, O'Brien sign, and Neer impingement test were accurately demonstrated in 50, 36, and 27% of videos, respectively. Inter-rater reliability was excellent (mean kappa 0.80, range 0.79-0.81). Our results suggest that information presented in open-access video tutorials featuring the physical examination of the shoulder is inconsistent. Trainee exposure to such potentially inaccurate information may have a significant impact on trainee education.

  6. Improved Techniques for Video Compression and Communication

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Chen, Haoming

    2016-01-01

    Video compression and communication has been an important field over the past decades and critical for many applications, e.g., video on demand, video-conferencing, and remote education. In many applications, providing low-delay and error-resilient video transmission and increasing the coding efficiency are two major challenges. Low-delay and…

  7. Educational Quality of YouTube Videos in Thumb Exercises for Carpometacarpal Osteoarthritis: A Search on Current Practice.

    PubMed

    Villafañe, Jorge Hugo; Cantero-Tellez, Raquel; Valdes, Kristin; Usuelli, Federico Giuseppe; Berjano, Pedro

    2017-09-01

    Conservative treatments are commonly performed therapeutic interventions for the management of carpometacarpal (CMC) joint osteoarthritis (OA). Physical and occupational therapies are starting to use video-based online content as both a patient teaching tool and a source for treatment techniques. YouTube is a popular video-sharing website that can be accessed easily. The purpose of this study was to analyze the quality of content and potential sources of bias in videos available on YouTube pertaining to thumb exercises for CMC OA. The YouTube video database was systematically searched using the search term thumb osteoarthritis and exercises from its inception to March 10, 2017. Authors independently selected videos, conducted quality assessment, and extracted results. A total of 832 videos were found using the keywords. Of these, 10 videos clearly demonstrated therapeutic exercise for the management of CMC OA. In addition, the top-ranked video found by performing a search of "views" was a video with more than 121 863 views uploaded in 2015 that lasted 12.33 minutes and scored only 2 points on the Global Score for Educational Value rating scale. Most of the videos viewed that described conservative interventions for CMC OA management have a low level of evidence to support their use. Although patients and novice hand therapists are using YouTube and other online resources, videos that are produced by expert hand therapists are scarce.

  8. Quality of pharmaceutical care at the pharmacy counter: patients’ experiences versus video observation

    PubMed Central

    Koster, Ellen S; Blom, Lyda; Overbeeke, Marloes R; Philbert, Daphne; Vervloet, Marcia; Koopman, Laura; van Dijk, Liset

    2016-01-01

    Introduction Consumer Quality Index questionnaires are used to assess quality of care from patients’ experiences. Objective To provide insight into the agreement about quality of pharmaceutical care, measured both by a patient questionnaire and video observations. Methods Pharmaceutical encounters in four pharmacies were video-recorded. Patients completed a questionnaire based upon the Consumer Quality Index Pharmaceutical Care after the encounter containing questions about patients’ experiences regarding information provision, medication counseling, and pharmacy staff’s communication style. An observation protocol was used to code the recorded encounters. Agreement between video observation and patients’ experiences was calculated. Results In total, 109 encounters were included for analysis. For the domains “medication counseling” and “communication style”, agreement between patients’ experiences and observations was very high (>90%). Less agreement (45%) was found for “information provision”, which was rated more positive by patients compared to the observations, especially for the topic, encouragement of patients’ questioning behavior. Conclusion A questionnaire is useful to assess the quality of medication counseling and pharmacy staff’s communication style, but might be less suitable to evaluate information provision and pharmacy staff’s encouragement of patients’ questioning behavior. Although patients may believe that they have received all necessary information to use their new medicine, some information on specific instructions was not addressed during the encounter. When using questionnaires to get insight into information provision, observations of encounters are very informative to validate the patient questionnaires and make necessary adjustments. PMID:27042025

  9. Prioritized packet video transmission over time-varying wireless channel using proactive FEC

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kumwilaisak, Wuttipong; Kim, JongWon; Kuo, C.-C. Jay

    2000-12-01

    Quality of video transmitted over time-varying wireless channels relies heavily on the coordinated effort to cope with both channel and source variations dynamically. Given the priority of each source packet and the estimated channel condition, an adaptive protection scheme based on joint source-channel criteria is investigated via proactive forward error correction (FEC). With proactive FEC in Reed Solomon (RS)/Rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes, we study a practical algorithm to match the relative priority of source packets and instantaneous channel conditions. The channel condition is estimated to capture the long-term fading effect in terms of the averaged SNR over a preset window. Proactive protection is performed for each packet based on the joint source-channel criteria with special attention to the accuracy, time-scale match, and feedback delay of channel status estimation. The overall gain of the proposed protection mechanism is demonstrated in terms of the end-to-end wireless video performance.

  10. VQone MATLAB toolbox: A graphical experiment builder for image and video quality evaluations: VQone MATLAB toolbox.

    PubMed

    Nuutinen, Mikko; Virtanen, Toni; Rummukainen, Olli; Häkkinen, Jukka

    2016-03-01

    This article presents VQone, a graphical experiment builder, written as a MATLAB toolbox, developed for image and video quality ratings. VQone contains the main elements needed for the subjective image and video quality rating process. This includes building and conducting experiments and data analysis. All functions can be controlled through graphical user interfaces. The experiment builder includes many standardized image and video quality rating methods. Moreover, it enables the creation of new methods or modified versions from standard methods. VQone is distributed free of charge under the terms of the GNU general public license and allows code modifications to be made so that the program's functions can be adjusted according to a user's requirements. VQone is available for download from the project page (http://www.helsinki.fi/psychology/groups/visualcognition/).

  11. Game theoretic wireless resource allocation for H.264 MGS video transmission over cognitive radio networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Fragkoulis, Alexandros; Kondi, Lisimachos P.; Parsopoulos, Konstantinos E.

    2015-03-01

    We propose a method for the fair and efficient allocation of wireless resources over a cognitive radio system network to transmit multiple scalable video streams to multiple users. The method exploits the dynamic architecture of the Scalable Video Coding extension of the H.264 standard, along with the diversity that OFDMA networks provide. We use a game-theoretic Nash Bargaining Solution (NBS) framework to ensure that each user receives the minimum video quality requirements, while maintaining fairness over the cognitive radio system. An optimization problem is formulated, where the objective is the maximization of the Nash product while minimizing the waste of resources. The problem is solved by using a Swarm Intelligence optimizer, namely Particle Swarm Optimization. Due to the high dimensionality of the problem, we also introduce a dimension-reduction technique. Our experimental results demonstrate the fairness imposed by the employed NBS framework.

  12. Method and Apparatus for Evaluating the Visual Quality of Processed Digital Video Sequences

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Watson, Andrew B. (Inventor)

    2002-01-01

    A Digital Video Quality (DVQ) apparatus and method that incorporate a model of human visual sensitivity to predict the visibility of artifacts. The DVQ method and apparatus are used for the evaluation of the visual quality of processed digital video sequences and for adaptively controlling the bit rate of the processed digital video sequences without compromising the visual quality. The DVQ apparatus minimizes the required amount of memory and computation. The input to the DVQ apparatus is a pair of color image sequences: an original (R) non-compressed sequence, and a processed (T) sequence. Both sequences (R) and (T) are sampled, cropped, and subjected to color transformations. The sequences are then subjected to blocking and discrete cosine transformation, and the results are transformed to local contrast. The next step is a time filtering operation which implements the human sensitivity to different time frequencies. The results are converted to threshold units by dividing each discrete cosine transform coefficient by its respective visual threshold. At the next stage the two sequences are subtracted to produce an error sequence. The error sequence is subjected to a contrast masking operation, which also depends upon the reference sequence (R). The masked errors can be pooled in various ways to illustrate the perceptual error over various dimensions, and the pooled error can be converted to a visual quality measure.

  13. A Comparison of Face to Face and Video-Based Self Care Education on Quality of Life of Hemodialysis Patients

    PubMed Central

    Hemmati Maslakpak, Masumeh; Shams, Shadi

    2015-01-01

    Background End stage renal disease negatively affects the patients’ quality of life. There are different educational methods to help these patients. This study was performed to compare the effectiveness of self-care education in two methods, face to face and video educational, on the quality of life in patients under treatment by hemodialysis in education-medical centers in Urmia. Methods In this quasi-experimental study, 120 hemodialysis patients were selected randomly; they were then randomly allocated to three groups: the control, face to face education and video education. For face to face group, education was given individually in two sessions of 35 to 45 minutes. For video educational group, CD was shown. Kidney Disease Quality Of Life- Short Form (KDQOL-SF) questionnaire was filled out before and two months after the intervention. Data analysis was performed in SPSS software by using one-way ANOVA. Results ANOVA test showed a statistically significant difference in the quality of life scores among the three groups after the intervention (P=0.024). After the intervention, Tukey’s post-hoc test showed a statistically significant difference between the two groups of video and face to face education regarding the quality of life (P>0.05). Conclusion Implementation of the face to face and video education methods improves the quality of life in hemodialysis patients. So, it is suggested that video educational should be used along with face to face education. PMID:26171412

  14. Video on phone lines: technology and applications

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hsing, T. Russell

    1996-03-01

    Recent advances in communications signal processing and VLSI technology are fostering tremendous interest in transmitting high-speed digital data over ordinary telephone lines at bit rates substantially above the ISDN Basic Access rate (144 Kbit/s). Two new technologies, high-bit-rate digital subscriber lines and asymmetric digital subscriber lines promise transmission over most of the embedded loop plant at 1.544 Mbit/s and beyond. Stimulated by these research promises and rapid advances on video coding techniques and the standards activity, information networks around the globe are now exploring possible business opportunities of offering quality video services (such as distant learning, telemedicine, and telecommuting etc.) through this high-speed digital transport capability in the copper loop plant. Visual communications for residential customers have become more feasible than ever both technically and economically.

  15. Video Measurements: Quantity or Quality

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Zajkov, Oliver; Mitrevski, Boce

    2012-01-01

    Students have problems with understanding, using and interpreting graphs. In order to improve the students' skills for working with graphs, we propose Manual Video Measurement (MVM). In this paper, the MVM method is explained and its accuracy is tested. The comparison with the standardized video data software shows that its accuracy is comparable…

  16. The study of surgical image quality evaluation system by subjective quality factor method

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhang, Jian J.; Xuan, Jason R.; Yang, Xirong; Yu, Honggang; Koullick, Edouard

    2016-03-01

    GreenLightTM procedure is an effective and economical way of treatment of benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH); there are almost a million of patients treated with GreenLightTM worldwide. During the surgical procedure, the surgeon or physician will rely on the monitoring video system to survey and confirm the surgical progress. There are a few obstructions that could greatly affect the image quality of the monitoring video, like laser glare by the tissue and body fluid, air bubbles and debris generated by tissue evaporation, and bleeding, just to name a few. In order to improve the physician's visual experience of a laser surgical procedure, the system performance parameter related to image quality needs to be well defined. However, since image quality is the integrated set of perceptions of the overall degree of excellence of an image, or in other words, image quality is the perceptually weighted combination of significant attributes (contrast, graininess …) of an image when considered in its marketplace or application, there is no standard definition on overall image or video quality especially for the no-reference case (without a standard chart as reference). In this study, Subjective Quality Factor (SQF) and acutance are used for no-reference image quality evaluation. Basic image quality parameters, like sharpness, color accuracy, size of obstruction and transmission of obstruction, are used as subparameter to define the rating scale for image quality evaluation or comparison. Sample image groups were evaluated by human observers according to the rating scale. Surveys of physician groups were also conducted with lab generated sample videos. The study shows that human subjective perception is a trustworthy way of image quality evaluation. More systematic investigation on the relationship between video quality and image quality of each frame will be conducted as a future study.

  17. Instructional analysis of lecture video recordings and its application for quality improvement of medical lectures.

    PubMed

    Baek, Sunyong; Im, Sun Ju; Lee, Sun Hee; Kam, Beesung; Yune, So Joung; Lee, Sang Soo; Lee, Jung A; Lee, Yuna; Lee, Sang Yeoup

    2011-12-01

    The lecture is a technique for delivering knowledge and information cost-effectively to large medical classes in medical education. The aim of this study was to analyze teaching quality, based on triangle analysis of video recordings of medical lectures, to strengthen teaching competency in medical school. The subjects of this study were 13 medical professors who taught 1st- and 2nd-year medical students and agreed to a triangle analysis of video recordings of their lectures. We first performed triangle analysis, which consisted of a professional analysis of video recordings, self-assessment by teaching professors, and feedback from students, and the data were crosschecked by five school consultants for reliability and consistency. Most of the distress that teachers experienced during the lecture occurred in uniform teaching environments, such as larger lecture classes. Larger lectures that primarily used PowerPoint as a medium to deliver information effected poor interaction with students. Other distressing factors in the lecture were personal characteristics and lack of strategic faculty development. Triangle analysis of video recordings of medical lectures gives teachers an opportunity and motive to improve teaching quality. Faculty development and various improvement strategies, based on this analysis, are expected to help teachers succeed as effective, efficient, and attractive lecturers while improving the quality of larger lecture classes.

  18. A blinded assessment of video quality in wearable technology for telementoring in open surgery: the Google Glass experience.

    PubMed

    Hashimoto, Daniel A; Phitayakorn, Roy; Fernandez-del Castillo, Carlos; Meireles, Ozanan

    2016-01-01

    The goal of telementoring is to recreate face-to-face encounters with a digital presence. Open-surgery telementoring is limited by lack of surgeon's point-of-view cameras. Google Glass is a wearable computer that looks like a pair of glasses but is equipped with wireless connectivity, a camera, and viewing screen for video conferencing. This study aimed to assess the safety of using Google Glass by assessing the video quality of a telementoring session. Thirty-four (n = 34) surgeons at a single institution were surveyed and blindly compared via video captured with Google Glass versus an Apple iPhone 5 during the open cholecystectomy portion of a Whipple. Surgeons were asked to evaluate the quality of the video and its adequacy for safe use in telementoring. Thirty-four of 107 invited surgical attendings (32%) responded to the anonymous survey. A total of 50% rated the Google Glass video as fair with the other 50% rating it as bad to poor. A total of 52.9% of respondents rated the Apple iPhone video as good. A significantly greater proportion of respondents felt Google Glass video quality was inadequate for telementoring versus the Apple iPhone's (82.4 vs 26.5%, p < 0.0001). Intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.924 (95% CI 0.660-0.999, p < 0.001). While Google Glass provides a great breadth of functionality as a wearable device with two-way communication capabilities, current hardware limitations prevent its use as a telementoring device in surgery as the video quality is inadequate for safe telementoring. As the device is still in initial phases of development, future iterations or competitor devices may provide a better telementoring application for wearable devices.

  19. Objective video presentation QoE predictor for smart adaptive video streaming

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wang, Zhou; Zeng, Kai; Rehman, Abdul; Yeganeh, Hojatollah; Wang, Shiqi

    2015-09-01

    How to deliver videos to consumers over the network for optimal quality-of-experience (QoE) has been the central goal of modern video delivery services. Surprisingly, regardless of the large volume of videos being delivered everyday through various systems attempting to improve visual QoE, the actual QoE of end consumers is not properly assessed, not to say using QoE as the key factor in making critical decisions at the video hosting, network and receiving sites. Real-world video streaming systems typically use bitrate as the main video presentation quality indicator, but using the same bitrate to encode different video content could result in drastically different visual QoE, which is further affected by the display device and viewing condition of each individual consumer who receives the video. To correct this, we have to put QoE back to the driver's seat and redesign the video delivery systems. To achieve this goal, a major challenge is to find an objective video presentation QoE predictor that is accurate, fast, easy-to-use, display device adaptive, and provides meaningful QoE predictions across resolution and content. We propose to use the newly developed SSIMplus index (https://ece.uwaterloo.ca/~z70wang/research/ssimplus/) for this role. We demonstrate that based on SSIMplus, one can develop a smart adaptive video streaming strategy that leads to much smoother visual QoE impossible to achieve using existing adaptive bitrate video streaming approaches. Furthermore, SSIMplus finds many more applications, in live and file-based quality monitoring, in benchmarking video encoders and transcoders, and in guiding network resource allocations.

  20. Video Compression Study: h.265 vs h.264

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Pryor, Jonathan

    2016-01-01

    H.265 video compression (also known as High Efficiency Video Encoding (HEVC)) promises to provide double the video quality at half the bandwidth, or the same quality at half the bandwidth of h.264 video compression [1]. This study uses a Tektronix PQA500 to determine the video quality gains by using h.265 encoding. This study also compares two video encoders to see how different implementations of h.264 and h.265 impact video quality at various bandwidths.

  1. Cross-layer Energy Optimization Under Image Quality Constraints for Wireless Image Transmissions.

    PubMed

    Yang, Na; Demirkol, Ilker; Heinzelman, Wendi

    2012-01-01

    Wireless image transmission is critical in many applications, such as surveillance and environment monitoring. In order to make the best use of the limited energy of the battery-operated cameras, while satisfying the application-level image quality constraints, cross-layer design is critical. In this paper, we develop an image transmission model that allows the application layer (e.g., the user) to specify an image quality constraint, and optimizes the lower layer parameters of transmit power and packet length, to minimize the energy dissipation in image transmission over a given distance. The effectiveness of this approach is evaluated by applying the proposed energy optimization to a reference ZigBee system and a WiFi system, and also by comparing to an energy optimization study that does not consider any image quality constraint. Evaluations show that our scheme outperforms the default settings of the investigated commercial devices and saves a significant amount of energy at middle-to-large transmission distances.

  2. Real-time 3D video compression for tele-immersive environments

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yang, Zhenyu; Cui, Yi; Anwar, Zahid; Bocchino, Robert; Kiyanclar, Nadir; Nahrstedt, Klara; Campbell, Roy H.; Yurcik, William

    2006-01-01

    Tele-immersive systems can improve productivity and aid communication by allowing distributed parties to exchange information via a shared immersive experience. The TEEVE research project at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the University of California at Berkeley seeks to foster the development and use of tele-immersive environments by a holistic integration of existing components that capture, transmit, and render three-dimensional (3D) scenes in real time to convey a sense of immersive space. However, the transmission of 3D video poses significant challenges. First, it is bandwidth-intensive, as it requires the transmission of multiple large-volume 3D video streams. Second, existing schemes for 2D color video compression such as MPEG, JPEG, and H.263 cannot be applied directly because the 3D video data contains depth as well as color information. Our goal is to explore from a different angle of the 3D compression space with factors including complexity, compression ratio, quality, and real-time performance. To investigate these trade-offs, we present and evaluate two simple 3D compression schemes. For the first scheme, we use color reduction to compress the color information, which we then compress along with the depth information using zlib. For the second scheme, we use motion JPEG to compress the color information and run-length encoding followed by Huffman coding to compress the depth information. We apply both schemes to 3D videos captured from a real tele-immersive environment. Our experimental results show that: (1) the compressed data preserves enough information to communicate the 3D images effectively (min. PSNR > 40) and (2) even without inter-frame motion estimation, very high compression ratios (avg. > 15) are achievable at speeds sufficient to allow real-time communication (avg. ~ 13 ms per 3D video frame).

  3. Imagining life with an ostomy: Does a video intervention improve quality-of-life predictions for a medical condition that may elicit disgust?☆

    PubMed Central

    Angott, Andrea M.; Comerford, David A.; Ubel, Peter A.

    2014-01-01

    Objective To test a video intervention as a way to improve predictions of mood and quality-of-life with an emotionally evocative medical condition. Such predictions are typically inaccurate, which can be consequential for decision making. Method In Part 1, people presently or formerly living with ostomies predicted how watching a video depicting a person changing his ostomy pouch would affect mood and quality-of-life forecasts for life with an ostomy. In Part 2, participants from the general public read a description about life with an ostomy; half also watched a video depicting a person changing his ostomy pouch. Participants’ quality-of-life and mood forecasts for life with an ostomy were assessed. Results Contrary to our expectations, and the expectations of people presently or formerly living with ostomies, the video did not reduce mood or quality-of-life estimates, even among participants high in trait disgust sensitivity. Among low-disgust participants, watching the video increased quality-of-life predictions for ostomy. Conclusion Video interventions may improve mood and quality-of-life forecasts for medical conditions, including those that may elicit disgust, such as ostomy. Practice implications Video interventions focusing on patients’ experience of illness continue to show promise as components of decision aids, even for emotionally charged health states such as ostomy. PMID:23177398

  4. Application of video-cameras for quality control and sampling optimisation of hydrological and erosion measurements in a catchment

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lora-Millán, Julio S.; Taguas, Encarnacion V.; Gomez, Jose A.; Perez, Rafael

    2014-05-01

    Long term soil erosion studies imply substantial efforts, particularly when there is the need to maintain continuous measurements. There are high costs associated to maintenance of field equipment keeping and quality control of data collection. Energy supply and/or electronic failures, vandalism and burglary are common causes of gaps in datasets, reducing their reach in many cases. In this work, a system of three video-cameras, a recorder and a transmission modem (3G technology) has been set up in a gauging station where rainfall, runoff flow and sediment concentration are monitored. The gauging station is located in the outlet of an olive orchard catchment of 6.4 ha. Rainfall is measured with one automatic raingauge that records intensity at one minute intervals. The discharge is measured by a flume of critical flow depth, where the water is recorded by an ultrasonic sensor. When the water level rises to a predetermined level, the automatic sampler turns on and fills a bottle at different intervals according to a program depending on the antecedent precipitation. A data logger controls the instruments' functions and records the data. The purpose of the video-camera system is to improve the quality of the dataset by i) the visual analysis of the measurement conditions of flow into the flume; ii) the optimisation of the sampling programs. The cameras are positioned to record the flow at the approximation and the gorge of the flume. In order to contrast the values of ultrasonic sensor, there is a third camera recording the flow level close to a measure tape. This system is activated when the ultrasonic sensor detects a height threshold, equivalent to an electric intensity level. Thus, only when there is enough flow, video-cameras record the event. This simplifies post-processing and reduces the cost of download of recordings. The preliminary contrast analysis will be presented as well as the main improvements in the sample program.

  5. Picturing Video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    2000-01-01

    Video Pics is a software program that generates high-quality photos from video. The software was developed under an SBIR contract with Marshall Space Flight Center by Redhawk Vision, Inc.--a subsidiary of Irvine Sensors Corporation. Video Pics takes information content from multiple frames of video and enhances the resolution of a selected frame. The resulting image has enhanced sharpness and clarity like that of a 35 mm photo. The images are generated as digital files and are compatible with image editing software.

  6. Quality of Widely Available Video Instructional Materials for Point-of-Care Ultrasound-Guided Procedure Training in Internal Medicine.

    PubMed

    Khandelwal, Aditi; Devine, Luke A; Otremba, Mirek

    2017-07-01

    Many instructional materials for point-of-care ultrasound (US)-guided procedures exist; however, their quality is unknown. This study assessed widely available educational videos for point-of-care US-guided procedures relevant to internal medicine: central venous catheterization, thoracentesis, and paracentesis. We searched Ovid MEDLINE, YouTube, and Google to identify videos for point-of-care US-guided paracentesis, thoracentesis, and central venous catheterization. Videos were evaluated with a 5-point scale assessing the global educational value and a checklist based on consensus guidelines for competencies in point-of-care US-guided procedures. For point-of-care US-guided central venous catheterization, 12 videos were found, with an average global educational value score ± SD of 4.5 ± 0.7. Indications to abort the procedure were discussed in only 3 videos. Five videos described the indications and contraindications for performing central venous catheterization. For point-of-care US-guided thoracentesis, 8 videos were identified, with an average global educational value score of 4.0 ± 0.9. Only one video discussed indications to abort the procedure, and 3 videos discussed sterile technique. For point-of-care US-guided paracentesis, 7 videos were included, with an average global educational value score of 4.1 ± 0.9. Only 1 video discussed indications to abort the procedure, and 2 described the location of the inferior epigastric artery. The 27 videos reviewed contained good-quality general instruction. However, we noted a lack of safety-related information in most of the available videos. Further development of resources is required to teach internal medicine trainees skills that focus on the safety of point-of-care US guidance. © 2017 by the American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine.

  7. New Integrated Video and Graphics Technology: Digital Video Interactive.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Optical Information Systems, 1987

    1987-01-01

    Describes digital video interactive (DVI), a new technology which combines the interactivity of the graphics capabilities in personal computers with the realism of high-quality motion video and multitrack audio in an all-digital integrated system. (MES)

  8. Multi-frame super-resolution with quality self-assessment for retinal fundus videos.

    PubMed

    Köhler, Thomas; Brost, Alexander; Mogalle, Katja; Zhang, Qianyi; Köhler, Christiane; Michelson, Georg; Hornegger, Joachim; Tornow, Ralf P

    2014-01-01

    This paper proposes a novel super-resolution framework to reconstruct high-resolution fundus images from multiple low-resolution video frames in retinal fundus imaging. Natural eye movements during an examination are used as a cue for super-resolution in a robust maximum a-posteriori scheme. In order to compensate heterogeneous illumination on the fundus, we integrate retrospective illumination correction for photometric registration to the underlying imaging model. Our method utilizes quality self-assessment to provide objective quality scores for reconstructed images as well as to select regularization parameters automatically. In our evaluation on real data acquired from six human subjects with a low-cost video camera, the proposed method achieved considerable enhancements of low-resolution frames and improved noise and sharpness characteristics by 74%. In terms of image analysis, we demonstrate the importance of our method for the improvement of automatic blood vessel segmentation as an example application, where the sensitivity was increased by 13% using super-resolution reconstruction.

  9. Qualitative and quantitative assessment of video transmitted by DVTS (digital video transport system) in surgical telemedicine.

    PubMed

    Shima, Yoichiro; Suwa, Akina; Gomi, Yuichiro; Nogawa, Hiroki; Nagata, Hiroshi; Tanaka, Hiroshi

    2007-01-01

    Real-time video pictures can be transmitted inexpensively via a broadband connection using the DVTS (digital video transport system). However, the degradation of video pictures transmitted by DVTS has not been sufficiently evaluated. We examined the application of DVTS to remote consultation by using images of laparoscopic and endoscopic surgeries. A subjective assessment by the double stimulus continuous quality scale (DSCQS) method of the transmitted video pictures was carried out by eight doctors. Three of the four video recordings were assessed as being transmitted with no degradation in quality. None of the doctors noticed any degradation in the images due to encryption by the VPN (virtual private network) system. We also used an automatic picture quality assessment system to make an objective assessment of the same images. The objective DSCQS values were similar to the subjective ones. We conclude that although the quality of video pictures transmitted by the DVTS was slightly reduced, they were useful for clinical purposes. Encryption with a VPN did not degrade image quality.

  10. Video Encryption and Decryption on Quantum Computers

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yan, Fei; Iliyasu, Abdullah M.; Venegas-Andraca, Salvador E.; Yang, Huamin

    2015-08-01

    A method for video encryption and decryption on quantum computers is proposed based on color information transformations on each frame encoding the content of the encoding the content of the video. The proposed method provides a flexible operation to encrypt quantum video by means of the quantum measurement in order to enhance the security of the video. To validate the proposed approach, a tetris tile-matching puzzle game video is utilized in the experimental simulations. The results obtained suggest that the proposed method enhances the security and speed of quantum video encryption and decryption, both properties required for secure transmission and sharing of video content in quantum communication.

  11. Influence of video compression on the measurement error of the television system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Sotnik, A. V.; Yarishev, S. N.; Korotaev, V. V.

    2015-05-01

    Video data require a very large memory capacity. Optimal ratio quality / volume video encoding method is one of the most actual problem due to the urgent need to transfer large amounts of video over various networks. The technology of digital TV signal compression reduces the amount of data used for video stream representation. Video compression allows effective reduce the stream required for transmission and storage. It is important to take into account the uncertainties caused by compression of the video signal in the case of television measuring systems using. There are a lot digital compression methods. The aim of proposed work is research of video compression influence on the measurement error in television systems. Measurement error of the object parameter is the main characteristic of television measuring systems. Accuracy characterizes the difference between the measured value abd the actual parameter value. Errors caused by the optical system can be selected as a source of error in the television systems measurements. Method of the received video signal processing is also a source of error. Presence of error leads to large distortions in case of compression with constant data stream rate. Presence of errors increases the amount of data required to transmit or record an image frame in case of constant quality. The purpose of the intra-coding is reducing of the spatial redundancy within a frame (or field) of television image. This redundancy caused by the strong correlation between the elements of the image. It is possible to convert an array of image samples into a matrix of coefficients that are not correlated with each other, if one can find corresponding orthogonal transformation. It is possible to apply entropy coding to these uncorrelated coefficients and achieve a reduction in the digital stream. One can select such transformation that most of the matrix coefficients will be almost zero for typical images . Excluding these zero coefficients also

  12. An Evaluation of Educational Neurological Eye Movement Disorder Videos Posted on Internet Video Sharing Sites.

    PubMed

    Hickman, Simon J

    2016-03-01

    Internet video sharing sites allow the free dissemination of educational material. This study investigated the quality and educational content of videos of eye movement disorders posted on such sites. Educational neurological eye movement videos were identified by entering the titles of the eye movement abnormality into the search boxes of the video sharing sites. Also, suggested links were followed from each video. The number of views, likes, and dislikes for each video were recorded. The videos were then rated for their picture and sound quality. Their educational value was assessed according to whether the video included a description of the eye movement abnormality, the anatomical location of the lesion (if appropriate), and the underlying diagnosis. Three hundred fifty-four of these videos were found on YouTube and Vimeo. There was a mean of 6,443 views per video (range, 1-195,957). One hundred nineteen (33.6%) had no form of commentary about the eye movement disorder shown apart from the title. Forty-seven (13.3%) contained errors in the title or in the text. Eighty (22.6%) had excellent educational value by describing the eye movement abnormality, the anatomical location of the lesion, and the underlying diagnosis. Of these, 30 also had good picture and sound quality. The videos with excellent educational value had a mean of 9.84 "likes" per video compared with 2.37 for those videos without a commentary (P < 0.001). The videos that combined excellent educational value with good picture and sound quality had a mean of 10.23 "likes" per video (P = 0.004 vs videos with no commentary). There was no significant difference in the mean number of "dislikes" between those videos that had no commentary or which contained errors and those with excellent educational value. There are a large number of eye movement videos freely available on these sites; however, due to the lack of peer review, a significant number have poor educational value due to having no commentary

  13. A Feasibility Study of Smartphone-Based Telesonography for Evaluating Cardiac Dynamic Function and Diagnosing Acute Appendicitis with Control of the Image Quality of the Transmitted Videos.

    PubMed

    Kim, Changsun; Cha, Hyunmin; Kang, Bo Seung; Choi, Hyuk Joong; Lim, Tae Ho; Oh, Jaehoon

    2016-06-01

    Our aim was to prove the feasibility of the remote interpretation of real-time transmitted ultrasound videos of dynamic and static organs using a smartphone with control of the image quality given a limited internet connection speed. For this study, 100 cases of echocardiography videos (dynamic organ)-50 with an ejection fraction (EF) of ≥50 s and 50 with EF <50 %-and 100 cases of suspected pediatric appendicitis (static organ)-50 with signs of acute appendicitis and 50 with no findings of appendicitis-were consecutively selected. Twelve reviewers reviewed the original videos using the liquid crystal display (LCD) monitor of an ultrasound machine and using a smartphone, to which the images were transmitted from the ultrasound machine. The resolution of the transmitted echocardiography videos was reduced by approximately 20 % to increase the frame rate of transmission given the limited internet speed. The differences in diagnostic performance between the two devices when evaluating left ventricular (LV) systolic function by measuring the EF and when evaluating the presence of acute appendicitis were investigated using a five-point Likert scale. The average areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves for each reviewer's interpretations using the LCD monitor and smartphone were respectively 0.968 (0.949-0.986) and 0.963 (0.945-0.982) (P = 0.548) for echocardiography and 0.972 (0.954-0.989) and 0.966 (0.947-0.984) (P = 0.175) for abdominal ultrasonography. We confirmed the feasibility of remotely interpreting ultrasound images using smartphones, specifically for evaluating LV function and diagnosing pediatric acute appendicitis; the images were transferred from the ultrasound machine using image quality-controlled telesonography.

  14. Effects of music and music video interventions on sleep quality: A randomized controlled trial in adults with sleep disturbances.

    PubMed

    Huang, Chiung-Yu; Chang, En-Ting; Hsieh, Yuan-Mei; Lai, Hui-Ling

    2017-10-01

    The present study aimed to compare the effects of music and music video interventions on objective and subjective sleep quality in adults with sleep disturbances. A randomized controlled trial was performed on 71 adults who were recruited from the outpatient department of a hospital with 1100 beds and randomly assigned to the control, music, and music video groups. During the 4 test days (Days 2-5), for 30min before nocturnal sleep, the music group listened to Buddhist music and the music video group watched Buddhist music videos. They were instructed to not listen/watch to the music/MV on the first night (pretest, Day 1) and the final night (Day 6). The control group received no intervention. Sleep was assessed using a one-channel electroencephalography machine in their homes and self-reported questionnaires. The music and music video interventions had no effect on any objective sleep parameters, as measured using electroencephalography. However, the music group had significantly longer subjective total sleep time than the music video group did (Wald χ 2 =6.23, p=0.04). Our study results increase knowledge regarding music interventions for sleep quality in adults with sleep disturbances. This study suggested that more research is required to strengthen the scientific knowledge of the effects of music intervention on sleep quality in adults with sleep disturbances. (ISRCTN94971645). Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  15. A comparison of video review and feedback device measurement of chest compressions quality during pediatric cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

    PubMed

    Hsieh, Ting-Chang; Wolfe, Heather; Sutton, Robert; Myers, Sage; Nadkarni, Vinay; Donoghue, Aaron

    2015-08-01

    To describe chest compression (CC) rate, depth, and leaning during pediatric cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) as measured by two simultaneous methods, and to assess the accuracy and reliability of video review in measuring CC quality. Resuscitations in a pediatric emergency department are videorecorded for quality improvement. Patients aged 8-18 years receiving CPR under videorecording were eligible for inclusion. CPR was recorded by a pressure/accelerometer feedback device and tabulated in 30-s epochs of uninterrupted CC. Investigators reviewed videorecorded CPR and measured rate, depth, and release by observation. Raters categorized epochs as 'meeting criteria' if 80% of CCs in an epoch were done with appropriate depth (>45 mm) and/or release (<2.5 kg leaning). Comparison between device measurement and video was made by Spearman's ρ for rate and by κ statistic for depth and release. Interrater reliability for depth and release was measured by κ statistic. Five patients underwent videorecorded CPR using the feedback device. 97 30-s epochs of CCs were analyzed. CCs met criteria for rate in 74/97 (76%) of epochs; depth in 38/97 (39%); release in 82/97 (84%). Agreement between video and feedback device for rate was good (ρ = 0.77); agreement was poor for depth and release (κ 0.04-0.41). Interrater reliability for depth and release measured by video was poor (κ 0.04-0.49). Video review measured CC rate accurately; depth and release were not reliably or accurately assessed by video. Future research should focus on the optimal combination of methods for measuring CPR quality. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  16. Encrypted IP video communication system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bogdan, Apetrechioaie; Luminiţa, Mateescu

    2010-11-01

    Digital video transmission is a permanent subject of development, research and improvement. This field of research has an exponentially growing market in civil, surveillance, security and military aplications. A lot of solutions: FPGA, ASIC, DSP have been used for this purpose. The paper presents the implementation of an encrypted, IP based, video communication system having a competitive performance/cost ratio .

  17. Video laryngoscopy in pre-hospital critical care - a quality improvement study.

    PubMed

    Rhode, Marianne Grønnebæk; Vandborg, Mads Partridge; Bladt, Vibeke; Rognås, Leif

    2016-06-13

    Pre-hospital endotracheal intubation is challenging and repeated endotracheal intubation is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. We investigated whether the introduction of the McGrath MAC video laryngoscope as the primary device for pre-hospital endotracheal intubation could improve first-pass success rate in our anaesthesiologist-staffed pre-hospital critical care services. We also investigated the incidence of failed pre-hospital endotracheal intubation, the use of airway adjuncts and back-up devices and problems encountered using the McGrath MAC video laryngoscope. Prospective quality improvement study collecting data from all adult pre-hospital endotracheal intubation performed by four anaesthesiologist-staffed pre-hospital critical care teams between December 15(th) 2013 and December 15(th) 2014. We registered data from 273 consecutive patients. When using the McGrath MAC video laryngoscope the overall pre-hospital endotracheal intubation first-pass success rate was 80.8 %. Following rapid sequence intubation (RSI) it was 88.9 %. This was not significantly different from previously reported first-pass success rates in our system (p = 0.27 and p = 0.41). During the last nine months of the study period the overall first-pass success rate was 80.1 (p = 0.47) but the post-RSI first-pass success rate improved to 94.4 % (0.048). The overall pre-hospital endotracheal intubation success rate with the McGrath MAC video laryngoscope was 98.9 % (p = 0.17). Gastric content, blood or secretion in the airway resulted in reduced vision when using the McGrath MAC video laryngoscope. In this study of video laryngoscope implementation in a Scandinavian anaesthesiologist-staffed pre-hospital critical care service, overall pre-hospital endotracheal first pass success rate did not change. The post-RSI first-pass success rate was significantly higher during the last nine months of our 12-month study compared with our results from before

  18. A novel no-reference objective stereoscopic video quality assessment method based on visual saliency analysis

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yang, Xinyan; Zhao, Wei; Ye, Long; Zhang, Qin

    2017-07-01

    This paper proposes a no-reference objective stereoscopic video quality assessment method with the motivation that making the effect of objective experiments close to that of subjective way. We believe that the image regions with different visual salient degree should not have the same weights when designing an assessment metric. Therefore, we firstly use GBVS algorithm to each frame pairs and separate both the left and right viewing images into the regions with strong, general and week saliency. Besides, local feature information like blockiness, zero-crossing and depth are extracted and combined with a mathematical model to calculate a quality assessment score. Regions with different salient degree are assigned with different weights in the mathematical model. Experiment results demonstrate the superiority of our method compared with the existed state-of-the-art no-reference objective Stereoscopic video quality assessment methods.

  19. A Completely Blind Video Integrity Oracle.

    PubMed

    Mittal, Anish; Saad, Michele A; Bovik, Alan C

    2016-01-01

    Considerable progress has been made toward developing still picture perceptual quality analyzers that do not require any reference picture and that are not trained on human opinion scores of distorted images. However, there do not yet exist any such completely blind video quality assessment (VQA) models. Here, we attempt to bridge this gap by developing a new VQA model called the video intrinsic integrity and distortion evaluation oracle (VIIDEO). The new model does not require the use of any additional information other than the video being quality evaluated. VIIDEO embodies models of intrinsic statistical regularities that are observed in natural vidoes, which are used to quantify disturbances introduced due to distortions. An algorithm derived from the VIIDEO model is thereby able to predict the quality of distorted videos without any external knowledge about the pristine source, anticipated distortions, or human judgments of video quality. Even with such a paucity of information, we are able to show that the VIIDEO algorithm performs much better than the legacy full reference quality measure MSE on the LIVE VQA database and delivers performance comparable with a leading human judgment trained blind VQA model. We believe that the VIIDEO algorithm is a significant step toward making real-time monitoring of completely blind video quality possible.

  20. Web-based video monitoring of CT and MRI procedures

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ratib, Osman M.; Dahlbom, Magdalena; Kho, Hwa T.; Valentino, Daniel J.; McCoy, J. Michael

    2000-05-01

    A web-based video transmission of images from CT and MRI consoles was implemented in an Intranet environment for real- time monitoring of ongoing procedures. Images captured from the consoles are compressed to video resolution and broadcasted through a web server. When called upon, the attending radiologists can view these live images on any computer within the secured Intranet network. With adequate compression, these images can be displayed simultaneously in different locations at a rate of 2 to 5 images/sec through standard LAN. The quality of the images being insufficient for diagnostic purposes, our users survey showed that they were suitable for supervising a procedure, positioning the imaging slices and for routine quality checking before completion of a study. The system was implemented at UCLA to monitor 9 CTs and 6 MRIs distributed in 4 buildings. This system significantly improved the radiologists productivity by saving precious time spent in trips between reading rooms and examination rooms. It also improved patient throughput by reducing the waiting time for the radiologists to come to check a study before moving the patient from the scanner.

  1. An Optical Flow-Based Full Reference Video Quality Assessment Algorithm.

    PubMed

    K, Manasa; Channappayya, Sumohana S

    2016-06-01

    We present a simple yet effective optical flow-based full-reference video quality assessment (FR-VQA) algorithm for assessing the perceptual quality of natural videos. Our algorithm is based on the premise that local optical flow statistics are affected by distortions and the deviation from pristine flow statistics is proportional to the amount of distortion. We characterize the local flow statistics using the mean, the standard deviation, the coefficient of variation (CV), and the minimum eigenvalue ( λ min ) of the local flow patches. Temporal distortion is estimated as the change in the CV of the distorted flow with respect to the reference flow, and the correlation between λ min of the reference and of the distorted patches. We rely on the robust multi-scale structural similarity index for spatial quality estimation. The computed temporal and spatial distortions, thus, are then pooled using a perceptually motivated heuristic to generate a spatio-temporal quality score. The proposed method is shown to be competitive with the state-of-the-art when evaluated on the LIVE SD database, the EPFL Polimi SD database, and the LIVE Mobile HD database. The distortions considered in these databases include those due to compression, packet-loss, wireless channel errors, and rate-adaptation. Our algorithm is flexible enough to allow for any robust FR spatial distortion metric for spatial distortion estimation. In addition, the proposed method is not only parameter-free but also independent of the choice of the optical flow algorithm. Finally, we show that the replacement of the optical flow vectors in our proposed method with the much coarser block motion vectors also results in an acceptable FR-VQA algorithm. Our algorithm is called the flow similarity index.

  2. Video image processing greatly enhances contrast, quality, and speed in polarization-based microscopy

    PubMed Central

    1981-01-01

    Video cameras with contrast and black level controls can yield polarized light and differential interference contrast microscope images with unprecedented image quality, resolution, and recording speed. The theoretical basis and practical aspects of video polarization and differential interference contrast microscopy are discussed and several applications in cell biology are illustrated. These include: birefringence of cortical structures and beating cilia in Stentor, birefringence of rotating flagella on a single bacterium, growth and morphogenesis of echinoderm skeletal spicules in culture, ciliary and electrical activity in a balancing organ of a nudibranch snail, and acrosomal reaction in activated sperm. PMID:6788777

  3. Full-frame video stabilization with motion inpainting.

    PubMed

    Matsushita, Yasuyuki; Ofek, Eyal; Ge, Weina; Tang, Xiaoou; Shum, Heung-Yeung

    2006-07-01

    Video stabilization is an important video enhancement technology which aims at removing annoying shaky motion from videos. We propose a practical and robust approach of video stabilization that produces full-frame stabilized videos with good visual quality. While most previous methods end up with producing smaller size stabilized videos, our completion method can produce full-frame videos by naturally filling in missing image parts by locally aligning image data of neighboring frames. To achieve this, motion inpainting is proposed to enforce spatial and temporal consistency of the completion in both static and dynamic image areas. In addition, image quality in the stabilized video is enhanced with a new practical deblurring algorithm. Instead of estimating point spread functions, our method transfers and interpolates sharper image pixels of neighboring frames to increase the sharpness of the frame. The proposed video completion and deblurring methods enabled us to develop a complete video stabilizer which can naturally keep the original image quality in the stabilized videos. The effectiveness of our method is confirmed by extensive experiments over a wide variety of videos.

  4. ATM Quality of Service Tests for Digitized Video Using ATM Over Satellite: Laboratory Tests

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Ivancic, William D.; Brooks, David E.; Frantz, Brian D.

    1997-01-01

    A digitized video application was used to help determine minimum quality of service parameters for asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) over satellite. For these tests, binomially distributed and other errors were digitally inserted in an intermediate frequency link via a satellite modem and a commercial gaussian noise generator. In this paper, the relation- ship between the ATM cell error and cell loss parameter specifications is discussed with regard to this application. In addition, the video-encoding algorithms, test configurations, and results are presented in detail.

  5. Efficient data replication for the delivery of high-quality video content over P2P VoD advertising networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ho, Chien-Peng; Yu, Jen-Yu; Lee, Suh-Yin

    2011-12-01

    Recent advances in modern television systems have had profound consequences for the scalability, stability, and quality of transmitted digital data signals. This is of particular significance for peer-to-peer (P2P) video-on-demand (VoD) related platforms, faced with an immediate and growing demand for reliable service delivery. In response to demands for high-quality video, the key objectives in the construction of the proposed framework were user satisfaction with perceived video quality and the effective utilization of available resources on P2P VoD networks. This study developed a peer-based promoter to support online advertising in P2P VoD networks based on an estimation of video distortion prior to the replication of data stream chunks. The proposed technology enables the recovery of lost video using replicated stream chunks in real time. Load balance is achieved by adjusting the replication level of each candidate group according to the degree-of-distortion, thereby enabling a significant reduction in server load and increased scalability in the P2P VoD system. This approach also promotes the use of advertising as an efficient tool for commercial promotion. Results indicate that the proposed system efficiently satisfies the given fault tolerances.

  6. Image quality assessment for video stream recognition systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chernov, Timofey S.; Razumnuy, Nikita P.; Kozharinov, Alexander S.; Nikolaev, Dmitry P.; Arlazarov, Vladimir V.

    2018-04-01

    Recognition and machine vision systems have long been widely used in many disciplines to automate various processes of life and industry. Input images of optical recognition systems can be subjected to a large number of different distortions, especially in uncontrolled or natural shooting conditions, which leads to unpredictable results of recognition systems, making it impossible to assess their reliability. For this reason, it is necessary to perform quality control of the input data of recognition systems, which is facilitated by modern progress in the field of image quality evaluation. In this paper, we investigate the approach to designing optical recognition systems with built-in input image quality estimation modules and feedback, for which the necessary definitions are introduced and a model for describing such systems is constructed. The efficiency of this approach is illustrated by the example of solving the problem of selecting the best frames for recognition in a video stream for a system with limited resources. Experimental results are presented for the system for identity documents recognition, showing a significant increase in the accuracy and speed of the system under simulated conditions of automatic camera focusing, leading to blurring of frames.

  7. Automated content and quality assessment of full-motion-video for the generation of meta data

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Harguess, Josh

    2015-05-01

    Virtually all of the video data (and full-motion-video (FMV)) that is currently collected and stored in support of missions has been corrupted to various extents by image acquisition and compression artifacts. Additionally, video collected by wide-area motion imagery (WAMI) surveillance systems and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and similar sources is often of low quality or in other ways corrupted so that it is not worth storing or analyzing. In order to make progress in the problem of automatic video analysis, the first problem that should be solved is deciding whether the content of the video is even worth analyzing to begin with. We present a work in progress to address three types of scenes which are typically found in real-world data stored in support of Department of Defense (DoD) missions: no or very little motion in the scene, large occlusions in the scene, and fast camera motion. Each of these produce video that is generally not usable to an analyst or automated algorithm for mission support and therefore should be removed or flagged to the user as such. We utilize recent computer vision advances in motion detection and optical flow to automatically assess FMV for the identification and generation of meta-data (or tagging) of video segments which exhibit unwanted scenarios as described above. Results are shown on representative real-world video data.

  8. Design of UAV high resolution image transmission system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gao, Qiang; Ji, Ming; Pang, Lan; Jiang, Wen-tao; Fan, Pengcheng; Zhang, Xingcheng

    2017-02-01

    In order to solve the problem of the bandwidth limitation of the image transmission system on UAV, a scheme with image compression technology for mini UAV is proposed, based on the requirements of High-definition image transmission system of UAV. The video codec standard H.264 coding module and key technology was analyzed and studied for UAV area video communication. Based on the research of high-resolution image encoding and decoding technique and wireless transmit method, The high-resolution image transmission system was designed on architecture of Android and video codec chip; the constructed system was confirmed by experimentation in laboratory, the bit-rate could be controlled easily, QoS is stable, the low latency could meets most applied requirement not only for military use but also for industrial applications.

  9. Cross-Layer Design for Video Transmission over Wireless Rician Slow-Fading Channels Using an Adaptive Multiresolution Modulation and Coding Scheme

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pei, Yong; Modestino, James W.

    2007-12-01

    We describe a multilayered video transport scheme for wireless channels capable of adapting to channel conditions in order to maximize end-to-end quality of service (QoS). This scheme combines a scalable H.263+ video source coder with unequal error protection (UEP) across layers. The UEP is achieved by employing different channel codes together with a multiresolution modulation approach to transport the different priority layers. Adaptivity to channel conditions is provided through a joint source-channel coding (JSCC) approach which attempts to jointly optimize the source and channel coding rates together with the modulation parameters to obtain the maximum achievable end-to-end QoS for the prevailing channel conditions. In this work, we model the wireless links as slow-fading Rician channel where the channel conditions can be described in terms of the channel signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and the ratio of specular-to-diffuse energy[InlineEquation not available: see fulltext.]. The multiresolution modulation/coding scheme consists of binary rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes used together with nonuniform phase-shift keyed (PSK) signaling constellations. Results indicate that this adaptive JSCC scheme employing scalable video encoding together with a multiresolution modulation/coding approach leads to significant improvements in delivered video quality for specified channel conditions. In particular, the approach results in considerably improved graceful degradation properties for decreasing channel SNR.

  10. Digital Video Over Space Systems and Networks

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Grubbs, Rodney

    2010-01-01

    This slide presentation reviews the use of digital video with space systems and networks. The earliest use of video was the use of film precluding live viewing, which gave way to live television from space. This has given way to digital video using internet protocol for transmission. This has provided for many improvements with new challenges. Some of these ehallenges are reviewed. The change to digital video transmitted over space systems can provide incredible imagery, however the process must be viewed as an entire system, rather than piece-meal.

  11. Using Video from Mobile Phones to Improve Pediatric Phone Triage in an Underserved Population.

    PubMed

    Freeman, Brandi; Mayne, Stephanie; Localio, A Russell; Luberti, Anthony; Zorc, Joseph J; Fiks, Alexander G

    2017-02-01

    Video-capable mobile phones are widely available, but few studies have evaluated their use in telephone triage for pediatric patients. We assessed the feasibility, acceptability, and utility of videos sent via mobile phones to enhance pediatric telephone triage for an underserved population with asthma. We recruited children who presented to an urban pediatric emergency department with an asthma exacerbation along with their parent/guardian. Parents and the research team each obtained a video of the child's respiratory exam, and the research team conducted a concurrent in-person rating of respiratory status. We measured the acceptability of families sending videos as part of telephone triage (survey) and the feasibility of this approach (rates of successful video transmission by parents to the research team). To estimate the utility of the video in appropriately triaging children, four clinicians reviewed each video and rated whether they found the video reassuring, neutral, or raising concerns. Among 60 families (78% Medicaid, 85% Black), 80% of parents reported that sending a video would be helpful and 68% reported that a nurse's review of a video would increase their trust in the triage assessment. Most families (75%) successfully transmitted a video to the research team. All clinician raters found the video reassuring regarding the severity of the child's asthma exacerbation for 68% of children. Obtaining mobile phone videos for telephone triage is acceptable to families, feasible, and may help improve the quality of telephone triage in an urban, minority population.

  12. Smartphone based automatic organ validation in ultrasound video.

    PubMed

    Vaish, Pallavi; Bharath, R; Rajalakshmi, P

    2017-07-01

    Telesonography involves transmission of ultrasound video from remote areas to the doctors for getting diagnosis. Due to the lack of trained sonographers in remote areas, the ultrasound videos scanned by these untrained persons do not contain the proper information that is required by a physician. As compared to standard methods for video transmission, mHealth driven systems need to be developed for transmitting valid medical videos. To overcome this problem, we are proposing an organ validation algorithm to evaluate the ultrasound video based on the content present. This will guide the semi skilled person to acquire the representative data from patient. Advancement in smartphone technology allows us to perform high medical image processing on smartphone. In this paper we have developed an Application (APP) for a smartphone which can automatically detect the valid frames (which consist of clear organ visibility) in an ultrasound video and ignores the invalid frames (which consist of no-organ visibility), and produces a compressed sized video. This is done by extracting the GIST features from the Region of Interest (ROI) of the frame and then classifying the frame using SVM classifier with quadratic kernel. The developed application resulted with the accuracy of 94.93% in classifying valid and invalid images.

  13. Remote video assessment for missile launch facilities

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Wagner, G.G.; Stewart, W.A.

    1995-07-01

    The widely dispersed, unmanned launch facilities (LFs) for land-based ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles) currently do not have visual assessment capability for existing intrusion alarms. The security response force currently must assess each alarm on-site. Remote assessment will enhance manpower, safety, and security efforts. Sandia National Laboratories was tasked by the USAF Electronic Systems Center to research, recommend, and demonstrate a cost-effective remote video assessment capability at missile LFs. The project`s charter was to provide: system concepts; market survey analysis; technology search recommendations; and operational hardware demonstrations for remote video assessment from a missile LF to a remote security center viamore » a cost-effective transmission medium and without using visible, on-site lighting. The technical challenges of this project were to: analyze various video transmission media and emphasize using the existing missile system copper line which can be as long as 30 miles; accentuate and extremely low-cost system because of the many sites requiring system installation; integrate the video assessment system with the current LF alarm system; and provide video assessment at the remote sites with non-visible lighting.« less

  14. Unequal power allocation for JPEG transmission over MIMO systems.

    PubMed

    Sabir, Muhammad Farooq; Bovik, Alan Conrad; Heath, Robert W

    2010-02-01

    With the introduction of multiple transmit and receive antennas in next generation wireless systems, real-time image and video communication are expected to become quite common, since very high data rates will become available along with improved data reliability. New joint transmission and coding schemes that explore advantages of multiple antenna systems matched with source statistics are expected to be developed. Based on this idea, we present an unequal power allocation scheme for transmission of JPEG compressed images over multiple-input multiple-output systems employing spatial multiplexing. The JPEG-compressed image is divided into different quality layers, and different layers are transmitted simultaneously from different transmit antennas using unequal transmit power, with a constraint on the total transmit power during any symbol period. Results show that our unequal power allocation scheme provides significant image quality improvement as compared to different equal power allocations schemes, with the peak-signal-to-noise-ratio gain as high as 14 dB at low signal-to-noise-ratios.

  15. State of the art in video system performance

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Lewis, Michael J.

    1990-01-01

    The closed circuit television (CCTV) system that is onboard the Space Shuttle has the following capabilities: camera, video signal switching and routing unit (VSU); and Space Shuttle video tape recorder. However, this system is inadequate for use with many experiments that require video imaging. In order to assess the state-of-the-art in video technology and data storage systems, a survey was conducted of the High Resolution, High Frame Rate Video Technology (HHVT) products. The performance of the state-of-the-art solid state cameras and image sensors, video recording systems, data transmission devices, and data storage systems versus users' requirements are shown graphically.

  16. Video media-induced aggressiveness in children.

    PubMed

    Cardwell, Michael Steven

    2013-09-01

    Transmission of aggressive behaviors to children through modeling by adults has long been a commonly held psychological concept; however, with the advent of technological innovations during the last 30 years, video media-television, movies, video games, and the Internet-has become the primary model for transmitting aggressiveness to children. This review explores the acquisition of aggressive behaviors by children through modeling behaviors in violent video media. The impact of aggressive behaviors on the child, the family, and society is addressed. Suggestive action plans to curb this societal ill are presented.

  17. Digital codec for real-time processing of broadcast quality video signals at 1.8 bits/pixel

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Shalkhauser, Mary JO; Whyte, Wayne A., Jr.

    1989-01-01

    The authors present the hardware implementation of a digital television bandwidth compression algorithm which processes standard NTSC (National Television Systems Committee) composite color television signals and produces broadcast-quality video in real time at an average of 1.8 b/pixel. The sampling rate used with this algorithm results in 768 samples over the active portion of each video line by 512 active video lines per video frame. The algorithm is based on differential pulse code modulation (DPCM), but additionally utilizes a nonadaptive predictor, nonuniform quantizer, and multilevel Huffman coder to reduce the data rate substantially below that achievable with straight DPCM. The nonadaptive predictor and multilevel Huffman coder combine to set this technique apart from prior-art DPCM encoding algorithms. The authors describe the data compression algorithm and the hardware implementation of the codec and provide performance results.

  18. Sub-component modeling for face image reconstruction in video communications

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Shiell, Derek J.; Xiao, Jing; Katsaggelos, Aggelos K.

    2008-08-01

    Emerging communications trends point to streaming video as a new form of content delivery. These systems are implemented over wired systems, such as cable or ethernet, and wireless networks, cell phones, and portable game systems. These communications systems require sophisticated methods of compression and error-resilience encoding to enable communications across band-limited and noisy delivery channels. Additionally, the transmitted video data must be of high enough quality to ensure a satisfactory end-user experience. Traditionally, video compression makes use of temporal and spatial coherence to reduce the information required to represent an image. In many communications systems, the communications channel is characterized by a probabilistic model which describes the capacity or fidelity of the channel. The implication is that information is lost or distorted in the channel, and requires concealment on the receiving end. We demonstrate a generative model based transmission scheme to compress human face images in video, which has the advantages of a potentially higher compression ratio, while maintaining robustness to errors and data corruption. This is accomplished by training an offline face model and using the model to reconstruct face images on the receiving end. We propose a sub-component AAM modeling the appearance of sub-facial components individually, and show face reconstruction results under different types of video degradation using a weighted and non-weighted version of the sub-component AAM.

  19. Clinical applications of commercially available video recording and monitoring systems: inexpensive, high-quality video recording and monitoring systems for endoscopy and microsurgery.

    PubMed

    Tsunoda, Koichi; Tsunoda, Atsunobu; Ishimoto, ShinnIchi; Kimura, Satoko

    2006-01-01

    The exclusive charge-coupled device (CCD) camera system for the endoscope and electronic fiberscopes are in widespread use. However, both are usually stationary in an office or examination room, and a wheeled cart is needed for mobility. The total costs of the CCD camera system and electronic fiberscopy system are at least US Dollars 10,000 and US Dollars 30,000, respectively. Recently, the performance of audio and visual instruments has improved dramatically, with a concomitant reduction in their cost. Commercially available CCD video cameras with small monitors have become common. They provide excellent image quality and are much smaller and less expensive than previous models. The authors have developed adaptors for the popular mini-digital video (mini-DV) camera. The camera also provides video and acoustic output signals; therefore, the endoscopic images can be viewed on a large monitor simultaneously. The new system (a mini-DV video camera and an adaptor) costs only US Dollars 1,000. Therefore, the system is both cost-effective and useful for the outpatient clinic or casualty setting, or on house calls for the purpose of patient education. In the future, the authors plan to introduce the clinical application of a high-vision camera and an infrared camera as medical instruments for clinical and research situations.

  20. Perceptual quality estimation of H.264/AVC videos using reduced-reference and no-reference models

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Shahid, Muhammad; Pandremmenou, Katerina; Kondi, Lisimachos P.; Rossholm, Andreas; Lövström, Benny

    2016-09-01

    Reduced-reference (RR) and no-reference (NR) models for video quality estimation, using features that account for the impact of coding artifacts, spatio-temporal complexity, and packet losses, are proposed. The purpose of this study is to analyze a number of potentially quality-relevant features in order to select the most suitable set of features for building the desired models. The proposed sets of features have not been used in the literature and some of the features are used for the first time in this study. The features are employed by the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO), which selects only the most influential of them toward perceptual quality. For comparison, we apply feature selection in the complete feature sets and ridge regression on the reduced sets. The models are validated using a database of H.264/AVC encoded videos that were subjectively assessed for quality in an ITU-T compliant laboratory. We infer that just two features selected by RR LASSO and two bitstream-based features selected by NR LASSO are able to estimate perceptual quality with high accuracy, higher than that of ridge, which uses more features. The comparisons with competing works and two full-reference metrics also verify the superiority of our models.

  1. 76 FR 67118 - Structure and Practices of the Video Relay Service Program

    Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

    2011-10-31

    ... Practices of the Video Relay Service Program AGENCY: Federal Communications Commission. ACTION: Proposed... Commission's Structure and Practices of the Video Relay Service Program, Further Notice of Proposed..., and video using wired telecommunications networks. Transmission facilities may be based on a single...

  2. Automatic generation of pictorial transcripts of video programs

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Shahraray, Behzad; Gibbon, David C.

    1995-03-01

    An automatic authoring system for the generation of pictorial transcripts of video programs which are accompanied by closed caption information is presented. A number of key frames, each of which represents the visual information in a segment of the video (i.e., a scene), are selected automatically by performing a content-based sampling of the video program. The textual information is recovered from the closed caption signal and is initially segmented based on its implied temporal relationship with the video segments. The text segmentation boundaries are then adjusted, based on lexical analysis and/or caption control information, to account for synchronization errors due to possible delays in the detection of scene boundaries or the transmission of the caption information. The closed caption text is further refined through linguistic processing for conversion to lower- case with correct capitalization. The key frames and the related text generate a compact multimedia presentation of the contents of the video program which lends itself to efficient storage and transmission. This compact representation can be viewed on a computer screen, or used to generate the input to a commercial text processing package to generate a printed version of the program.

  3. Subjective quality of video sequences rendered on LCD with local backlight dimming at different lighting conditions

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mantel, Claire; Korhonen, Jari; Pedersen, Jesper M.; Bech, Søren; Andersen, Jakob Dahl; Forchhammer, Søren

    2015-01-01

    This paper focuses on the influence of ambient light on the perceived quality of videos displayed on Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) with local backlight dimming. A subjective test assessing the quality of videos with two backlight dimming methods and three lighting conditions, i.e. no light, low light level (5 lux) and higher light level (60 lux) was organized to collect subjective data. Results show that participants prefer the method exploiting local dimming possibilities to the conventional full backlight but that this preference varies depending on the ambient light level. The clear preference for one method at the low light conditions decreases at the high ambient light, confirming that the ambient light significantly attenuates the perception of the leakage defect (light leaking through dark pixels). Results are also highly dependent on the content of the sequence, which can modulate the effect of the ambient light from having an important influence on the quality grades to no influence at all.

  4. Efficacy of video-music therapy on quality of life improvement in a group of patients with Alzheimer's disease: a pre-post study.

    PubMed

    Rubbi, Ivan; Magnani, Daniela; Naldoni, Giada; Di Lorenzo, Rosaria; Cremonini, Valeria; Capucci, Patrizia; Artioli, Giovanna; Ferri, Paola

    2016-11-22

    Alzheimer's disease is the most common degenerative dementia with a predominantly senile onset. The difficult management of altered behaviour related to this disorder, poorly responsive to pharmacological treatments, has stimulated growth in non-pharmacological interventions, such as music therapy, whose effectiveness has not been supported by the literature up to now. The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of video-music therapy on quality of life improvement in Patients affected by Alzheimer's Disease (AD). A pre-post study was conducted in a residential facility. 32 AD Patients, who attended this facility daily to participate in supportive and rehabilitative programs, were treated with 2 cycles of 6 video-music-therapy sessions, which consisted of folk music and video, recalling local traditions. In order to investigate their cognitive status, Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) was administered and Patients were divided into stages according to MMSE scores. After each session of video-music-therapy, Quality of Life in Alzheimer's Disease Scale (QOL-AD) was administered to our Patients. 21 AD Patients completed the 2 cycles of video-music therapy. Among them, only the Patients with questionable, mild and moderate neurocognitive impairment (MMSE Stages 1, 2, 3) reported an improvement in their quality of life, whereas the Patients with severe deterioration (MMSE stage 4) did not report any change. Many items of QOL-AD improved, showing a statistically significantly correlation to each other. Video-music therapy was a valuable tool for improving the quality of life only in Patients affected by less severe neurocognitive impairment.

  5. Secure Internet video conferencing for assessing acute medical problems in a nursing facility.

    PubMed Central

    Weiner, M.; Schadow, G.; Lindbergh, D.; Warvel, J.; Abernathy, G.; Dexter, P.; McDonald, C. J.

    2001-01-01

    Although video-based teleconferencing is becoming more widespread in the medical profession, especially for scheduled consultations, applications for rapid assessment of acute medical problems are rare. Use of such a video system in a nursing facility may be especially beneficial, because physicians are often not immediately available to evaluate patients. We have assembled and tested a portable, wireless conferencing system to prepare for a randomized trial of the system s influence on resource utilization and satisfaction. The system includes a rolling cart with video conferencing hardware and software, a remotely controllable digital camera, light, wireless network, and battery. A semi-automated paging system informs physicians of patient s study status and indications for conferencing. Data transmission occurs wirelessly in the nursing home and then through Internet cables to the physician s home. This provides sufficient bandwidth to support quality motion images. IPsec secures communications. Despite human and technical challenges, this system is affordable and functional. Images Figure 1 PMID:11825286

  6. Digital Video and the Internet: A Powerful Combination.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Barron, Ann E.; Orwig, Gary W.

    1995-01-01

    Provides an overview of digital video and outlines hardware and software necessary for interactive training on the World Wide Web and for videoconferences via the Internet. Lists sites providing additional information on digital video, on CU-SeeMe software, and on MBONE (Multicast BackBONE), a technology that permits real-time transmission of…

  7. Annotation of UAV surveillance video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Howlett, Todd; Robertson, Mark A.; Manthey, Dan; Krol, John

    2004-08-01

    Significant progress toward the development of a video annotation capability is presented in this paper. Research and development of an object tracking algorithm applicable for UAV video is described. Object tracking is necessary for attaching the annotations to the objects of interest. A methodology and format is defined for encoding video annotations using the SMPTE Key-Length-Value encoding standard. This provides the following benefits: a non-destructive annotation, compliance with existing standards, video playback in systems that are not annotation enabled and support for a real-time implementation. A model real-time video annotation system is also presented, at a high level, using the MPEG-2 Transport Stream as the transmission medium. This work was accomplished to meet the Department of Defense"s (DoD"s) need for a video annotation capability. Current practices for creating annotated products are to capture a still image frame, annotate it using an Electric Light Table application, and then pass the annotated image on as a product. That is not adequate for reporting or downstream cueing. It is too slow and there is a severe loss of information. This paper describes a capability for annotating directly on the video.

  8. High-grade video compression of echocardiographic studies: a multicenter validation study of selected motion pictures expert groups (MPEG)-4 algorithms.

    PubMed

    Barbier, Paolo; Alimento, Marina; Berna, Giovanni; Celeste, Fabrizio; Gentile, Francesco; Mantero, Antonio; Montericcio, Vincenzo; Muratori, Manuela

    2007-05-01

    Large files produced by standard compression algorithms slow down spread of digital and tele-echocardiography. We validated echocardiographic video high-grade compression with the new Motion Pictures Expert Groups (MPEG)-4 algorithms with a multicenter study. Seven expert cardiologists blindly scored (5-point scale) 165 uncompressed and compressed 2-dimensional and color Doppler video clips, based on combined diagnostic content and image quality (uncompressed files as references). One digital video and 3 MPEG-4 algorithms (WM9, MV2, and DivX) were used, the latter at 3 compression levels (0%, 35%, and 60%). Compressed file sizes decreased from 12 to 83 MB to 0.03 to 2.3 MB (1:1051-1:26 reduction ratios). Mean SD of differences was 0.81 for intraobserver variability (uncompressed and digital video files). Compared with uncompressed files, only the DivX mean score at 35% (P = .04) and 60% (P = .001) compression was significantly reduced. At subcategory analysis, these differences were still significant for gray-scale and fundamental imaging but not for color or second harmonic tissue imaging. Original image quality, session sequence, compression grade, and bitrate were all independent determinants of mean score. Our study supports use of MPEG-4 algorithms to greatly reduce echocardiographic file sizes, thus facilitating archiving and transmission. Quality evaluation studies should account for the many independent variables that affect image quality grading.

  9. About subjective evaluation of adaptive video streaming

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Tavakoli, Samira; Brunnström, Kjell; Garcia, Narciso

    2015-03-01

    The usage of HTTP Adaptive Streaming (HAS) technology by content providers is increasing rapidly. Having available the video content in multiple qualities, using HAS allows to adapt the quality of downloaded video to the current network conditions providing smooth video-playback. However, the time-varying video quality by itself introduces a new type of impairment. The quality adaptation can be done in different ways. In order to find the best adaptation strategy maximizing users perceptual quality it is necessary to investigate about the subjective perception of adaptation-related impairments. However, the novelties of these impairments and their comparably long time duration make most of the standardized assessment methodologies fall less suited for studying HAS degradation. Furthermore, in traditional testing methodologies, the quality of the video in audiovisual services is often evaluated separated and not in the presence of audio. Nevertheless, the requirement of jointly evaluating the audio and the video within a subjective test is a relatively under-explored research field. In this work, we address the research question of determining the appropriate assessment methodology to evaluate the sequences with time-varying quality due to the adaptation. This was done by studying the influence of different adaptation related parameters through two different subjective experiments using a methodology developed to evaluate long test sequences. In order to study the impact of audio presence on quality assessment by the test subjects, one of the experiments was done in the presence of audio stimuli. The experimental results were subsequently compared with another experiment using the standardized single stimulus Absolute Category Rating (ACR) methodology.

  10. Toward enhancing the distributed video coder under a multiview video codec framework

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lee, Shih-Chieh; Chen, Jiann-Jone; Tsai, Yao-Hong; Chen, Chin-Hua

    2016-11-01

    The advance of video coding technology enables multiview video (MVV) or three-dimensional television (3-D TV) display for users with or without glasses. For mobile devices or wireless applications, a distributed video coder (DVC) can be utilized to shift the encoder complexity to decoder under the MVV coding framework, denoted as multiview distributed video coding (MDVC). We proposed to exploit both inter- and intraview video correlations to enhance side information (SI) and improve the MDVC performance: (1) based on the multiview motion estimation (MVME) framework, a categorized block matching prediction with fidelity weights (COMPETE) was proposed to yield a high quality SI frame for better DVC reconstructed images. (2) The block transform coefficient properties, i.e., DCs and ACs, were exploited to design the priority rate control for the turbo code, such that the DVC decoding can be carried out with fewest parity bits. In comparison, the proposed COMPETE method demonstrated lower time complexity, while presenting better reconstructed video quality. Simulations show that the proposed COMPETE can reduce the time complexity of MVME to 1.29 to 2.56 times smaller, as compared to previous hybrid MVME methods, while the image peak signal to noise ratios (PSNRs) of a decoded video can be improved 0.2 to 3.5 dB, as compared to H.264/AVC intracoding.

  11. Learning to Swim Using Video Modelling and Video Feedback within a Self-Management Program

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Lao, So-An; Furlonger, Brett E.; Moore, Dennis W.; Busacca, Margherita

    2016-01-01

    Although many adults who cannot swim are primarily interested in learning by direct coaching there are options that have a focus on self-directed learning. As an alternative a self-management program combined with video modelling, video feedback and high quality and affordable video technology was used to assess its effectiveness to assisting an…

  12. Converting laserdisc video to digital video: a demonstration project using brain animations.

    PubMed

    Jao, C S; Hier, D B; Brint, S U

    1995-01-01

    Interactive laserdiscs are of limited value in large group learning situations due to the expense of establishing multiple workstations. The authors implemented an alternative to laserdisc video by using indexed digital video combined with an expert system. High-quality video was captured from a laserdisc player and combined with waveform audio into an audio-video-interleave (AVI) file format in the Microsoft Video-for-Windows environment (Microsoft Corp., Seattle, WA). With the use of an expert system, a knowledge-based computer program provided random access to these indexed AVI files. The program can be played on any multimedia computer without the need for laserdiscs. This system offers a high level of interactive video without the overhead and cost of a laserdisc player.

  13. Miniaturized video-microscopy system for near real-time water quality biomonitoring using microfluidic chip-based devices

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Huang, Yushi; Nigam, Abhimanyu; Campana, Olivia; Nugegoda, Dayanthi; Wlodkowic, Donald

    2016-12-01

    Biomonitoring studies apply biological responses of sensitive biomonitor organisms to rapidly detect adverse environmental changes such as presence of physic-chemical stressors and toxins. Behavioral responses such as changes in swimming patterns of small aquatic invertebrates are emerging as sensitive endpoints to monitor aquatic pollution. Although behavioral responses do not deliver information on an exact type or the intensity of toxicants present in water samples, they could provide orders of magnitude higher sensitivity than lethal endpoints such as mortality. Despite the advantages of behavioral biotests performed on sentinel organisms, their wider application in real-time and near realtime biomonitoring of water quality is limited by the lack of dedicated and automated video-microscopy systems. Current behavioral analysis systems rely mostly on static test conditions and manual procedures that are time-consuming and labor intensive. Tracking and precise quantification of locomotory activities of multiple small aquatic organisms requires high-resolution optical data recording. This is often problematic due to small size of fast moving animals and limitations of culture vessels that are not specially designed for video data recording. In this work, we capitalized on recent advances in miniaturized CMOS cameras, high resolution optics and biomicrofluidic technologies to develop near real-time water quality sensing using locomotory activities of small marine invertebrates. We present proof-of-concept integration of high-resolution time-resolved video recording system and high-throughput miniaturized perfusion biomicrofluidic platform for optical tracking of nauplii of marine crustacean Artemia franciscana. Preliminary data demonstrate that Artemia sp. exhibits rapid alterations of swimming patterns in response to toxicant exposure. The combination of video-microscopy and biomicrofluidic platform facilitated straightforward recording of fast moving objects. We

  14. Transmission of digital images within the NTSC analog format

    DOEpatents

    Nickel, George H.

    2004-06-15

    HDTV and NTSC compatible image communication is done in a single NTSC channel bandwidth. Luminance and chrominance image data of a scene to be transmitted is obtained. The image data is quantized and digitally encoded to form digital image data in HDTV transmission format having low-resolution terms and high-resolution terms. The low-resolution digital image data terms are transformed to a voltage signal corresponding to NTSC color subcarrier modulation with retrace blanking and color bursts to form a NTSC video signal. The NTSC video signal and the high-resolution digital image data terms are then transmitted in a composite NTSC video transmission. In a NTSC receiver, the NTSC video signal is processed directly to display the scene. In a HDTV receiver, the NTSC video signal is processed to invert the color subcarrier modulation to recover the low-resolution terms, where the recovered low-resolution terms are combined with the high-resolution terms to reconstruct the scene in a high definition format.

  15. Quality of audio-assisted versus video-assisted dispatcher-instructed bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

    PubMed

    Lin, Yu-You; Chiang, Wen-Chu; Hsieh, Ming-Ju; Sun, Jen-Tang; Chang, Yi-Chung; Ma, Matthew Huei-Ming

    2018-02-01

    This study aimed to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis comparing the effect of video-assistance and audio-assistance on quality of dispatcher-instructed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (DI-CPR) for bystanders. Five databases were searched, including PubMed, Cochrane library, Embase, Scopus and NIH clinical trial, to find randomized control trials published before June 2017. Qualitative analysis and meta-analysis were undertaken to examine the difference between the quality of video-instructed and audio-instructed dispatcher-instructed bystander CPR. The database search yielded 929 records, resulting in the inclusion of 9 relevant articles in this study. Of these, 6 were included in the meta-analysis. Initiation of chest compressions was slower in the video-instructed group than in the audio-instructed group (median delay 31.5 s; 95% CI: 10.94-52.09). The difference in the number of chest compressions per minute between the groups was 19.9 (95% CI: 10.50-29.38) with significantly faster compressions in the video-instructed group than in the audio-instructed group (104.8 vs. 80.6). The odds ratio (OR) for correct hand positioning was 0.8 (95% CI: 0.53-1.30) when comparing the audio-instructed and video-instructed groups. The differences in chest compression depth (mm) and time to first ventilation (seconds) between the video-instructed group and audio-instructed group were 1.6 mm (95% CI: -8.75, 5.55) and 7.5 s (95% CI: -56.84, 71.80), respectively. Video-instructed DI-CPR significantly improved the chest compression rate compared to the audio-instructed method, and a trend for correctness of hand position was also observed. However, this method caused a delay in the commencement of bystander-initiated CPR in the simulation setting. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  16. A robust low-rate coding scheme for packet video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chen, Y. C.; Sayood, Khalid; Nelson, D. J.; Arikan, E. (Editor)

    1991-01-01

    Due to the rapidly evolving field of image processing and networking, video information promises to be an important part of telecommunication systems. Although up to now video transmission has been transported mainly over circuit-switched networks, it is likely that packet-switched networks will dominate the communication world in the near future. Asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) techniques in broadband-ISDN can provide a flexible, independent and high performance environment for video communication. For this paper, the network simulator was used only as a channel in this simulation. Mixture blocking coding with progressive transmission (MBCPT) has been investigated for use over packet networks and has been found to provide high compression rate with good visual performance, robustness to packet loss, tractable integration with network mechanics and simplicity in parallel implementation.

  17. Image and Video Compression with VLSI Neural Networks

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Fang, W.; Sheu, B.

    1993-01-01

    An advanced motion-compensated predictive video compression system based on artificial neural networks has been developed to effectively eliminate the temporal and spatial redundancy of video image sequences and thus reduce the bandwidth and storage required for the transmission and recording of the video signal. The VLSI neuroprocessor for high-speed high-ratio image compression based upon a self-organization network and the conventional algorithm for vector quantization are compared. The proposed method is quite efficient and can achieve near-optimal results.

  18. Enhanced video indirect ophthalmoscopy (VIO) via robust mosaicing.

    PubMed

    Estrada, Rolando; Tomasi, Carlo; Cabrera, Michelle T; Wallace, David K; Freedman, Sharon F; Farsiu, Sina

    2011-10-01

    Indirect ophthalmoscopy (IO) is the standard of care for evaluation of the neonatal retina. When recorded on video from a head-mounted camera, IO images have low quality and narrow Field of View (FOV). We present an image fusion methodology for converting a video IO recording into a single, high quality, wide-FOV mosaic that seamlessly blends the best frames in the video. To this end, we have developed fast and robust algorithms for automatic evaluation of video quality, artifact detection and removal, vessel mapping, registration, and multi-frame image fusion. Our experiments show the effectiveness of the proposed methods.

  19. An energy saving mechanism of EPON networks for real time video transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Liu, Chien-Ping; Wu, Ho-Ting; Chiang, Yun-Ting; Chien, Shieh-Chieh; Ke, Kai-Wei

    2015-07-01

    Modern access networks are constructed widely by passive optical networks (PONs) to meet the growing bandwidth demand. However, higher bandwidth means more energy consumption. To save energy, a few research works propose the dual-mode energy saving mechanism that allows the ONU to operate between active and sleep modes periodically. However, such dual-mode energy saving design may induce unnecessary power consumption or packet delay increase in the case where only downstream data exist for most of the time. In this paper, we propose a new tri-mode energy saving scheme for Ethernet PON (EPON). The new tri-mode energy saving design, combining the dual-mode saving mechanism with the doze mode, allows the ONU to switch among these three modes alternatively. In the doze mode, the ONU may receive downstream data while keeping its transmitter close. Such scenario is often observed for real time video downstream transmission. Furthermore, the low packet delay of high priority upstream data can be attained through the use of early wake-up mechanism employed in both energy saving modes. The energy saving and system efficiency can thus be achieved jointly while maintaining the differentiated QoS for data with various priorities. Performance results via simulation have demonstrated the effectiveness of such mechanism.

  20. Video Communication Program.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Haynes, Leonard Stanley

    This thesis describes work done as part of the Video Console Indexing Project (VICI), a program to improve the quality and reduce the time and work involved in indexing documents. The objective of the work described was to design a video terminal system which could be connected to a main computer to provide rapid natural communication between the…

  1. Packet based serial link realized in FPGA dedicated for high resolution infrared image transmission

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bieszczad, Grzegorz

    2015-05-01

    In article the external digital interface specially designed for thermographic camera built in Military University of Technology is described. The aim of article is to illustrate challenges encountered during design process of thermal vision camera especially related to infrared data processing and transmission. Article explains main requirements for interface to transfer Infra-Red or Video digital data and describes the solution which we elaborated based on Low Voltage Differential Signaling (LVDS) physical layer and signaling scheme. Elaborated link for image transmission is built using FPGA integrated circuit with built-in high speed serial transceivers achieving up to 2500Gbps throughput. Image transmission is realized using proprietary packet protocol. Transmission protocol engine was described in VHDL language and tested in FPGA hardware. The link is able to transmit 1280x1024@60Hz 24bit video data using one signal pair. Link was tested to transmit thermal-vision camera picture to remote monitor. Construction of dedicated video link allows to reduce power consumption compared to solutions with ASIC based encoders and decoders realizing video links like DVI or packed based Display Port, with simultaneous reduction of wires needed to establish link to one pair. Article describes functions of modules integrated in FPGA design realizing several functions like: synchronization to video source, video stream packeting, interfacing transceiver module and dynamic clock generation for video standard conversion.

  2. Evaluating Cell Processes, Quality, and Biomarkers in Pluripotent Stem Cells Using Video Bioinformatics

    PubMed Central

    Lin, Sabrina C.; Bays, Brett C.; Omaiye, Esther; Bhanu, Bir; Talbot, Prue

    2016-01-01

    There is a foundational need for quality control tools in stem cell laboratories engaged in basic research, regenerative therapies, and toxicological studies. These tools require automated methods for evaluating cell processes and quality during in vitro passaging, expansion, maintenance, and differentiation. In this paper, an unbiased, automated high-content profiling toolkit, StemCellQC, is presented that non-invasively extracts information on cell quality and cellular processes from time-lapse phase-contrast videos. Twenty four (24) morphological and dynamic features were analyzed in healthy, unhealthy, and dying human embryonic stem cell (hESC) colonies to identify those features that were affected in each group. Multiple features differed in the healthy versus unhealthy/dying groups, and these features were linked to growth, motility, and death. Biomarkers were discovered that predicted cell processes before they were detectable by manual observation. StemCellQC distinguished healthy and unhealthy/dying hESC colonies with 96% accuracy by non-invasively measuring and tracking dynamic and morphological features over 48 hours. Changes in cellular processes can be monitored by StemCellQC and predictions can be made about the quality of pluripotent stem cell colonies. This toolkit reduced the time and resources required to track multiple pluripotent stem cell colonies and eliminated handling errors and false classifications due to human bias. StemCellQC provided both user-specified and classifier-determined analysis in cases where the affected features are not intuitive or anticipated. Video analysis algorithms allowed assessment of biological phenomena using automatic detection analysis, which can aid facilities where maintaining stem cell quality and/or monitoring changes in cellular processes are essential. In the future StemCellQC can be expanded to include other features, cell types, treatments, and differentiating cells. PMID:26848582

  3. Evaluating Cell Processes, Quality, and Biomarkers in Pluripotent Stem Cells Using Video Bioinformatics.

    PubMed

    Zahedi, Atena; On, Vincent; Lin, Sabrina C; Bays, Brett C; Omaiye, Esther; Bhanu, Bir; Talbot, Prue

    2016-01-01

    There is a foundational need for quality control tools in stem cell laboratories engaged in basic research, regenerative therapies, and toxicological studies. These tools require automated methods for evaluating cell processes and quality during in vitro passaging, expansion, maintenance, and differentiation. In this paper, an unbiased, automated high-content profiling toolkit, StemCellQC, is presented that non-invasively extracts information on cell quality and cellular processes from time-lapse phase-contrast videos. Twenty four (24) morphological and dynamic features were analyzed in healthy, unhealthy, and dying human embryonic stem cell (hESC) colonies to identify those features that were affected in each group. Multiple features differed in the healthy versus unhealthy/dying groups, and these features were linked to growth, motility, and death. Biomarkers were discovered that predicted cell processes before they were detectable by manual observation. StemCellQC distinguished healthy and unhealthy/dying hESC colonies with 96% accuracy by non-invasively measuring and tracking dynamic and morphological features over 48 hours. Changes in cellular processes can be monitored by StemCellQC and predictions can be made about the quality of pluripotent stem cell colonies. This toolkit reduced the time and resources required to track multiple pluripotent stem cell colonies and eliminated handling errors and false classifications due to human bias. StemCellQC provided both user-specified and classifier-determined analysis in cases where the affected features are not intuitive or anticipated. Video analysis algorithms allowed assessment of biological phenomena using automatic detection analysis, which can aid facilities where maintaining stem cell quality and/or monitoring changes in cellular processes are essential. In the future StemCellQC can be expanded to include other features, cell types, treatments, and differentiating cells.

  4. Scalable Video Streaming in Wireless Mesh Networks for Education

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Liu, Yan; Wang, Xinheng; Zhao, Liqiang

    2011-01-01

    In this paper, a video streaming system for education based on a wireless mesh network is proposed. A wireless mesh network is a self-organizing, self-managing and reliable intelligent network, which allows educators to deploy a network quickly. Video streaming plays an important role in this system for multimedia data transmission. This new…

  5. VideoBeam portable laser communicator

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mecherle, G. Stephen; Holcomb, Terry L.

    1999-01-01

    A VideoBeamTM portable laser communicator has been developed which provides full duplex communication links consisting of high quality analog video and stereo audio. The 3.2-pound unit resembles a binocular-type form factor and has an operational range of over two miles (clear air) with excellent jam-resistance and low probability of interception characteristics. The VideoBeamTM unit is ideally suited for numerous military scenarios, surveillance/espionage, industrial precious mineral exploration, and campus video teleconferencing applications.

  6. Content-based management service for medical videos.

    PubMed

    Mendi, Engin; Bayrak, Coskun; Cecen, Songul; Ermisoglu, Emre

    2013-01-01

    Development of health information technology has had a dramatic impact to improve the efficiency and quality of medical care. Developing interoperable health information systems for healthcare providers has the potential to improve the quality and equitability of patient-centered healthcare. In this article, we describe an automated content-based medical video analysis and management service that provides convenience and ease in accessing the relevant medical video content without sequential scanning. The system facilitates effective temporal video segmentation and content-based visual information retrieval that enable a more reliable understanding of medical video content. The system is implemented as a Web- and mobile-based service and has the potential to offer a knowledge-sharing platform for the purpose of efficient medical video content access.

  7. Reduction in Fall Rate in Dementia Managed Care Through Video Incident Review: Pilot Study.

    PubMed

    Bayen, Eleonore; Jacquemot, Julien; Netscher, George; Agrawal, Pulkit; Tabb Noyce, Lynn; Bayen, Alexandre

    2017-10-17

    Falls of individuals with dementia are frequent, dangerous, and costly. Early detection and access to the history of a fall is crucial for efficient care and secondary prevention in cognitively impaired individuals. However, most falls remain unwitnessed events. Furthermore, understanding why and how a fall occurred is a challenge. Video capture and secure transmission of real-world falls thus stands as a promising assistive tool. The objective of this study was to analyze how continuous video monitoring and review of falls of individuals with dementia can support better quality of care. A pilot observational study (July-September 2016) was carried out in a Californian memory care facility. Falls were video-captured (24×7), thanks to 43 wall-mounted cameras (deployed in all common areas and in 10 out of 40 private bedrooms of consenting residents and families). Video review was provided to facility staff, thanks to a customized mobile device app. The outcome measures were the count of residents' falls happening in the video-covered areas, the acceptability of video recording, the analysis of video review, and video replay possibilities for care practice. Over 3 months, 16 falls were video-captured. A drop in fall rate was observed in the last month of the study. Acceptability was good. Video review enabled screening for the severity of falls and fall-related injuries. Video replay enabled identifying cognitive-behavioral deficiencies and environmental circumstances contributing to the fall. This allowed for secondary prevention in high-risk multi-faller individuals and for updated facility care policies regarding a safer living environment for all residents. Video monitoring offers high potential to support conventional care in memory care facilities. ©Eleonore Bayen, Julien Jacquemot, George Netscher, Pulkit Agrawal, Lynn Tabb Noyce, Alexandre Bayen. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 17.10.2017.

  8. Reduction in Fall Rate in Dementia Managed Care Through Video Incident Review: Pilot Study

    PubMed Central

    Netscher, George; Agrawal, Pulkit; Tabb Noyce, Lynn; Bayen, Alexandre

    2017-01-01

    Background Falls of individuals with dementia are frequent, dangerous, and costly. Early detection and access to the history of a fall is crucial for efficient care and secondary prevention in cognitively impaired individuals. However, most falls remain unwitnessed events. Furthermore, understanding why and how a fall occurred is a challenge. Video capture and secure transmission of real-world falls thus stands as a promising assistive tool. Objective The objective of this study was to analyze how continuous video monitoring and review of falls of individuals with dementia can support better quality of care. Methods A pilot observational study (July-September 2016) was carried out in a Californian memory care facility. Falls were video-captured (24×7), thanks to 43 wall-mounted cameras (deployed in all common areas and in 10 out of 40 private bedrooms of consenting residents and families). Video review was provided to facility staff, thanks to a customized mobile device app. The outcome measures were the count of residents’ falls happening in the video-covered areas, the acceptability of video recording, the analysis of video review, and video replay possibilities for care practice. Results Over 3 months, 16 falls were video-captured. A drop in fall rate was observed in the last month of the study. Acceptability was good. Video review enabled screening for the severity of falls and fall-related injuries. Video replay enabled identifying cognitive-behavioral deficiencies and environmental circumstances contributing to the fall. This allowed for secondary prevention in high-risk multi-faller individuals and for updated facility care policies regarding a safer living environment for all residents. Conclusions Video monitoring offers high potential to support conventional care in memory care facilities. PMID:29042342

  9. Staff acceptance of video monitoring for coordination: a video system to support perioperative situation awareness.

    PubMed

    Kim, Young Ju; Xiao, Yan; Hu, Peter; Dutton, Richard

    2009-08-01

    To understand staff acceptance of a remote video monitoring system for operating room (OR) coordination. Improved real-time remote visual access to OR may enhance situational awareness but also raises privacy concerns for patients and staff. Survey. A system was implemented in a six-room surgical suite to display OR monitoring video at an access restricted control desk area. Image quality was manipulated to improve staff acceptance. Two months after installation, interviews and a survey were conducted on staff acceptance of video monitoring. About half of all OR personnel responded (n = 63). Overall levels of concerns were low, with 53% rated no concerns and 42% little concern. Top two reported uses of the video were to see if cases are finished and to see if a room is ready. Viewing the video monitoring system as useful did not reduce levels of concern. Staff in supervisory positions perceived less concern about the system's impact on privacy than did those supervised (p < 0.03). Concerns for patient privacy correlated with concerns for staff privacy and performance monitoring. Technical means such as manipulating image quality helped staff acceptance. Manipulation of image quality resulted overall acceptance of monitoring video, with residual levels of concerns. OR nurses may express staff privacy concern in the form of concerns over patient privacy. This study provided suggestions for technological and implementation strategies of video monitoring for coordination use in OR. Deployment of communication technology and integration of clinical information will likely raise concerns over staff privacy and performance monitoring. The potential gain of increased information access may be offset by negative impact of a sense of loss of autonomy.

  10. Potential digitization/compression techniques for Shuttle video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Habibi, A.; Batson, B. H.

    1978-01-01

    The Space Shuttle initially will be using a field-sequential color television system but it is possible that an NTSC color TV system may be used for future missions. In addition to downlink color TV transmission via analog FM links, the Shuttle will use a high resolution slow-scan monochrome system for uplink transmission of text and graphics information. This paper discusses the characteristics of the Shuttle video systems, and evaluates digitization and/or bandwidth compression techniques for the various links. The more attractive techniques for the downlink video are based on a two-dimensional DPCM encoder that utilizes temporal and spectral as well as the spatial correlation of the color TV imagery. An appropriate technique for distortion-free coding of the uplink system utilizes two-dimensional HCK codes.

  11. WCE video segmentation using textons

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gallo, Giovanni; Granata, Eliana

    2010-03-01

    Wireless Capsule Endoscopy (WCE) integrates wireless transmission with image and video technology. It has been used to examine the small intestine non invasively. Medical specialists look for signicative events in the WCE video by direct visual inspection manually labelling, in tiring and up to one hour long sessions, clinical relevant frames. This limits the WCE usage. To automatically discriminate digestive organs such as esophagus, stomach, small intestine and colon is of great advantage. In this paper we propose to use textons for the automatic discrimination of abrupt changes within a video. In particular, we consider, as features, for each frame hue, saturation, value, high-frequency energy content and the responses to a bank of Gabor filters. The experiments have been conducted on ten video segments extracted from WCE videos, in which the signicative events have been previously labelled by experts. Results have shown that the proposed method may eliminate up to 70% of the frames from further investigations. The direct analysis of the doctors may hence be concentrated only on eventful frames. A graphical tool showing sudden changes in the textons frequencies for each frame is also proposed as a visual aid to find clinically relevant segments of the video.

  12. Personal-Computer Video-Terminal Emulator

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Buckley, R. H.; Koromilas, A.; Smith, R. M.; Lee, G. E.; Giering, E. W.

    1985-01-01

    OWL-1200 video terminal emulator has been written for IBM Personal Computer. The OWL-1200 is a simple user terminal with some intelligent capabilities. These capabilities include screen formatting and block transmission of data. Emulator is written in PASCAL and Assembler for the IBM Personal Computer operating under DOS 1.1.

  13. Video medical interpretation over 3G cellular networks: a feasibility study.

    PubMed

    Locatis, Craig; Williamson, Deborah; Sterrett, James; Detzler, Isabel; Ackerman, Michael

    2011-12-01

    To test the feasibility of using cell phone technology to provide video medical interpretation services at a distance. Alternative cell phone services were researched and videoconferencing technologies were tried out to identify video products and telecommunication services needed to meet video medical interpretation requirements. The video and telecommunication technologies were tried out in a pharmacy setting and compared with use of the telephone. Outcomes were similar to findings in previous research involving video medical interpretation with higher bandwidth and video quality. Patients appreciated the interpretation service no matter how it is provided, while health providers and interpreters preferred video. It is possible to provide video medical interpretation services via cellular communication using lower bandwidth videoconferencing technology that provides sufficient quality, at least in pharmacy settings. However, a number of issues need to be addressed to ensure quality of service.

  14. Scalable Video Transmission Over Multi-Rate Multiple Access Channels

    DTIC Science & Technology

    2007-06-01

    Rate - compatible punctured convolutional codes (RCPC codes ) and their ap- plications,” IEEE...source encoded using the MPEG-4 video codec. The source encoded bitstream is then channel encoded with Rate Compatible Punctured Convolutional (RCPC...Clark, and J. M. Geist, “ Punctured convolutional codes or rate (n-1)/n and simplified maximum likelihood decoding,” IEEE Transactions on

  15. Learning a Continuous-Time Streaming Video QoE Model.

    PubMed

    Ghadiyaram, Deepti; Pan, Janice; Bovik, Alan C

    2018-05-01

    Over-the-top adaptive video streaming services are frequently impacted by fluctuating network conditions that can lead to rebuffering events (stalling events) and sudden bitrate changes. These events visually impact video consumers' quality of experience (QoE) and can lead to consumer churn. The development of models that can accurately predict viewers' instantaneous subjective QoE under such volatile network conditions could potentially enable the more efficient design of quality-control protocols for media-driven services, such as YouTube, Amazon, Netflix, and so on. However, most existing models only predict a single overall QoE score on a given video and are based on simple global video features, without accounting for relevant aspects of human perception and behavior. We have created a QoE evaluator, called the time-varying QoE Indexer, that accounts for interactions between stalling events, analyzes the spatial and temporal content of a video, predicts the perceptual video quality, models the state of the client-side data buffer, and consequently predicts continuous-time quality scores that agree quite well with human opinion scores. The new QoE predictor also embeds the impact of relevant human cognitive factors, such as memory and recency, and their complex interactions with the video content being viewed. We evaluated the proposed model on three different video databases and attained standout QoE prediction performance.

  16. Layer-based buffer aware rate adaptation design for SHVC video streaming

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gudumasu, Srinivas; Hamza, Ahmed; Asbun, Eduardo; He, Yong; Ye, Yan

    2016-09-01

    This paper proposes a layer based buffer aware rate adaptation design which is able to avoid abrupt video quality fluctuation, reduce re-buffering latency and improve bandwidth utilization when compared to a conventional simulcast based adaptive streaming system. The proposed adaptation design schedules DASH segment requests based on the estimated bandwidth, dependencies among video layers and layer buffer fullness. Scalable HEVC video coding is the latest state-of-art video coding technique that can alleviate various issues caused by simulcast based adaptive video streaming. With scalable coded video streams, the video is encoded once into a number of layers representing different qualities and/or resolutions: a base layer (BL) and one or more enhancement layers (EL), each incrementally enhancing the quality of the lower layers. Such layer based coding structure allows fine granularity rate adaptation for the video streaming applications. Two video streaming use cases are presented in this paper. The first use case is to stream HD SHVC video over a wireless network where available bandwidth varies, and the performance comparison between proposed layer-based streaming approach and conventional simulcast streaming approach is provided. The second use case is to stream 4K/UHD SHVC video over a hybrid access network that consists of a 5G millimeter wave high-speed wireless link and a conventional wired or WiFi network. The simulation results verify that the proposed layer based rate adaptation approach is able to utilize the bandwidth more efficiently. As a result, a more consistent viewing experience with higher quality video content and minimal video quality fluctuations can be presented to the user.

  17. Schemes for efficient transmission of encoded video streams on high-speed networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ramanathan, Srinivas; Vin, Harrick M.; Rangan, P. Venkat

    1994-04-01

    In this paper, we argue that significant performance benefits can accrue if integrated networks implement application-specific mechanisms that account for the diversities in media compression schemes. Towards this end, we propose a simple, yet effective, strategy called Frame Induced Packet Discarding (FIPD), in which, upon detection of loss of a threshold number (determined by an application's video encoding scheme) of packets belonging to a video frame, the network attempts to discard all the remaining packets of that frame. In order to analytically quantify the performance of FIPD so as to obtain fractional frame losses that can be guaranteed to video channels, we develop a finite state, discrete time markov chain model of the FIPD strategy. The fractional frame loss thus computed can serve as the criterion for admission control at the network. Performance evaluations demonstrate the utility of the FIPD strategy.

  18. Standardization of End-to-End Performance of Digital Video Teleconferencing/Video Telephony Systems

    DTIC Science & Technology

    1991-12-01

    SYSTEM 3-1 end-to-end video transmission system including both firmly specified and peripheral flexible functions. The format converter changes either...which manifests itself in both subjective evaluations and objective tests. The relative importance of performance parameters is likely to change with...conventional analog performance parameters to be largely independent of bit rate, and only slightly changed between different codec models. The

  19. Using Digital Videos to Enhance Teacher Preparation

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Dymond, Stacy K.; Bentz, Johnell L.

    2006-01-01

    The technology to produce high quality, digital videos is widely available, yet its use in teacher preparation remains largely overlooked. A digital video library was created to augment instruction in a special education methods course for preservice elementary education teachers. The videos illustrated effective strategies for working with…

  20. Evaluation of MLC leaf transmission on IMRT treatment plan quality of patients with advanced lung cancer.

    PubMed

    Chen, Jiayun; Fu, Guishan; Li, Minghui; Song, Yixin; Dai, Jianrong; Miao, Junjie; Liu, Zhiqiang; Li, Yexiong

    2017-12-14

    The purpose of this paper was to evaluate the impact of leaf treatment of multileaf collimator (MLC) in plan quality of intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) of patients with advanced lung cancer. Five MLCs with different leaf transmissions (0.01%, 0.5%, 1.2%, 1.8%, and 3%) were configured for an accelerator in a treatment planning system. Correspondingly, 5 treatment plans with the same optimization setting were created and evaluated quantitatively for each patient (11 patients total) who was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer. All of the 5 plans for each patient met the dose requirement for the planning treatment volumes (PTVs) and had similar target dose homogeneity and conformity. On average, the doses to selected organs were as follows: (1) V 5 , V 20 , and the mean dose of total lung; (2) the maximum and mean dose to spinal cord planning organ-at-risk volume (PRV); and (3) V 30 and V 40 of heart, decreased slightly when MLC transmission was decreased, but with no statistical differences. There is a clear grouping of plans having total quality score (S D ) value, which is used to evaluate plan quality: (1) more than 1 (patient nos. 1 to 3, 5, and 8), and more than 2.5 (patient no. 6); (2) less than 1 (patient nos. 7 and 10); (3) around 1 (patient nos. 4, 9, and 11). As MLC transmission increased, overall S D values increased as well and plan dose requirement was harder to meet. The clinical requirements were violated increasingly as MLC transmission became large. Total S D with and without normal tissue (NT) showed similar results, with no statistically significant differences. Therefore, decrease of MLC transmission did have minimum impact on plan, and it improved target coverage and reduced normal tissue radiation slightly, with no statistical significance. Plan quality could not be significantly improved by MLC transmission reduction. However, lower MLC transmission may have advantages on lung sparing to low- and intermediate-dose exposure. Besides

  1. Misinformation is prevalent in psoriasis-related YouTube videos.

    PubMed

    Qi, J; Trang, T; Doong, J; Kang, S; Chien, A L

    2016-11-15

    Background Psoriasis patients seek information online, but little is known about their interaction with YouTube. We examined the quality of content in psoriasis-related YouTube videos and investigated their interactions with viewers.Methods YouTube was searched using the term "psoriasis." Relevant videos in English were independently categorized by two reviewers as useful, misleading, or patient view (regarding experience with psoriasis). Disagreements were settled by a third reviewer. Videos were rated on a Global Quality Scale (GQS) (1=poor, 5=excellent).Results According to our reviewers, 17% of the 47 videos were useful, 21% were misleading, and 62% represented patient views. Mean GQS scores were 4.2 ± 1.3 for useful videos, 1.7 ± 0.7 for misleading videos, and 2.2 ± 1.1 for patient view videos (p<0.001). Video views per day did not differ among the categories (p=0.65), whereas useful videos had fewest "Likes" (useful: 31 ± 55, 33 misleading: 151 ± 218, patient views: 165 ± 325, p=0.06) and comments (useful: 9.8 ± 18.3, misleading: 64.1 ± 89.7, 124.9 ± 34 199.4, p=0.009).Conclusions Useful videos were highest in quality but had similar viewership as misleading and patient view videos, with lower popularity and  engagement of users compared to other categories. Physicians and psoriasis patients should be aware of this pattern when pproaching YouTube as a resource.

  2. A robust coding scheme for packet video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chen, Y. C.; Sayood, Khalid; Nelson, D. J.

    1991-01-01

    We present a layered packet video coding algorithm based on a progressive transmission scheme. The algorithm provides good compression and can handle significant packet loss with graceful degradation in the reconstruction sequence. Simulation results for various conditions are presented.

  3. A robust coding scheme for packet video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Chen, Yun-Chung; Sayood, Khalid; Nelson, Don J.

    1992-01-01

    A layered packet video coding algorithm based on a progressive transmission scheme is presented. The algorithm provides good compression and can handle significant packet loss with graceful degradation in the reconstruction sequence. Simulation results for various conditions are presented.

  4. Identifying Measures Used for Assessing Quality of YouTube Videos with Patient Health Information: A Review of Current Literature.

    PubMed

    Gabarron, Elia; Fernandez-Luque, Luis; Armayones, Manuel; Lau, Annie Ys

    2013-02-28

    Recent publications on YouTube have advocated its potential for patient education. However, a reliable description of what could be considered quality information for patient education on YouTube is missing. To identify topics associated with the concept of quality information for patient education on YouTube in the scientific literature. A literature review was performed in MEDLINE, ISI Web of Knowledge, Scopus, and PsychINFO. Abstract selection was first conducted by two independent reviewers; discrepancies were discussed in a second abstract review with two additional independent reviewers. Full text of selected papers were analyzed looking for concepts, definitions, and topics used by its authors that focused on the quality of information on YouTube for patient education. In total, 456 abstracts were extracted and 13 papers meeting eligibility criteria were analyzed. Concepts identified related to quality of information for patient education are categorized as expert-driven, popularity-driven, or heuristic-driven measures. These include (in descending order): (1) quality of content in 10/13 (77%), (2) view count in 9/13 (69%), (3) health professional opinion in 8/13 (62%), (4) adequate length or duration in 6/13 (46%), (5) public ratings in 5/13 (39%), (6) adequate title, tags, and description in 5/13 (39%), (7) good description or a comprehensive narrative in 4/13 (31%), (8) evidence-based practices included in video in 4/13 (31%), (9) suitability as a teaching tool in 4/13 (31%), (10) technical quality in 4/13 (31%), (11) credentials provided in video in 4/13 (31%), (12) enough amount of content to identify its objective in 3/13 (23%), and (13) viewership share in 2/13 (15%). Our review confirms that the current topics linked to quality of information for patient education on YouTube are unclear and not standardized. Although expert-driven, popularity-driven, or heuristic-driven measures are used as proxies to estimate the quality of video information

  5. Identifying Measures Used for Assessing Quality of YouTube Videos with Patient Health Information: A Review of Current Literature

    PubMed Central

    Fernandez-Luque, Luis; Armayones, Manuel; Lau, Annie YS

    2013-01-01

    Background Recent publications on YouTube have advocated its potential for patient education. However, a reliable description of what could be considered quality information for patient education on YouTube is missing. Objective To identify topics associated with the concept of quality information for patient education on YouTube in the scientific literature. Methods A literature review was performed in MEDLINE, ISI Web of Knowledge, Scopus, and PsychINFO. Abstract selection was first conducted by two independent reviewers; discrepancies were discussed in a second abstract review with two additional independent reviewers. Full text of selected papers were analyzed looking for concepts, definitions, and topics used by its authors that focused on the quality of information on YouTube for patient education. Results In total, 456 abstracts were extracted and 13 papers meeting eligibility criteria were analyzed. Concepts identified related to quality of information for patient education are categorized as expert-driven, popularity-driven, or heuristic-driven measures. These include (in descending order): (1) quality of content in 10/13 (77%), (2) view count in 9/13 (69%), (3) health professional opinion in 8/13 (62%), (4) adequate length or duration in 6/13 (46%), (5) public ratings in 5/13 (39%), (6) adequate title, tags, and description in 5/13 (39%), (7) good description or a comprehensive narrative in 4/13 (31%), (8) evidence-based practices included in video in 4/13 (31%), (9) suitability as a teaching tool in 4/13 (31%), (10) technical quality in 4/13 (31%), (11) credentials provided in video in 4/13 (31%), (12) enough amount of content to identify its objective in 3/13 (23%), and (13) viewership share in 2/13 (15%). Conclusions Our review confirms that the current topics linked to quality of information for patient education on YouTube are unclear and not standardized. Although expert-driven, popularity-driven, or heuristic-driven measures are used as proxies to

  6. Deblocking of mobile stereo video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Azzari, Lucio; Gotchev, Atanas; Egiazarian, Karen

    2012-02-01

    Most of candidate methods for compression of mobile stereo video apply block-transform based compression based on the H-264 standard with quantization of transform coefficients driven by quantization parameter (QP). The compression ratio and the resulting bit rate are directly determined by the QP level and high compression is achieved for the price of visually noticeable blocking artifacts. Previous studies on perceived quality of mobile stereo video have revealed that blocking artifacts are the most annoying and most influential in the acceptance/rejection of mobile stereo video and can even completely cancel the 3D effect and the corresponding quality added value. In this work, we address the problem of deblocking of mobile stereo video. We modify a powerful non-local transform-domain collaborative filtering method originally developed for denoising of images and video. The method employs grouping of similar block patches residing in spatial and temporal vicinity of a reference block in filtering them collaboratively in a suitable transform domain. We study the most suitable way of finding similar patches in both channels of stereo video and suggest a hybrid four-dimensional transform to process the collected synchronized (stereo) volumes of grouped blocks. The results benefit from the additional correlation available between the left and right channel of the stereo video. Furthermore, addition sharpening is applied through an embedded alpha-rooting in transform domain, which improve the visual appearance of the deblocked frames.

  7. Enhance Video Film using Retnix method

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Awad, Rasha; Al-Zuky, Ali A.; Al-Saleh, Anwar H.; Mohamad, Haidar J.

    2018-05-01

    An enhancement technique used to improve the studied video quality. Algorithms like mean and standard deviation are used as a criterion within this paper, and it applied for each video clip that divided into 80 images. The studied filming environment has different light intensity (315, 566, and 644Lux). This different environment gives similar reality to the outdoor filming. The outputs of the suggested algorithm are compared with the results before applying it. This method is applied into two ways: first, it is applied for the full video clip to get the enhanced film; second, it is applied for every individual image to get the enhanced image then compiler them to get the enhanced film. This paper shows that the enhancement technique gives good quality video film depending on a statistical method, and it is recommended to use it in different application.

  8. Concurrent Transmission Based on Channel Quality in Ad Hoc Networks: A Game Theoretic Approach

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chen, Chen; Gao, Xinbo; Li, Xiaoji; Pei, Qingqi

    In this paper, a decentralized concurrent transmission strategy in shared channel in Ad Hoc networks is proposed based on game theory. Firstly, a static concurrent transmissions game is used to determine the candidates for transmitting by channel quality threshold and to maximize the overall throughput with consideration of channel quality variation. To achieve NES (Nash Equilibrium Solution), the selfish behaviors of node to attempt to improve the channel gain unilaterally are evaluated. Therefore, this game allows each node to be distributed and to decide whether to transmit concurrently with others or not depending on NES. Secondly, as there are always some nodes with lower channel gain than NES, which are defined as hunger nodes in this paper, a hunger suppression scheme is proposed by adjusting the price function with interferences reservation and forward relay, to fairly give hunger nodes transmission opportunities. Finally, inspired by stock trading, a dynamic concurrent transmission threshold determination scheme is implemented to make the static game practical. Numerical results show that the proposed scheme is feasible to increase concurrent transmission opportunities for active nodes, and at the same time, the number of hunger nodes is greatly reduced with the least increase of threshold by interferences reservation. Also, the good performance on network goodput of the proposed model can be seen from the results.

  9. Design and implementation of H.264 based embedded video coding technology

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mao, Jian; Liu, Jinming; Zhang, Jiemin

    2016-03-01

    In this paper, an embedded system for remote online video monitoring was designed and developed to capture and record the real-time circumstances in elevator. For the purpose of improving the efficiency of video acquisition and processing, the system selected Samsung S5PV210 chip as the core processor which Integrated graphics processing unit. And the video was encoded with H.264 format for storage and transmission efficiently. Based on S5PV210 chip, the hardware video coding technology was researched, which was more efficient than software coding. After running test, it had been proved that the hardware video coding technology could obviously reduce the cost of system and obtain the more smooth video display. It can be widely applied for the security supervision [1].

  10. A video wireless capsule endoscopy system powered wirelessly: design, analysis and experiment

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pan, Guobing; Xin, Wenhui; Yan, Guozheng; Chen, Jiaoliao

    2011-06-01

    Wireless capsule endoscopy (WCE), as a relatively new technology, has brought about a revolution in the diagnosis of gastrointestinal (GI) tract diseases. However, the existing WCE systems are not widely applied in clinic because of the low frame rate and low image resolution. A video WCE system based on a wireless power supply is developed in this paper. This WCE system consists of a video capsule endoscope (CE), a wireless power transmission device, a receiving box and an image processing station. Powered wirelessly, the video CE has the abilities of imaging the GI tract and transmitting the images wirelessly at a frame rate of 30 frames per second (f/s). A mathematical prototype was built to analyze the power transmission system, and some experiments were performed to test the capability of energy transferring. The results showed that the wireless electric power supply system had the ability to transfer more than 136 mW power, which was enough for the working of a video CE. In in vitro experiments, the video CE produced clear images of the small intestine of a pig with the resolution of 320 × 240, and transmitted NTSC format video outside the body. Because of the wireless power supply, the video WCE system with high frame rate and high resolution becomes feasible, and provides a novel solution for the diagnosis of the GI tract in clinic.

  11. Transmission system for distribution of video over long-haul optical point-to-point links using a microwave photonic filter in the frequency range of 0.01-10 GHz

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zaldívar Huerta, Ignacio E.; Pérez Montaña, Diego F.; Nava, Pablo Hernández; Juárez, Alejandro García; Asomoza, Jorge Rodríguez; Leal Cruz, Ana L.

    2013-12-01

    We experimentally demonstrate the use of an electro-optical transmission system for distribution of video over long-haul optical point-to-point links using a microwave photonic filter in the frequency range of 0.01-10 GHz. The frequency response of the microwave photonic filter consists of four band-pass windows centered at frequencies that can be tailored to the function of the spectral free range of the optical source, the chromatic dispersion parameter of the optical fiber used, as well as the length of the optical link. In particular, filtering effect is obtained by the interaction of an externally modulated multimode laser diode emitting at 1.5 μm associated to the length of a dispersive optical fiber. Filtered microwave signals are used as electrical carriers to transmit TV-signal over long-haul optical links point-to-point. Transmission of TV-signal coded on the microwave band-pass windows located at 4.62, 6.86, 4.0 and 6.0 GHz are achieved over optical links of 25.25 km and 28.25 km, respectively. Practical applications for this approach lie in the field of the FTTH access network for distribution of services as video, voice, and data.

  12. Independent transmission of sign language interpreter in DVB: assessment of image compression

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zatloukal, Petr; Bernas, Martin; Dvořák, LukáÅ.¡

    2015-02-01

    Sign language on television provides information to deaf that they cannot get from the audio content. If we consider the transmission of the sign language interpreter over an independent data stream, the aim is to ensure sufficient intelligibility and subjective image quality of the interpreter with minimum bit rate. The work deals with the ROI-based video compression of Czech sign language interpreter implemented to the x264 open source library. The results of this approach are verified in subjective tests with the deaf. They examine the intelligibility of sign language expressions containing minimal pairs for different levels of compression and various resolution of image with interpreter and evaluate the subjective quality of the final image for a good viewing experience.

  13. Content-Aware Video Adaptation under Low-Bitrate Constraint

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hsiao, Ming-Ho; Chen, Yi-Wen; Chen, Hua-Tsung; Chou, Kuan-Hung; Lee, Suh-Yin

    2007-12-01

    With the development of wireless network and the improvement of mobile device capability, video streaming is more and more widespread in such an environment. Under the condition of limited resource and inherent constraints, appropriate video adaptations have become one of the most important and challenging issues in wireless multimedia applications. In this paper, we propose a novel content-aware video adaptation in order to effectively utilize resource and improve visual perceptual quality. First, the attention model is derived from analyzing the characteristics of brightness, location, motion vector, and energy features in compressed domain to reduce computation complexity. Then, through the integration of attention model, capability of client device and correlational statistic model, attractive regions of video scenes are derived. The information object- (IOB-) weighted rate distortion model is used for adjusting the bit allocation. Finally, the video adaptation scheme dynamically adjusts video bitstream in frame level and object level. Experimental results validate that the proposed scheme achieves better visual quality effectively and efficiently.

  14. Secured web-based video repository for multicenter studies

    PubMed Central

    Yan, Ling; Hicks, Matt; Winslow, Korey; Comella, Cynthia; Ludlow, Christy; Jinnah, H. A; Rosen, Ami R; Wright, Laura; Galpern, Wendy R; Perlmutter, Joel S

    2015-01-01

    Background We developed a novel secured web-based dystonia video repository for the Dystonia Coalition, part of the Rare Disease Clinical Research network funded by the Office of Rare Diseases Research and the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. A critical component of phenotypic data collection for all projects of the Dystonia Coalition includes a standardized video of each participant. We now describe our method for collecting, serving and securing these videos that is widely applicable to other studies. Methods Each recruiting site uploads standardized videos to a centralized secured server for processing to permit website posting. The streaming technology used to view the videos from the website does not allow downloading of video files. With appropriate institutional review board approval and agreement with the hosting institution, users can search and view selected videos on the website using customizable, permissions-based access that maintains security yet facilitates research and quality control. Results This approach provides a convenient platform for researchers across institutions to evaluate and analyze shared video data. We have applied this methodology for quality control, confirmation of diagnoses, validation of rating scales, and implementation of new research projects. Conclusions We believe our system can be a model for similar projects that require access to common video resources. PMID:25630890

  15. "Physics on Stage" Festival Video Now Available

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    2001-01-01

    available on the "Physics on Stage" webpages at CERN , ESA and ESO ). Note also the brief account published in the December 2000 issue of the ESO Messenger. The present video clip is available in four versions: two MPEG files and two streamer-versions of different sizes; the latter require RealPlayer software. Video Clip 01/01 may be freely reproduced. Tapes of this video clip and the 18-min video, suitable for transmission and in full professional quality (Betacam, etc.), are available for broadcasters upon request ; please contact the ESO EPR Department for more details. Most of the ESO PR Video Clips at the ESO website provide "animated" illustrations of the ongoing work and events at the European Southern Observatory. The most recent clip was: ESO PR Video Clip 06/00 about Fourth Light at Paranal! (4 September 2000) . General information is available on the web about ESO videos.

  16. An 802.11 n wireless local area network transmission scheme for wireless telemedicine applications.

    PubMed

    Lin, C F; Hung, S I; Chiang, I H

    2010-10-01

    In this paper, an 802.11 n transmission scheme is proposed for wireless telemedicine applications. IEEE 802.11n standards, a power assignment strategy, space-time block coding (STBC), and an object composition Petri net (OCPN) model are adopted. With the proposed wireless system, G.729 audio bit streams, Joint Photographic Experts Group 2000 (JPEG 2000) clinical images, and Moving Picture Experts Group 4 (MPEG-4) video bit streams achieve a transmission bit error rate (BER) of 10-7, 10-4, and 103 simultaneously. The proposed system meets the requirements prescribed for wireless telemedicine applications. An essential feature of this proposed transmission scheme is that clinical information that requires a high quality of service (QoS) is transmitted at a high power transmission rate with significant error protection. For maximizing resource utilization and minimizing the total transmission power, STBC and adaptive modulation techniques are used in the proposed 802.11 n wireless telemedicine system. Further, low power, direct mapping (DM), low-error protection scheme, and high-level modulation are adopted for messages that can tolerate a high BER. With the proposed transmission scheme, the required reliability of communication can be achieved. Our simulation results have shown that the proposed 802.11 n transmission scheme can be used for developing effective wireless telemedicine systems.

  17. Descriptive analysis of YouTube music therapy videos.

    PubMed

    Gooding, Lori F; Gregory, Dianne

    2011-01-01

    The purpose of this study was to conduct a descriptive analysis of music therapy-related videos on YouTube. Preliminary searches using the keywords music therapy, music therapy session, and "music therapy session" resulted in listings of 5000, 767, and 59 videos respectively. The narrowed down listing of 59 videos was divided between two investigators and reviewed in order to determine their relationship to actual music therapy practice. A total of 32 videos were determined to be depictions of music therapy sessions. These videos were analyzed using a 16-item investigator-created rubric that examined both video specific information and therapy specific information. Results of the analysis indicated that audio and visual quality was adequate, while narrative descriptions and identification information were ineffective in the majority of the videos. The top 5 videos (based on the highest number of viewings in the sample) were selected for further analysis in order to investigate demonstration of the Professional Level of Practice Competencies set forth in the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) Professional Competencies (AMTA, 2008). Four of the five videos met basic competency criteria, with the quality of the fifth video precluding evaluation of content. Of particular interest is the fact that none of the videos included credentialing information. Results of this study suggest the need to consider ways to ensure accurate dissemination of music therapy-related information in the YouTube environment, ethical standards when posting music therapy session videos, and the possibility of creating AMTA standards for posting music therapy related video.

  18. Web-video-mining-supported workflow modeling for laparoscopic surgeries.

    PubMed

    Liu, Rui; Zhang, Xiaoli; Zhang, Hao

    2016-11-01

    As quality assurance is of strong concern in advanced surgeries, intelligent surgical systems are expected to have knowledge such as the knowledge of the surgical workflow model (SWM) to support their intuitive cooperation with surgeons. For generating a robust and reliable SWM, a large amount of training data is required. However, training data collected by physically recording surgery operations is often limited and data collection is time-consuming and labor-intensive, severely influencing knowledge scalability of the surgical systems. The objective of this research is to solve the knowledge scalability problem in surgical workflow modeling with a low cost and labor efficient way. A novel web-video-mining-supported surgical workflow modeling (webSWM) method is developed. A novel video quality analysis method based on topic analysis and sentiment analysis techniques is developed to select high-quality videos from abundant and noisy web videos. A statistical learning method is then used to build the workflow model based on the selected videos. To test the effectiveness of the webSWM method, 250 web videos were mined to generate a surgical workflow for the robotic cholecystectomy surgery. The generated workflow was evaluated by 4 web-retrieved videos and 4 operation-room-recorded videos, respectively. The evaluation results (video selection consistency n-index ≥0.60; surgical workflow matching degree ≥0.84) proved the effectiveness of the webSWM method in generating robust and reliable SWM knowledge by mining web videos. With the webSWM method, abundant web videos were selected and a reliable SWM was modeled in a short time with low labor cost. Satisfied performances in mining web videos and learning surgery-related knowledge show that the webSWM method is promising in scaling knowledge for intelligent surgical systems. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  19. Compression and Transmission of RF Signals for Telediagnosis

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Seko, Toshihiro; Doi, Motonori; Oshiro, Osamu; Chihara, Kunihiro

    2000-05-01

    Health care is a critical issue nowadays. Much emphasis is given to quality care for all people. Telediagnosis has attracted public attention. We propose a new method of ultrasound image transmission for telediagnosis. In conventional methods, video image signals are transmitted. In our method, the RF signals which are acquired by an ultrasound probe, are transmitted. The RF signals can be transformed to color Doppler images or high-resolution images by a receiver. Because a stored form is adopted, the proposed system can be realized with existent technology such as hyper text transfer protocol (HTTP) and file transfer protocol (FTP). In this paper, we describe two lossless compression methods which specialize in the transmission of RF signals. One of the methods uses the characteristics of the RF signal. In the other method, the amount of the data is reduced. Measurements were performed in water targeting an iron block and triangular Styrofoam. Additionally, abdominal fat measurement was performed. Our method achieved a compression rate of 13% with 8 bit data.

  20. The emerging High Efficiency Video Coding standard (HEVC)

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Raja, Gulistan; Khan, Awais

    2013-12-01

    High definition video (HDV) is becoming popular day by day. This paper describes the performance analysis of latest upcoming video standard known as High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). HEVC is designed to fulfil all the requirements for future high definition videos. In this paper, three configurations (intra only, low delay and random access) of HEVC are analyzed using various 480p, 720p and 1080p high definition test video sequences. Simulation results show the superior objective and subjective quality of HEVC.

  1. Surgical videos online: a survey of prominent sources and future trends.

    PubMed

    Dinscore, Amanda; Andres, Amy

    2010-01-01

    This article determines the extent of the online availability and quality of surgical videos for the educational benefit of the surgical community. A comprehensive survey was performed that compared a number of online sites providing surgical videos according to their content, production quality, authority, audience, navigability, and other features. Methods for evaluating video content are discussed as well as possible future directions and emerging trends. Surgical videos are a valuable tool for demonstrating and teaching surgical technique and, despite room for growth in this area, advances in streaming video technology have made providing and accessing these resources easier than ever before.

  2. Video observation of anesthesia practice: a useful and reliable tool for quality improvement initiatives.

    PubMed

    Rampersad, Sally E; Martin, Lizabeth D; Geiduschek, Jeremy M; Weiss, Gillian K; Bates, Shelly W; Martin, Lynn D

    2013-07-01

    Patients with central venous catheters who are transferred out of the Intensive Care Unit to the care of an anesthesiology team for an operation or interventional radiology procedure had excessive rates of catheter associated blood stream infection (CABSI). We convened a multi-disciplinary team to audit anesthesia practice and to develop countermeasures for those aspects of practice that were thought to be contributing to CABSI's. It was noted that provider behavior changed in the presence of an auditor (Hawthorne effect) and so videorecordings were used, in the hope that this Hawthorne effect would be reduced. Clips were chosen from the hours of video (without audio) recordings that showed medication administration, airway management and touching the anesthesia cart of equipment/supplies. These clips were viewed by three observers and measurements were made to assess intra-rater and inter-rater reliability. The clips were then viewed to quantify differences in practice before and after our bundle of "best practices" was introduced. Although video recording has been used to evaluate adherence to resuscitation protocols in both trauma and in neonatal resuscitation, (Pediatric Emergency Care, 26, 2010, 803; Pediatrics, 117, 2006, 658; Pediatrics, 106, 2000, 654) we believe this is the first time that video has been used to record before and after behaviors for an anesthesia quality improvement initiative. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

  3. Examining the effect of task on viewing behavior in videos using saliency maps

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Alers, Hani; Redi, Judith A.; Heynderickx, Ingrid

    2012-03-01

    Research has shown that when viewing still images, people will look at these images in a different manner if instructed to evaluate their quality. They will tend to focus less on the main features of the image and, instead, scan the entire image area looking for clues for its level of quality. It is questionable, however, whether this finding can be extended to videos considering their dynamic nature. One can argue that when watching a video the viewer will always focus on the dynamically changing features of the video regardless of the given task. To test whether this is true, an experiment was conducted where half of the participants viewed videos with the task of quality evaluation while the other half were simply told to watch the videos as if they were watching a movie on TV or a video downloaded from the internet. The videos contained content which was degraded with compression artifacts over a wide range of quality. An eye tracking device was used to record the viewing behavior in both conditions. By comparing the behavior during each task, it was possible to observe a systematic difference in the viewing behavior which seemed to correlate to the quality of the videos.

  4. Design considerations for computationally constrained two-way real-time video communication

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bivolarski, Lazar M.; Saunders, Steven E.; Ralston, John D.

    2009-08-01

    Today's video codecs have evolved primarily to meet the requirements of the motion picture and broadcast industries, where high-complexity studio encoding can be utilized to create highly-compressed master copies that are then broadcast one-way for playback using less-expensive, lower-complexity consumer devices for decoding and playback. Related standards activities have largely ignored the computational complexity and bandwidth constraints of wireless or Internet based real-time video communications using devices such as cell phones or webcams. Telecommunications industry efforts to develop and standardize video codecs for applications such as video telephony and video conferencing have not yielded image size, quality, and frame-rate performance that match today's consumer expectations and market requirements for Internet and mobile video services. This paper reviews the constraints and the corresponding video codec requirements imposed by real-time, 2-way mobile video applications. Several promising elements of a new mobile video codec architecture are identified, and more comprehensive computational complexity metrics and video quality metrics are proposed in order to support the design, testing, and standardization of these new mobile video codecs.

  5. Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR) Software

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1999-01-01

    Two scientists at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, atmospheric scientist Paul Meyer (left) and solar physicist Dr. David Hathaway, have developed promising new software, called Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR), that may help law enforcement agencies to catch criminals by improving the quality of video recorded at crime scenes, VISAR stabilizes camera motion in the horizontal and vertical as well as rotation and zoom effects; produces clearer images of moving objects; smoothes jagged edges; enhances still images; and reduces video noise of snow. VISAR could also have applications in medical and meteorological imaging. It could steady images of Ultrasounds which are infamous for their grainy, blurred quality. It would be especially useful for tornadoes, tracking whirling objects and helping to determine the tornado's wind speed. This image shows two scientists reviewing an enhanced video image of a license plate taken from a moving automobile.

  6. "First-person view" of pathogen transmission and hand hygiene - use of a new head-mounted video capture and coding tool.

    PubMed

    Clack, Lauren; Scotoni, Manuela; Wolfensberger, Aline; Sax, Hugo

    2017-01-01

    Healthcare workers' hands are the foremost means of pathogen transmission in healthcare, but detailed hand trajectories have been insufficiently researched so far. We developed and applied a new method to systematically document hand-to-surface exposures (HSE) to delineate true hand transmission pathways in real-life healthcare settings. A head-mounted camera and commercial coding software were used to capture ten active care episodes by eight nurses and two physicians and code HSE type and duration using a hierarchical coding scheme. We identified HSE sequences of particular relevance to infectious risks for patients based on the WHO 'Five Moments for Hand Hygiene'. The study took place in a trauma intensive care unit in a 900-bed university hospital in Switzerland. Overall, the ten videos totaled 296.5 min and featured eight nurses and two physicians. A total of 4222 HSE were identified (1 HSE every 4.2 s), which concerned bare (79%) and gloved (21%) hands. The HSE inside the patient zone ( n  = 1775; 42%) included mobile objects (33%), immobile surfaces (5%), and patient intact skin (4%), while HSE outside the patient zone ( n  = 1953; 46%) included HCW's own body (10%), mobile objects (28%), and immobile surfaces (8%). A further 494 (12%) events involved patient critical sites. Sequential analysis revealed 291 HSE transitions from outside to inside patient zone, i.e. "colonization events", and 217 from any surface to critical sites, i.e. "infection events". Hand hygiene occurred 97 times, 14 (5% adherence) times at colonization events and three (1% adherence) times at infection events. On average, hand rubbing lasted 13 ± 9 s. The abundance of HSE underscores the central role of hands in the spread of potential pathogens while hand hygiene occurred rarely at potential colonization and infection events. Our approach produced a valid video and coding instrument for in-depth analysis of hand trajectories during active patient care that may help to design

  7. A Video Transmission System for Severely Degraded Channels

    DTIC Science & Technology

    2006-07-01

    rate compatible punctured convolutional codes (RCPC) . By separating the SPIHT bitstream...June 2000. 149 [170] J. Hagenauer, Rate - compatible punctured convolutional codes (RCPC codes ) and their applications, IEEE Transactions on...Farvardin [160] used rate compatible convolutional codes . They noticed that for some transmission rates , one of their EEP schemes, which may

  8. Multidimensional QoE of Multiview Video and Selectable Audio IP Transmission

    PubMed Central

    Nunome, Toshiro; Ishida, Takuya

    2015-01-01

    We evaluate QoE of multiview video and selectable audio (MVV-SA), in which users can switch not only video but also audio according to a viewpoint change request, transmitted over IP networks by a subjective experiment. The evaluation is performed by the semantic differential (SD) method with 13 adjective pairs. In the subjective experiment, we ask assessors to evaluate 40 stimuli which consist of two kinds of UDP load traffic, two kinds of fixed additional delay, five kinds of playout buffering time, and selectable or unselectable audio (i.e., MVV-SA or the previous MVV-A). As a result, MVV-SA gives higher presence to the user than MVV-A and then enhances QoE. In addition, we employ factor analysis for subjective assessment results to clarify the component factors of QoE. We then find that three major factors affect QoE in MVV-SA. PMID:26106640

  9. Interactive Video Program. Final Report and Recommendations.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Midwestern Higher Education Commission, Minneapolis, MN.

    This report presents recommendations on interactive video transmission standards, equipment, room designs, and service plans for member institutions of the Midwestern Higher Education Commission (MHEC) and reviews MHEC's efforts to find and contract for such services with vendors. The report describes the MHEC objective of establishing a dial-up,…

  10. Evaluation of educational content of YouTube videos relating to neurogenic bladder and intermittent catheterization

    PubMed Central

    Ho, Matthew; Stothers, Lynn; Lazare, Darren; Tsang, Brian; Macnab, Andrew

    2015-01-01

    Introduction: Many patients conduct internet searches to manage their own health problems, to decide if they need professional help, and to corroborate information given in a clinical encounter. Good information can improve patients’ understanding of their condition and their self-efficacy. Patients with spinal cord injury (SCI) featuring neurogenic bladder (NB) require knowledge and skills related to their condition and need for intermittent catheterization (IC). Methods: Information quality was evaluated in videos accessed via YouTube relating to NB and IC using search terms “neurogenic bladder intermittent catheter” and “spinal cord injury intermittent catheter.” Video content was independently rated by 3 investigators using criteria based on European Urological Association (EAU) guidelines and established clinical practice. Results: In total, 71 videos met the inclusion criteria. Of these, 12 (17%) addressed IC and 50 (70%) contained information on NB. The remaining videos met inclusion criteria, but did not contain information relevant to either IC or NB. Analysis indicated poor overall quality of information, with some videos with information contradictory to EAU guidelines for IC. High-quality videos were randomly distributed by YouTube. IC videos featuring a healthcare narrator scored significantly higher than patient-narrated videos, but not higher than videos with a merchant narrator. About half of the videos contained commercial content. Conclusions: Some good-quality educational videos about NB and IC are available on YouTube, but most are poor. The videos deemed good quality were not prominently ranked by the YouTube search algorithm, consequently user access is less likely. Study limitations include the limit of 50 videos per category and the use of a de novo rating tool. Information quality in videos with healthcare narrators was not higher than in those featuring merchant narrators. Better material is required to improve patients

  11. Evaluation of educational content of YouTube videos relating to neurogenic bladder and intermittent catheterization.

    PubMed

    Ho, Matthew; Stothers, Lynn; Lazare, Darren; Tsang, Brian; Macnab, Andrew

    2015-01-01

    Many patients conduct internet searches to manage their own health problems, to decide if they need professional help, and to corroborate information given in a clinical encounter. Good information can improve patients' understanding of their condition and their self-efficacy. Patients with spinal cord injury (SCI) featuring neurogenic bladder (NB) require knowledge and skills related to their condition and need for intermittent catheterization (IC). Information quality was evaluated in videos accessed via YouTube relating to NB and IC using search terms "neurogenic bladder intermittent catheter" and "spinal cord injury intermittent catheter." Video content was independently rated by 3 investigators using criteria based on European Urological Association (EAU) guidelines and established clinical practice. In total, 71 videos met the inclusion criteria. Of these, 12 (17%) addressed IC and 50 (70%) contained information on NB. The remaining videos met inclusion criteria, but did not contain information relevant to either IC or NB. Analysis indicated poor overall quality of information, with some videos with information contradictory to EAU guidelines for IC. High-quality videos were randomly distributed by YouTube. IC videos featuring a healthcare narrator scored significantly higher than patient-narrated videos, but not higher than videos with a merchant narrator. About half of the videos contained commercial content. Some good-quality educational videos about NB and IC are available on YouTube, but most are poor. The videos deemed good quality were not prominently ranked by the YouTube search algorithm, consequently user access is less likely. Study limitations include the limit of 50 videos per category and the use of a de novo rating tool. Information quality in videos with healthcare narrators was not higher than in those featuring merchant narrators. Better material is required to improve patients' understanding of their condition.

  12. Flexible video conference system based on ASICs and DSPs

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hu, Qiang; Yu, Songyu

    1995-02-01

    In this paper, a video conference system we developed recently is presented. In this system the video codec is compatible with CCITT H.261, the audio codec is compatible with G.711 and G.722, the channel interface circuit is designed according to CCITT H.221. In this paper emphasis is given to the video codec, which is both flexible and robust. The video codec is based on LSI LOGIC Corporation's L64700 series video compression chipset. The main function blocks of H.261, such as DCT, motion estimation, VLC, VLD, are performed by this chipset, but the chipset is a nude chipset, no peripheral function, such as memory interface, is integrated into it, this results in great difficulty to implement the system. To implement the frame buffer controller, a DSP-TMS 320c25 and a group of GALs is used, SRAM is used as a current and previous frame buffer, the DSP is not only the controller of the frame buffer, it's also the controller of the whole video codec. Because of the use of the DSP, the architecture of the video codec is very flexible, many system parameters can be reconfigured for different applications. The architecture of the whole video codec is a streamline structure. In H.261, BCH(511,493) coding is recommended to work against random errors in transmission, but if burst error occurs, it causes serious result. To solve this problem, an interleaving method is used, that means the BCH code is interleaved before it's transmitted, in the receiver it is interleaved again and the bit stream is in the original order, but the error bits are distributed into several BCH words, and the BCH decoder is able to correct it. Considering that extreme conditions may occur, a function block is implemented which is somewhat like a watchdog, it assures that the receiver can recover from errors no matter what serious error occurs in transmission. In developing the video conference system, a new synchronization problem must be solved, the monitor on the receiver can't be easily

  13. H.264 Layered Coded Video over Wireless Networks: Channel Coding and Modulation Constraints

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Ghandi, M. M.; Barmada, B.; Jones, E. V.; Ghanbari, M.

    2006-12-01

    This paper considers the prioritised transmission of H.264 layered coded video over wireless channels. For appropriate protection of video data, methods such as prioritised forward error correction coding (FEC) or hierarchical quadrature amplitude modulation (HQAM) can be employed, but each imposes system constraints. FEC provides good protection but at the price of a high overhead and complexity. HQAM is less complex and does not introduce any overhead, but permits only fixed data ratios between the priority layers. Such constraints are analysed and practical solutions are proposed for layered transmission of data-partitioned and SNR-scalable coded video where combinations of HQAM and FEC are used to exploit the advantages of both coding methods. Simulation results show that the flexibility of SNR scalability and absence of picture drift imply that SNR scalability as modelled is superior to data partitioning in such applications.

  14. Watermarking textures in video games

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Liu, Huajian; Berchtold, Waldemar; Schäfer, Marcel; Lieb, Patrick; Steinebach, Martin

    2014-02-01

    Digital watermarking is a promising solution to video game piracy. In this paper, based on the analysis of special challenges and requirements in terms of watermarking textures in video games, a novel watermarking scheme for DDS textures in video games is proposed. To meet the performance requirements in video game applications, the proposed algorithm embeds the watermark message directly in the compressed stream in DDS files and can be straightforwardly applied in watermark container technique for real-time embedding. Furthermore, the embedding approach achieves high watermark payload to handle collusion secure fingerprinting codes with extreme length. Hence, the scheme is resistant to collusion attacks, which is indispensable in video game applications. The proposed scheme is evaluated in aspects of transparency, robustness, security and performance. Especially, in addition to classical objective evaluation, the visual quality and playing experience of watermarked games is assessed subjectively in game playing.

  15. Sporadic frame dropping impact on quality perception

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pastrana-Vidal, Ricardo R.; Gicquel, Jean Charles; Colomes, Catherine; Cherifi, Hocine

    2004-06-01

    Over the past few years there has been an increasing interest in real time video services over packet networks. When considering quality, it is essential to quantify user perception of the received sequence. Severe motion discontinuities are one of the most common degradations in video streaming. The end-user perceives a jerky motion when the discontinuities are uniformly distributed over time and an instantaneous fluidity break is perceived when the motion loss is isolated or irregularly distributed. Bit rate adaptation techniques, transmission errors in the packet networks or restitution strategy could be the origin of this perceived jerkiness. In this paper we present a psychovisual experiment performed to quantify the effect of sporadically dropped pictures on the overall perceived quality. First, the perceptual detection thresholds of generated temporal discontinuities were measured. Then, the quality function was estimated in relation to a single frame dropping for different durations. Finally, a set of tests was performed to quantify the effect of several impairments distributed over time. We have found that the detection thresholds are content, duration and motion dependent. The assessment results show how quality is impaired by a single burst of dropped frames in a 10 sec sequence. The effect of several bursts of discarded frames, irregularly distributed over the time is also discussed.

  16. A qualitative analysis of methotrexate self-injection education videos on YouTube.

    PubMed

    Rittberg, Rebekah; Dissanayake, Tharindri; Katz, Steven J

    2016-05-01

    The aim of this study is to identify and evaluate the quality of videos for patients available on YouTube for learning to self-administer subcutaneous methotrexate. Using the search term "Methotrexate injection," two clinical reviewers analyzed the first 60 videos on YouTube. Source and search rank of video, audience interaction, video duration, and time since video was uploaded on YouTube were recorded. Videos were classified as useful, misleading, or a personal patient view. Videos were rated for reliability, comprehensiveness, and global quality scale (GQS). Reasons for misleading videos were documented, and patient videos were documented as being either positive or negative towards methotrexate (MTX) injection. Fifty-one English videos overlapped between the two geographic locations; 10 videos were classified as useful (19.6 %), 14 misleading (27.5 %), and 27 personal patient view (52.9 %). Total views of videos were 161,028: 19.2 % useful, 72.8 % patient, and 8.0 % misleading. Mean GQS: 4.2 (±1.0) useful, 1.6 (±1.1) misleading, and 2.0 (±0.9) for patient videos (p < 0.0001). Mean reliability: 3.3 (±0.6) useful, 0.9 (±1.2) misleading, and 1.0 (±0.7) for patient videos (p < 0.0001). Comprehensiveness: 2.2 (±1.9) useful, 0.1 (±0.3) misleading, and 1.5 (±1.5) for patient view videos (p = 0.0027). This study demonstrates a minority of videos are useful for teaching MTX injection. Further, video quality does not correlate with video views. While web video may be an additional educational tool available, clinicians need to be familiar with specific resources to help guide and educate their patients to ensure best outcomes.

  17. Veterinary students' usage and perception of video teaching resources

    PubMed Central

    2011-01-01

    Background The purpose of our study was to use a student-centred approach to develop an online video learning resource (called 'Moo Tube') at the School of Veterinary Medicine and Science, University of Nottingham, UK and also to provide guidance for other academics in the School wishing to develop a similar resource in the future. Methods A focus group in the format of the nominal group technique was used to garner the opinions of 12 undergraduate students (3 from year-1, 4 from year-2 and 5 from year-3). Students generated lists of items in response to key questions, these responses were thematically analysed to generate key themes which were compared between the different year groups. The number of visits to 'Moo Tube' before and after an objective structured practical examination (OSPE) was also analysed to provide data on video usage. Results Students highlighted a number of strengths of video resources which can be grouped into four overarching themes: (1) teaching enhancement, (2) accessibility, (3) technical quality and (4) video content. Of these themes, students rated teaching enhancement and accessibility most highly. Video usage was seen to significantly increase (P < 0.05) prior to an examination and significantly decrease (P < 0.05) following the examination. Conclusions The students had a positive perception of video usage in higher education. Video usage increases prior to practical examinations. Image quality was a greater concern with year-3 students than with either year-1 or 2 students but all groups highlighted the following as important issues: i) good sound quality, ii) accessibility, including location of videos within electronic libraries, and iii) video content. Based on the findings from this study, guidelines are suggested for those developing undergraduate veterinary videos. We believe that many aspects of our list will have resonance in other areas of medicine education and higher education. PMID:21219639

  18. Veterinary students' usage and perception of video teaching resources.

    PubMed

    Roshier, Amanda L; Foster, Neil; Jones, Michael A

    2011-01-10

    The purpose of our study was to use a student-centred approach to develop an online video learning resource (called 'Moo Tube') at the School of Veterinary Medicine and Science, University of Nottingham, UK and also to provide guidance for other academics in the School wishing to develop a similar resource in the future. A focus group in the format of the nominal group technique was used to garner the opinions of 12 undergraduate students (3 from year-1, 4 from year-2 and 5 from year-3). Students generated lists of items in response to key questions, these responses were thematically analysed to generate key themes which were compared between the different year groups. The number of visits to 'Moo Tube' before and after an objective structured practical examination (OSPE) was also analysed to provide data on video usage. Students highlighted a number of strengths of video resources which can be grouped into four overarching themes: (1) teaching enhancement, (2) accessibility, (3) technical quality and (4) video content. Of these themes, students rated teaching enhancement and accessibility most highly. Video usage was seen to significantly increase (P < 0.05) prior to an examination and significantly decrease (P < 0.05) following the examination. The students had a positive perception of video usage in higher education. Video usage increases prior to practical examinations. Image quality was a greater concern with year-3 students than with either year-1 or 2 students but all groups highlighted the following as important issues: i) good sound quality, ii) accessibility, including location of videos within electronic libraries, and iii) video content. Based on the findings from this study, guidelines are suggested for those developing undergraduate veterinary videos. We believe that many aspects of our list will have resonance in other areas of medicine education and higher education.

  19. One hundred case studies of Asia-Pacific telemedicine using a digital video transport system over a research and education network.

    PubMed

    Shimizu, Shuji; Nakashima, Naoki; Okamura, Koji; Tanaka, Masao

    2009-01-01

    Although the use of video in telemedicine is most helpful, the transmission of high-quality moving images is difficult in conventional systems due to the limitation of network bandwidth and the quality of service. We have established a new system via the academic broadband network that can preserve the original quality and assure smooth movement of the image. Here we report on 100 case studies and discuss the lessons we have learned. Kyushu University Hospital in Fukuoka, Japan, was linked to 53 medical institutions and meeting venues in 13 countries and regions over the Asia-Pacific Advanced Network, an international research and education consortium. The digital video transport system (DVTS), free software that transforms digital video signals directly into Internet Protocol, was installed on a personal computer (PC) with a network bandwidth of 30 Mbps per channel. Between February 2003 and June 2007, 100 telecommunication sessions were held, 94 of which were international and 6 domestic. Furthermore, 47 involved real-time demonstrations and 53 interactive teleconferences using video or PC presentations. Multiple stations were connected in 37 events, and the number of connected stations in total reached 269. The time delay was restricted to 0.3-1.0 seconds between the stations. Participants provided feedback via questionnaires, and with respect to image quality, 509 (68.3%) participants reported "very good," 206 (27.7%) reported "good," 19 (2.6%) reported "poor," and 11 (1.5%) reported "very poor." DVTS is both economical, with a minimal initial investment, and simple to set up, and this is the first time that this advanced system has been used so widely in the Asia-Pacific region. Because the high-speed academic network for research and education is available worldwide, we believe our cutting-edge technology will facilitate medical standardization beyond geographic borders in the world.

  20. Real-time transmission of full-motion echocardiography over a high-speed data network: impact of data rate and network quality of service.

    PubMed

    Main, M L; Foltz, D; Firstenberg, M S; Bobinsky, E; Bailey, D; Frantz, B; Pleva, D; Baldizzi, M; Meyers, D P; Jones, K; Spence, M C; Freeman, K; Morehead, A; Thomas, J D

    2000-08-01

    With high-resolution network transmission required for telemedicine, education, and guided-image acquisition, the impact of errors and transmission rates on image quality needs evaluation. We transmitted clinical echocardiograms from 2 National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) research centers with the use of Motion Picture Expert Group-2 (MPEG-2) encoding and asynchronous transmission mode (ATM) network protocol over the NASA Research and Education Network. Data rates and network quality (cell losses [CLR], errors [CER], and delay variability [CVD]) were altered and image quality was judged. At speeds of 3 to 5 megabits per second (Mbps), digital images were superior to those on videotape; at 2 Mbps, images were equivalent. Increasing CLR caused occasional, brief pauses. Extreme CER and CDV increases still yielded high-quality images. Real-time echocardiographic acquisition, guidance, and transmission is feasible with the use of MPEG-2 and ATM with broadcast quality seen above 3 Mbps, even with severe network quality degradation. These techniques can be applied to telemedicine and used for planned echocardiography aboard the International Space Station.

  1. Real-time transmission of full-motion echocardiography over a high-speed data network: impact of data rate and network quality of service

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Main, M. L.; Foltz, D.; Firstenberg, M. S.; Bobinsky, E.; Bailey, D.; Frantz, B.; Pleva, D.; Baldizzi, M.; Meyers, D. P.; Jones, K.; hide

    2000-01-01

    With high-resolution network transmission required for telemedicine, education, and guided-image acquisition, the impact of errors and transmission rates on image quality needs evaluation. METHODS: We transmitted clinical echocardiograms from 2 National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) research centers with the use of Motion Picture Expert Group-2 (MPEG-2) encoding and asynchronous transmission mode (ATM) network protocol over the NASA Research and Education Network. Data rates and network quality (cell losses [CLR], errors [CER], and delay variability [CVD]) were altered and image quality was judged. RESULTS: At speeds of 3 to 5 megabits per second (Mbps), digital images were superior to those on videotape; at 2 Mbps, images were equivalent. Increasing CLR caused occasional, brief pauses. Extreme CER and CDV increases still yielded high-quality images. CONCLUSIONS: Real-time echocardiographic acquisition, guidance, and transmission is feasible with the use of MPEG-2 and ATM with broadcast quality seen above 3 Mbps, even with severe network quality degradation. These techniques can be applied to telemedicine and used for planned echocardiography aboard the International Space Station.

  2. Distributed Coding/Decoding Complexity in Video Sensor Networks

    PubMed Central

    Cordeiro, Paulo J.; Assunção, Pedro

    2012-01-01

    Video Sensor Networks (VSNs) are recent communication infrastructures used to capture and transmit dense visual information from an application context. In such large scale environments which include video coding, transmission and display/storage, there are several open problems to overcome in practical implementations. This paper addresses the most relevant challenges posed by VSNs, namely stringent bandwidth usage and processing time/power constraints. In particular, the paper proposes a novel VSN architecture where large sets of visual sensors with embedded processors are used for compression and transmission of coded streams to gateways, which in turn transrate the incoming streams and adapt them to the variable complexity requirements of both the sensor encoders and end-user decoder terminals. Such gateways provide real-time transcoding functionalities for bandwidth adaptation and coding/decoding complexity distribution by transferring the most complex video encoding/decoding tasks to the transcoding gateway at the expense of a limited increase in bit rate. Then, a method to reduce the decoding complexity, suitable for system-on-chip implementation, is proposed to operate at the transcoding gateway whenever decoders with constrained resources are targeted. The results show that the proposed method achieves good performance and its inclusion into the VSN infrastructure provides an additional level of complexity control functionality. PMID:22736972

  3. Distributed coding/decoding complexity in video sensor networks.

    PubMed

    Cordeiro, Paulo J; Assunção, Pedro

    2012-01-01

    Video Sensor Networks (VSNs) are recent communication infrastructures used to capture and transmit dense visual information from an application context. In such large scale environments which include video coding, transmission and display/storage, there are several open problems to overcome in practical implementations. This paper addresses the most relevant challenges posed by VSNs, namely stringent bandwidth usage and processing time/power constraints. In particular, the paper proposes a novel VSN architecture where large sets of visual sensors with embedded processors are used for compression and transmission of coded streams to gateways, which in turn transrate the incoming streams and adapt them to the variable complexity requirements of both the sensor encoders and end-user decoder terminals. Such gateways provide real-time transcoding functionalities for bandwidth adaptation and coding/decoding complexity distribution by transferring the most complex video encoding/decoding tasks to the transcoding gateway at the expense of a limited increase in bit rate. Then, a method to reduce the decoding complexity, suitable for system-on-chip implementation, is proposed to operate at the transcoding gateway whenever decoders with constrained resources are targeted. The results show that the proposed method achieves good performance and its inclusion into the VSN infrastructure provides an additional level of complexity control functionality.

  4. Video Surveillance: All Eyes Turn to IP

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Raths, David

    2011-01-01

    Many university officials recognize the need to upgrade their older analog video surveillance systems. In a 2010 survey by "Campus Safety" magazine, half of university respondents expressed dissatisfaction with the quality and coverage of their current video surveillance systems. Among the limitations of analog closed-circuit television…

  5. Mobile Video in Everyday Social Interactions

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Reponen, Erika; Lehikoinen, Jaakko; Impiö, Jussi

    Video recording has become a spontaneous everyday activity for many people, thanks to the video capabilities of modern mobile phones. Internet connectivity of mobile phones enables fluent sharing of captured material even real-time, which makes video an up-and-coming everyday interaction medium. In this article we discuss the effect of the video camera in the social environment, everyday life situations, mainly based on a study where four groups of people used digital video cameras in their normal settings. We also reflect on another study of ours, relating to real-time mobile video communication and discuss future views. The aim of our research is to understand the possibilities in the domain of mobile video. Live and delayed sharing seem to have their special characteristics, live video being used as a virtual window between places whereas delayed video usage has more scope for good-quality content. While this novel way of interacting via mobile video enables new social patterns, it also raises new concerns for privacy and trust between participating persons in all roles, largely due to the widely spreading possibilities of videos. Video in a social situation affects cameramen (who record), targets (who are recorded), passers-by (who are unintentionally in the situation), and the audience (who follow the videos or recording situations) but also the other way around, the participants affect the video by their varying and evolving personal and communicational motivations for recording.

  6. Spatiotemporal video deinterlacing using control grid interpolation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Venkatesan, Ragav; Zwart, Christine M.; Frakes, David H.; Li, Baoxin

    2015-03-01

    With the advent of progressive format display and broadcast technologies, video deinterlacing has become an important video-processing technique. Numerous approaches exist in the literature to accomplish deinterlacing. While most earlier methods were simple linear filtering-based approaches, the emergence of faster computing technologies and even dedicated video-processing hardware in display units has allowed higher quality but also more computationally intense deinterlacing algorithms to become practical. Most modern approaches analyze motion and content in video to select different deinterlacing methods for various spatiotemporal regions. We introduce a family of deinterlacers that employs spectral residue to choose between and weight control grid interpolation based spatial and temporal deinterlacing methods. The proposed approaches perform better than the prior state-of-the-art based on peak signal-to-noise ratio, other visual quality metrics, and simple perception-based subjective evaluations conducted by human viewers. We further study the advantages of using soft and hard decision thresholds on the visual performance.

  7. Everything is ok on YouTube! Quality assessment of YouTube videos on the topic of phacoemulsification in eyes with small pupil.

    PubMed

    Aykut, Aslan; Kukner, Amber Senel; Karasu, Bugra; Palancıglu, Yeliz; Atmaca, Fatih; Aydogan, Tumay

    2018-01-22

    Usage of YouTube as an educational tool is gaining attention in academic research. To date, there has been no study on the content and quality of eye surgery videos on YouTube. The aim of this study was to analyze YouTube videos on phacoemulsification in eyes with small pupil. We searched for the phrases "small pupil cataract surgery," "small pupil phacoemulsification," "small pupil cataract surgery complications," and "small pupil phacoemulsification complications" in January 2015. Each resulting video was evaluated by all authors, and Krippendorff's alpha was calculated to measure agreement. Videos were classified according to pupil size (small/very small) in the beginning of the surgery, and whether pupillary diameter was large enough to continue surgery safely after pupillary dilation by the surgeon in the video (safe/not safe). Methods of dilatation were also analyzed. Any stated ocular comorbidity or surgical complications were noted. A total of 96 videos were reviewed. No mechanical intervention for pupillary dilatation was performed in 46 videos. Fifty-eight operated eyes had no stated ocular comorbidity. Ninety-five operations ended successfully without major complication. There was fair agreement between the evaluators regarding pupil sizes (Kα = 0.670) but poor agreement regarding safety (Kα = 0.337). YouTube videos on small pupil phacoemulsification have low complication rates when compared to the literature, although no reliable mechanical dilatation methods are used in almost half of these videos. Until YouTube's place in e-learning becomes clearer, we suggest that viewers be cautious regarding small pupil phacoemulsification videos on YouTube.

  8. The Educational Efficacy of Distinct Information Delivery Systems in Modified Video Games

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Moshirnia, Andrew; Israel, Maya

    2010-01-01

    Despite the increasing popularity of many commercial video games, this popularity is not shared by educational video games. Modified video games, however, can bridge the gap in quality between commercial and education video games by embedding educational content into popular commercial video games. This study examined how different information…

  9. Algorithm design for automated transportation photo enforcement camera image and video quality diagnostic check modules

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Raghavan, Ajay; Saha, Bhaskar

    2013-03-01

    Photo enforcement devices for traffic rules such as red lights, toll, stops, and speed limits are increasingly being deployed in cities and counties around the world to ensure smooth traffic flow and public safety. These are typically unattended fielded systems, and so it is important to periodically check them for potential image/video quality problems that might interfere with their intended functionality. There is interest in automating such checks to reduce the operational overhead and human error involved in manually checking large camera device fleets. Examples of problems affecting such camera devices include exposure issues, focus drifts, obstructions, misalignment, download errors, and motion blur. Furthermore, in some cases, in addition to the sub-algorithms for individual problems, one also has to carefully design the overall algorithm and logic to check for and accurately classifying these individual problems. Some of these issues can occur in tandem or have the potential to be confused for each other by automated algorithms. Examples include camera misalignment that can cause some scene elements to go out of focus for wide-area scenes or download errors that can be misinterpreted as an obstruction. Therefore, the sequence in which the sub-algorithms are utilized is also important. This paper presents an overview of these problems along with no-reference and reduced reference image and video quality solutions to detect and classify such faults.

  10. Training value of laparoscopic colorectal videos on the World Wide Web: a pilot study on the educational quality of laparoscopic right hemicolectomy videos.

    PubMed

    Celentano, V; Browning, M; Hitchins, C; Giglio, M C; Coleman, M G

    2017-11-01

    Instructive laparoscopy videos with appropriate exposition could be ideal for initial training in laparoscopic surgery, but unfortunately there are no guidelines for annotating these videos or agreed methods to measure the educational content and the safety of the procedure presented. Aim of this study is to systematically search the World Wide Web to determine the availability of laparoscopic colorectal surgery videos and to objectively establish their potential training value. A search for laparoscopic right hemicolectomy videos was performed on the three most used English language web search engines Google.com, Bing.com, and Yahoo.com; moreover, a survey among 25 local trainees was performed to identify additional websites for inclusion. All laparoscopic right hemicolectomy videos with an English language title were included. Videos of open surgery, single incision laparoscopic surgery, robotic, and hand-assisted surgery were excluded. The safety of the demonstrated procedure was assessed with a validated competency assessment tool specifically designed for laparoscopic colorectal surgery and data on the educational content of the video were extracted. Thirty-one websites were identified and 182 surgical videos were included. One hundred and seventy-three videos (95%) detailed the year of publication; this demonstrated a significant increase in the number of videos published per year from 2009. Characteristics of the patient were rarely presented, only 10 videos (5.4%) reported operating time and only 6 videos (3.2%) reported 30-day morbidity; 34 videos (18.6%) underwent a peer-review process prior to publication. Formal case presentation, the presence of audio narration, the use of diagrams, and snapshots and a step-by-step approach are all characteristics of peer-reviewed videos but no significant difference was found in the safety of the procedure. Laparoscopic videos can be a useful adjunct to operative training. There is a large and increasing amount of

  11. Secure and Efficient Reactive Video Surveillance for Patient Monitoring.

    PubMed

    Braeken, An; Porambage, Pawani; Gurtov, Andrei; Ylianttila, Mika

    2016-01-02

    Video surveillance is widely deployed for many kinds of monitoring applications in healthcare and assisted living systems. Security and privacy are two promising factors that align the quality and validity of video surveillance systems with the caliber of patient monitoring applications. In this paper, we propose a symmetric key-based security framework for the reactive video surveillance of patients based on the inputs coming from data measured by a wireless body area network attached to the human body. Only authenticated patients are able to activate the video cameras, whereas the patient and authorized people can consult the video data. User and location privacy are at each moment guaranteed for the patient. A tradeoff between security and quality of service is defined in order to ensure that the surveillance system gets activated even in emergency situations. In addition, the solution includes resistance against tampering with the device on the patient's side.

  12. For Video Games, Bad News Is Good News: News Reporting of Violent Video Game Studies.

    PubMed

    Copenhaver, Allen; Mitrofan, Oana; Ferguson, Christopher J

    2017-12-01

    News coverage of video game violence studies has been critiqued for focusing mainly on studies supporting negative effects and failing to report studies that did not find evidence for such effects. These concerns were tested in a sample of 68 published studies using child and adolescent samples. Contrary to our hypotheses, study effect size was not a predictor of either newspaper coverage or publication in journals with a high-impact factor. However, a relationship between poorer study quality and newspaper coverage approached significance. High-impact journals were not found to publish studies with higher quality. Poorer quality studies, which tended to highlight negative findings, also received more citations in scholarly sources. Our findings suggest that negative effects of violent video games exposure in children and adolescents, rather than large effect size or high methodological quality, increase the likelihood of a study being cited in other academic publications and subsequently receiving news media coverage.

  13. The Use of Smart Glasses for Surgical Video Streaming.

    PubMed

    Hiranaka, Takafumi; Nakanishi, Yuta; Fujishiro, Takaaki; Hida, Yuichi; Tsubosaka, Masanori; Shibata, Yosaku; Okimura, Kenjiro; Uemoto, Harunobu

    2017-04-01

    Observation of surgical procedures performed by experts is extremely important for acquisition and improvement of surgical skills. Smart glasses are small computers, which comprise a head-mounted monitor and video camera, and can be connected to the internet. They can be used for remote observation of surgeries by video streaming. Although Google Glass is the most commonly used smart glasses for medical purposes, it is still unavailable commercially and has some limitations. This article reports the use of a different type of smart glasses, InfoLinker, for surgical video streaming. InfoLinker has been commercially available in Japan for industrial purposes for more than 2 years. It is connected to a video server via wireless internet directly, and streaming video can be seen anywhere an internet connection is available. We have attempted live video streaming of knee arthroplasty operations that were viewed at several different locations, including foreign countries, on a common web browser. Although the quality of video images depended on the resolution and dynamic range of the video camera, speed of internet connection, and the wearer's attention to minimize image shaking, video streaming could be easily performed throughout the procedure. The wearer could confirm the quality of the video as the video was being shot by the head-mounted display. The time and cost for observation of surgical procedures can be reduced by InfoLinker, and further improvement of hardware as well as the wearer's video shooting technique is expected. We believe that this can be used in other medical settings.

  14. A contourlet transform based algorithm for real-time video encoding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Katsigiannis, Stamos; Papaioannou, Georgios; Maroulis, Dimitris

    2012-06-01

    In recent years, real-time video communication over the internet has been widely utilized for applications like video conferencing. Streaming live video over heterogeneous IP networks, including wireless networks, requires video coding algorithms that can support various levels of quality in order to adapt to the network end-to-end bandwidth and transmitter/receiver resources. In this work, a scalable video coding and compression algorithm based on the Contourlet Transform is proposed. The algorithm allows for multiple levels of detail, without re-encoding the video frames, by just dropping the encoded information referring to higher resolution than needed. Compression is achieved by means of lossy and lossless methods, as well as variable bit rate encoding schemes. Furthermore, due to the transformation utilized, it does not suffer from blocking artifacts that occur with many widely adopted compression algorithms. Another highly advantageous characteristic of the algorithm is the suppression of noise induced by low-quality sensors usually encountered in web-cameras, due to the manipulation of the transform coefficients at the compression stage. The proposed algorithm is designed to introduce minimal coding delay, thus achieving real-time performance. Performance is enhanced by utilizing the vast computational capabilities of modern GPUs, providing satisfactory encoding and decoding times at relatively low cost. These characteristics make this method suitable for applications like video-conferencing that demand real-time performance, along with the highest visual quality possible for each user. Through the presented performance and quality evaluation of the algorithm, experimental results show that the proposed algorithm achieves better or comparable visual quality relative to other compression and encoding methods tested, while maintaining a satisfactory compression ratio. Especially at low bitrates, it provides more human-eye friendly images compared to

  15. Live HDR video streaming on commodity hardware

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    McNamee, Joshua; Hatchett, Jonathan; Debattista, Kurt; Chalmers, Alan

    2015-09-01

    High Dynamic Range (HDR) video provides a step change in viewing experience, for example the ability to clearly see the soccer ball when it is kicked from the shadow of the stadium into sunshine. To achieve the full potential of HDR video, so-called true HDR, it is crucial that all the dynamic range that was captured is delivered to the display device and tone mapping is confined only to the display. Furthermore, to ensure widespread uptake of HDR imaging, it should be low cost and available on commodity hardware. This paper describes an end-to-end HDR pipeline for capturing, encoding and streaming high-definition HDR video in real-time using off-the-shelf components. All the lighting that is captured by HDR-enabled consumer cameras is delivered via the pipeline to any display, including HDR displays and even mobile devices with minimum latency. The system thus provides an integrated HDR video pipeline that includes everything from capture to post-production, archival and storage, compression, transmission, and display.

  16. Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR) Software

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1999-01-01

    Two scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center,atmospheric scientist Paul Meyer and solar physicist Dr. David Hathaway, developed promising new software, called Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR). VISAR may help law enforcement agencies catch criminals by improving the quality of video recorded at crime scenes. In this photograph, the single frame at left, taken at night, was brightened in order to enhance details and reduce noise or snow. To further overcome the video defects in one frame, Law enforcement officials can use VISAR software to add information from multiple frames to reveal a person. Images from less than a second of videotape were added together to create the clarified image at right. VISAR stabilizes camera motion in the horizontal and vertical as well as rotation and zoom effects producing clearer images of moving objects, smoothes jagged edges, enhances still images, and reduces video noise or snow. VISAR could also have applications in medical and meteorological imaging. It could steady images of ultrasounds, which are infamous for their grainy, blurred quality. The software can be used for defense application by improving recornaissance video imagery made by military vehicles, aircraft, and ships traveling in harsh, rugged environments.

  17. Performance comparison of AV1, HEVC, and JVET video codecs on 360 (spherical) video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Topiwala, Pankaj; Dai, Wei; Krishnan, Madhu; Abbas, Adeel; Doshi, Sandeep; Newman, David

    2017-09-01

    This paper compares the coding efficiency performance on 360 videos, of three software codecs: (a) AV1 video codec from the Alliance for Open Media (AOM); (b) the HEVC Reference Software HM; and (c) the JVET JEM Reference SW. Note that 360 video is especially challenging content, in that one codes full res globally, but typically looks locally (in a viewport), which magnifies errors. These are tested in two different projection formats ERP and RSP, to check consistency. Performance is tabulated for 1-pass encoding on two fronts: (1) objective performance based on end-to-end (E2E) metrics such as SPSNR-NN, and WS-PSNR, currently developed in the JVET committee; and (2) informal subjective assessment of static viewports. Constant quality encoding is performed with all the three codecs for an unbiased comparison of the core coding tools. Our general conclusion is that under constant quality coding, AV1 underperforms HEVC, which underperforms JVET. We also test with rate control, where AV1 currently underperforms the open source X265 HEVC codec. Objective and visual evidence is provided.

  18. A Robust Model-Based Coding Technique for Ultrasound Video

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Docef, Alen; Smith, Mark J. T.

    1995-01-01

    This paper introduces a new approach to coding ultrasound video, the intended application being very low bit rate coding for transmission over low cost phone lines. The method exploits both the characteristic noise and the quasi-periodic nature of the signal. Data compression ratios between 250:1 and 1000:1 are shown to be possible, which is sufficient for transmission over ISDN and conventional phone lines. Preliminary results show this approach to be promising for remote ultrasound examinations.

  19. Video streaming technologies using ActiveX and LabVIEW

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Panoiu, M.; Rat, C. L.; Panoiu, C.

    2015-06-01

    The goal of this paper is to present the possibilities of remote image processing through data exchange between two programming technologies: LabVIEW and ActiveX. ActiveX refers to the process of controlling one program from another via ActiveX component; where one program acts as the client and the other as the server. LabVIEW can be either client or server. Both programs (client and server) exist independent of each other but are able to share information. The client communicates with the ActiveX objects that the server opens to allow the sharing of information [7]. In the case of video streaming [1] [2], most ActiveX controls can only display the data, being incapable of transforming it into a data type that LabVIEW can process. This becomes problematic when the system is used for remote image processing. The LabVIEW environment itself provides little if any possibilities for video streaming, and the methods it does offer are usually not high performance, but it possesses high performance toolkits and modules specialized in image processing, making it ideal for processing the captured data. Therefore, we chose to use existing software, specialized in video streaming along with LabVIEW and to capture the data provided by them, for further use, within LabVIEW. The software we studied (the ActiveX controls of a series of media players that utilize streaming technology) provide high quality data and a very small transmission delay, ensuring the reliability of the results of the image processing.

  20. Air quality and climate benefits of long-distance electricity transmission in China

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Peng, Wei; Yuan, Jiahai; Zhao, Yu; Lin, Meiyun; Zhang, Qiang; Victor, David G.; Mauzerall, Denise L.

    2017-06-01

    China is the world’s top carbon emitter and suffers from severe air pollution. It has recently made commitments to improve air quality and to peak its CO2 emissions by 2030. We examine one strategy that can potentially address both issues—utilizing long-distance electricity transmission to bring renewable power to the polluted eastern provinces. Based on an integrated assessment using state-of-the-science atmospheric modeling and recent epidemiological evidence, we find that transmitting a hybrid of renewable (60%) and coal power (40%) (Hybrid-by-wire) reduces 16% more national air-pollution-associated deaths and decreases three times more carbon emissions than transmitting only coal-based electricity. Moreover, although we find that transmitting coal power (Coal-by-Wire, CbW) is slightly more effective at reducing air pollution impacts than replacing old coal power plants with newer cleaner ones in the east (Coal-by-Rail, CbR) (CbW achieves a 6% greater reduction in national total air-pollution-related mortalities than CbR), both coal scenarios have approximately the same carbon emissions. We thus demonstrate that coordinating transmission planning with renewable energy deployment is critical to maximize both local air quality benefits and global climate benefits.

  1. Real-time video streaming in mobile cloud over heterogeneous wireless networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Abdallah-Saleh, Saleh; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos

    2012-06-01

    Recently, the concept of Mobile Cloud Computing (MCC) has been proposed to offload the resource requirements in computational capabilities, storage and security from mobile devices into the cloud. Internet video applications such as real-time streaming are expected to be ubiquitously deployed and supported over the cloud for mobile users, who typically encounter a range of wireless networks of diverse radio access technologies during their roaming. However, real-time video streaming for mobile cloud users across heterogeneous wireless networks presents multiple challenges. The network-layer quality of service (QoS) provision to support high-quality mobile video delivery in this demanding scenario remains an open research question, and this in turn affects the application-level visual quality and impedes mobile users' perceived quality of experience (QoE). In this paper, we devise a framework to support real-time video streaming in this new mobile video networking paradigm and evaluate the performance of the proposed framework empirically through a lab-based yet realistic testing platform. One particular issue we focus on is the effect of users' mobility on the QoS of video streaming over the cloud. We design and implement a hybrid platform comprising of a test-bed and an emulator, on which our concept of mobile cloud computing, video streaming and heterogeneous wireless networks are implemented and integrated to allow the testing of our framework. As representative heterogeneous wireless networks, the popular WLAN (Wi-Fi) and MAN (WiMAX) networks are incorporated in order to evaluate effects of handovers between these different radio access technologies. The H.264/AVC (Advanced Video Coding) standard is employed for real-time video streaming from a server to mobile users (client nodes) in the networks. Mobility support is introduced to enable continuous streaming experience for a mobile user across the heterogeneous wireless network. Real-time video stream packets

  2. Latest Highlights from our Direct Measurement Video Collection

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Vonk, M.; Bohacek, P. H.

    2014-12-01

    Recent advances in technology have made videos much easier to produce, edit, store, transfer, and view. This has spawned an explosion in a production of a wide variety of different types of pedagogical videos. But with the exception of student-made videos (which are often of poor quality) almost all of the educational videos being produced are passive. No matter how compelling the content, students are expected to simply sit and watch them. Because we feel that being engaged and active are necessary components of student learning, we have been working to create a free online library of Direct Measurement Videos (DMV's). These videos are short high-quality videos of real events, shot in a way that allows students to make measurements directly from the video. Instead of handing students a word problem about a car skidding on ice, we actually show them the car skidding on ice. We then ask them to measure the important quantities, make calculations based on those measurements and solve for unknowns. DMV's are more interesting than their word problem equivalents and frequently inspire further questions about the physics of the situation or about the uncertainty of the measurement in ways that word problems almost never do. We feel that it is simply impossible to a video of a roller coaster or a rocket and then argue that word problems are better. In this talk I will highlight some new additions to our DMV collection. This work is supported by NSF TUES award #1245268

  3. Secure and Efficient Reactive Video Surveillance for Patient Monitoring

    PubMed Central

    Braeken, An; Porambage, Pawani; Gurtov, Andrei; Ylianttila, Mika

    2016-01-01

    Video surveillance is widely deployed for many kinds of monitoring applications in healthcare and assisted living systems. Security and privacy are two promising factors that align the quality and validity of video surveillance systems with the caliber of patient monitoring applications. In this paper, we propose a symmetric key-based security framework for the reactive video surveillance of patients based on the inputs coming from data measured by a wireless body area network attached to the human body. Only authenticated patients are able to activate the video cameras, whereas the patient and authorized people can consult the video data. User and location privacy are at each moment guaranteed for the patient. A tradeoff between security and quality of service is defined in order to ensure that the surveillance system gets activated even in emergency situations. In addition, the solution includes resistance against tampering with the device on the patient’s side. PMID:26729130

  4. Portable wireless power transmission system for video capsule endoscopy.

    PubMed

    Zhiwei, Jia; Guozheng, Yan; Bingquan, Zhu

    2014-10-01

    Wireless power transmission is considered a practical way of overcoming the power shortage of wireless capsule endoscopy (VCE). However, most patients cannot tolerate the long hours of lying in a fixed transmitting coil during diagnosis. To develop a portable wireless power transmission system for VCE, a compact transmitting coil and a portable inverter circuit driven by rechargeable batteries are proposed. The couple coils, optimized considering the stability and safety conditions, are 28 turns of transmitting coil and six strands of receiving coil. The driven circuit is designed according to the portable principle. Experiments show that the integrated system could continuously supply power to a dual-head VCE for more than 8 h at a frame rate of 30 frames per second with resolution of 320 × 240. The portable VCE exhibits potential for clinical applications, but requires further improvement and tests.

  5. Music, Television, and Video: Historical and Aesthetic Considerations.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Burns, Gary; Thompson, Robert

    Rock videos have their antecedents in film and television images, although music in films is usually background music. Television made possible the live transmission of musical numbers with visuals. The musical television commercial is an amalgam of conventions, with background music suddenly erupting into text, unheard by the characters but…

  6. ATM Quality of Service Parameters at 45 Mbps Using a Satellite Emulator: Laboratory Measurements

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Ivancic, William D.; Bobinsky, Eric A.

    1997-01-01

    Results of 45-Mbps DS3 intermediate-frequency loopback measurements of asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) quality of service parameters (cell error ratio and cell loss ratio) are presented. These tests, which were conducted at the NASA Lewis Research Center in support of satellite-ATM interoperability research, represent initial efforts to quantify the minimum parameters for stringent ATM applications, such as MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 video transmission. Portions of these results were originally presented to the International Telecommunications Union's ITU-R Working Party 4B in February 1996 in support of their Draft Preliminary Recommendation on the Transmission of ATM Traffic via Satellite.

  7. Intelligent keyframe extraction for video printing

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhang, Tong

    2004-10-01

    Nowadays most digital cameras have the functionality of taking short video clips, with the length of video ranging from several seconds to a couple of minutes. The purpose of this research is to develop an algorithm which extracts an optimal set of keyframes from each short video clip so that the user could obtain proper video frames to print out. In current video printing systems, keyframes are normally obtained by evenly sampling the video clip over time. Such an approach, however, may not reflect highlights or regions of interest in the video. Keyframes derived in this way may also be improper for video printing in terms of either content or image quality. In this paper, we present an intelligent keyframe extraction approach to derive an improved keyframe set by performing semantic analysis of the video content. For a video clip, a number of video and audio features are analyzed to first generate a candidate keyframe set. These features include accumulative color histogram and color layout differences, camera motion estimation, moving object tracking, face detection and audio event detection. Then, the candidate keyframes are clustered and evaluated to obtain a final keyframe set. The objective is to automatically generate a limited number of keyframes to show different views of the scene; to show different people and their actions in the scene; and to tell the story in the video shot. Moreover, frame extraction for video printing, which is a rather subjective problem, is considered in this work for the first time, and a semi-automatic approach is proposed.

  8. Video coding for next-generation surveillance systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Klasen, Lena M.; Fahlander, Olov

    1997-02-01

    Video is used as recording media in surveillance system and also more frequently by the Swedish Police Force. Methods for analyzing video using an image processing system have recently been introduced at the Swedish National Laboratory of Forensic Science, and new methods are in focus in a research project at Linkoping University, Image Coding Group. The accuracy of the result of those forensic investigations often depends on the quality of the video recordings, and one of the major problems when analyzing videos from crime scenes is the poor quality of the recordings. Enhancing poor image quality might add manipulative or subjective effects and does not seem to be the right way of getting reliable analysis results. The surveillance system in use today is mainly based on video techniques, VHS or S-VHS, and the weakest link is the video cassette recorder, (VCR). Multiplexers for selecting one of many camera outputs for recording is another problem as it often filters the video signal, and recording is limited to only one of the available cameras connected to the VCR. A way to get around the problem of poor recording is to simultaneously record all camera outputs digitally. It is also very important to build such a system bearing in mind that image processing analysis methods becomes more important as a complement to the human eye. Using one or more cameras gives a large amount of data, and the need for data compression is more than obvious. Crime scenes often involve persons or moving objects, and the available coding techniques are more or less useful. Our goal is to propose a possible system, being the best compromise with respect to what needs to be recorded, movements in the recorded scene, loss of information and resolution etc., to secure the efficient recording of the crime and enable forensic analysis. The preventative effective of having a well functioning surveillance system and well established image analysis methods is not to be neglected. Aspects of

  9. Spatial-temporal distortion metric for in-service quality monitoring of any digital video system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wolf, Stephen; Pinson, Margaret H.

    1999-11-01

    Many organizations have focused on developing digital video quality metrics which produce results that accurately emulate subjective responses. However, to be widely applicable a metric must also work over a wide range of quality, and be useful for in-service quality monitoring. The Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) has developed spatial-temporal distortion metrics that meet all of these requirements. These objective metrics are described in detail and have a number of interesting properties, including utilization of (1) spatial activity filters which emphasize long edges on the order of 10 arc min while simultaneously performing large amounts of noise suppression, (2) the angular direction of the spatial gradient, (3) spatial-temporal compression factors of at least 384:1 (spatial compression of at least 64:1 and temporal compression of at least 6:1, and 4) simple perceptibility thresholds and spatial-temporal masking functions. Results are presented that compare the objective metric values with mean opinion scores from a wide range of subjective data bases spanning many different scenes, systems, bit-rates, and applications.

  10. Potential benefits of long-distance electricity transmission in China for air quality and climate

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Peng, W.; Mauzerall, D. L.; Yuan, J.; Zhao, Y.; Lin, M.; Zhang, Q.

    2015-12-01

    China is expanding west-to-east long-distance electricity transmission capacity with the aim of reducing eastern coal power production and resulting air pollution. In addition to coal power, this new grid capacity can be used to transport renewable-generated electricity with resulting climate co-benefits. Here we use an integrated assessment to evaluate the air quality and climate benefits of twelve proposed transmission lines in China, and compare two energy-by-wire strategies that transmit 1) only coal power (Coal-by-wire, CbW) or 2) combined renewable plus coal power (Renewable and coal-by-wire, (RE+C)bW), with 3) the current practice of transporting coal by rail for conversion to electricity near eastern demand centers (Coal-by-rail, CbR). Based on a regional atmospheric chemistry model, WRF-Chem, electricity transmission through the proposed lines leads to 2-3 μg/m3 (2-7%) reduction in the annual mean concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in the eastern provinces relative to 2010 levels, roughly ~1 μg/m3 greater than the reduction achieved in CbR where dirty coal units are locally replaced with efficient ones. Although the eastern air quality improvement is similar irrespective of the fuel source to power the lines, adding coal generation results in up to 3% increase in annual mean PM2.5 levels in some exporting provinces, whereas such increase is not observed when most added capacity is renewable-based. Counting both the economic value of reduced carbon emissions and the health-related air quality benefits can significantly improve the cost-effectiveness of transmitting both renewable and coal power. Comparing (RE+C)bW with the two coal-based options, we find not only 20% larger reduction in air-pollution-related deaths, but also three times greater reduction in CO2 emissions. Our study hence demonstrates the significance of coordinating renewable energy planning with transmission planning to simultaneously tackle air pollution and climate

  11. The effects of video compression on acceptability of images for monitoring life sciences experiments

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Haines, Richard F.; Chuang, Sherry L.

    1992-07-01

    Future manned space operations for Space Station Freedom will call for a variety of carefully planned multimedia digital communications, including full-frame-rate color video, to support remote operations of scientific experiments. This paper presents the results of an investigation to determine if video compression is a viable solution to transmission bandwidth constraints. It reports on the impact of different levels of compression and associated calculational parameters on image acceptability to investigators in life-sciences research at ARC. Three nonhuman life-sciences disciplines (plant, rodent, and primate biology) were selected for this study. A total of 33 subjects viewed experimental scenes in their own scientific disciplines. Ten plant scientists viewed still images of wheat stalks at various stages of growth. Each image was compressed to four different compression levels using the Joint Photographic Expert Group (JPEG) standard algorithm, and the images were presented in random order. Twelve and eleven staffmembers viewed 30-sec videotaped segments showing small rodents and a small primate, respectively. Each segment was repeated at four different compression levels in random order using an inverse cosine transform (ICT) algorithm. Each viewer made a series of subjective image-quality ratings. There was a significant difference in image ratings according to the type of scene viewed within disciplines; thus, ratings were scene dependent. Image (still and motion) acceptability does, in fact, vary according to compression level. The JPEG still-image-compression levels, even with the large range of 5:1 to 120:1 in this study, yielded equally high levels of acceptability. In contrast, the ICT algorithm for motion compression yielded a sharp decline in acceptability below 768 kb/sec. Therefore, if video compression is to be used as a solution for overcoming transmission bandwidth constraints, the effective management of the ratio and compression parameters

  12. The effects of video compression on acceptability of images for monitoring life sciences experiments

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Haines, Richard F.; Chuang, Sherry L.

    1992-01-01

    Future manned space operations for Space Station Freedom will call for a variety of carefully planned multimedia digital communications, including full-frame-rate color video, to support remote operations of scientific experiments. This paper presents the results of an investigation to determine if video compression is a viable solution to transmission bandwidth constraints. It reports on the impact of different levels of compression and associated calculational parameters on image acceptability to investigators in life-sciences research at ARC. Three nonhuman life-sciences disciplines (plant, rodent, and primate biology) were selected for this study. A total of 33 subjects viewed experimental scenes in their own scientific disciplines. Ten plant scientists viewed still images of wheat stalks at various stages of growth. Each image was compressed to four different compression levels using the Joint Photographic Expert Group (JPEG) standard algorithm, and the images were presented in random order. Twelve and eleven staffmembers viewed 30-sec videotaped segments showing small rodents and a small primate, respectively. Each segment was repeated at four different compression levels in random order using an inverse cosine transform (ICT) algorithm. Each viewer made a series of subjective image-quality ratings. There was a significant difference in image ratings according to the type of scene viewed within disciplines; thus, ratings were scene dependent. Image (still and motion) acceptability does, in fact, vary according to compression level. The JPEG still-image-compression levels, even with the large range of 5:1 to 120:1 in this study, yielded equally high levels of acceptability. In contrast, the ICT algorithm for motion compression yielded a sharp decline in acceptability below 768 kb/sec. Therefore, if video compression is to be used as a solution for overcoming transmission bandwidth constraints, the effective management of the ratio and compression parameters

  13. The Important Elements of a Science Video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Harned, D. A.; Moorman, M.; McMahon, G.

    2012-12-01

    New technologies have revolutionized use of video as a means of communication. Films have become easier to create and to distribute. Video is omnipresent in our culture and supplements or even replaces writing in many applications. How can scientists and educators best use video to communicate scientific results? Video podcasts are being used in addition to journal, print, and online publications to communicate the relevance of scientific findings of the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) program to general audiences such as resource managers, educational groups, public officials, and the general public. In an effort to improve the production of science videos a survey was developed to provide insight into effective science communication with video. Viewers of USGS podcast videos were surveyed using Likert response- scaling to identify the important elements of science videos. The surveys were of 120 scientists and educators attending the 2010 and 2011 Fall Meetings of the American Geophysical Union and the 2012 meeting of the National Monitoring Council. The median age of the respondents was 44 years, with an education level of a Bachelor's Degree or higher. Respondents reported that their primary sources for watching science videos were YouTube and science websites. Video length was the single most important element associated with reaching the greatest number of viewers. The surveys indicated a median length of 5 minutes as appropriate for a web video, with 5-7 minutes the 25th-75th percentiles. An illustration of the effect of length: a 5-minute and a 20-minute version of a USGS film on the effect of urbanization on water-quality was made available on the same website. The short film has been downloaded 3 times more frequently than the longer film version. The survey showed that the most important elements to include in a science film are style elements including strong visuals, an engaging story, and a simple message, and

  14. A digital audio/video interleaving system. [for Shuttle Orbiter

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Richards, R. W.

    1978-01-01

    A method of interleaving an audio signal with its associated video signal for simultaneous transmission or recording, and the subsequent separation of the two signals, is described. Comparisons are made between the new audio signal interleaving system and the Skylab Pam audio/video interleaving system, pointing out improvements gained by using the digital audio/video interleaving system. It was found that the digital technique is the simplest, most effective and most reliable method for interleaving audio and/or other types of data into the video signal for the Shuttle Orbiter application. Details of the design of a multiplexer capable of accommodating two basic data channels, each consisting of a single 31.5-kb/s digital bit stream are given. An adaptive slope delta modulation system is introduced to digitize audio signals, producing a high immunity of work intelligibility to channel errors, primarily due to the robust nature of the delta-modulation algorithm.

  15. Compression evaluation of surgery video recordings retaining diagnostic credibility (compression evaluation of surgery video)

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Duplaga, M.; Leszczuk, M. I.; Papir, Z.; Przelaskowski, A.

    2008-12-01

    Wider dissemination of medical digital video libraries is affected by two correlated factors, resource effective content compression that directly influences its diagnostic credibility. It has been proved that it is possible to meet these contradictory requirements halfway for long-lasting and low motion surgery recordings at compression ratios close to 100 (bronchoscopic procedures were a case study investigated). As the main supporting assumption, it has been accepted that the content can be compressed as far as clinicians are not able to sense a loss of video diagnostic fidelity (a visually lossless compression). Different market codecs were inspected by means of the combined subjective and objective tests toward their usability in medical video libraries. Subjective tests involved a panel of clinicians who had to classify compressed bronchoscopic video content according to its quality under the bubble sort algorithm. For objective tests, two metrics (hybrid vector measure and hosaka Plots) were calculated frame by frame and averaged over a whole sequence.

  16. Impact of different cloud deployments on real-time video applications for mobile video cloud users

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Khan, Kashif A.; Wang, Qi; Luo, Chunbo; Wang, Xinheng; Grecos, Christos

    2015-02-01

    The latest trend to access mobile cloud services through wireless network connectivity has amplified globally among both entrepreneurs and home end users. Although existing public cloud service vendors such as Google, Microsoft Azure etc. are providing on-demand cloud services with affordable cost for mobile users, there are still a number of challenges to achieve high-quality mobile cloud based video applications, especially due to the bandwidth-constrained and errorprone mobile network connectivity, which is the communication bottleneck for end-to-end video delivery. In addition, existing accessible clouds networking architectures are different in term of their implementation, services, resources, storage, pricing, support and so on, and these differences have varied impact on the performance of cloud-based real-time video applications. Nevertheless, these challenges and impacts have not been thoroughly investigated in the literature. In our previous work, we have implemented a mobile cloud network model that integrates localized and decentralized cloudlets (mini-clouds) and wireless mesh networks. In this paper, we deploy a real-time framework consisting of various existing Internet cloud networking architectures (Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Eucalyptus Cloud) and a cloudlet based on Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud over wireless mesh networking technology for mobile cloud end users. It is noted that the increasing trend to access real-time video streaming over HTTP/HTTPS is gaining popularity among both research and industrial communities to leverage the existing web services and HTTP infrastructure in the Internet. To study the performance under different deployments using different public and private cloud service providers, we employ real-time video streaming over the HTTP/HTTPS standard, and conduct experimental evaluation and in-depth comparative analysis of the impact of different deployments on the quality of service for mobile video cloud users. Empirical

  17. Smart sensing surveillance video system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hsu, Charles; Szu, Harold

    2016-05-01

    An intelligent video surveillance system is able to detect and identify abnormal and alarming situations by analyzing object movement. The Smart Sensing Surveillance Video (S3V) System is proposed to minimize video processing and transmission, thus allowing a fixed number of cameras to be connected on the system, and making it suitable for its applications in remote battlefield, tactical, and civilian applications including border surveillance, special force operations, airfield protection, perimeter and building protection, and etc. The S3V System would be more effective if equipped with visual understanding capabilities to detect, analyze, and recognize objects, track motions, and predict intentions. In addition, alarm detection is performed on the basis of parameters of the moving objects and their trajectories, and is performed using semantic reasoning and ontologies. The S3V System capabilities and technologies have great potential for both military and civilian applications, enabling highly effective security support tools for improving surveillance activities in densely crowded environments. It would be directly applicable to solutions for emergency response personnel, law enforcement, and other homeland security missions, as well as in applications requiring the interoperation of sensor networks with handheld or body-worn interface devices.

  18. MobileASL: intelligibility of sign language video over mobile phones.

    PubMed

    Cavender, Anna; Vanam, Rahul; Barney, Dane K; Ladner, Richard E; Riskin, Eve A

    2008-01-01

    For Deaf people, access to the mobile telephone network in the United States is currently limited to text messaging, forcing communication in English as opposed to American Sign Language (ASL), the preferred language. Because ASL is a visual language, mobile video phones have the potential to give Deaf people access to real-time mobile communication in their preferred language. However, even today's best video compression techniques can not yield intelligible ASL at limited cell phone network bandwidths. Motivated by this constraint, we conducted one focus group and two user studies with members of the Deaf Community to determine the intelligibility effects of video compression techniques that exploit the visual nature of sign language. Inspired by eye tracking results that show high resolution foveal vision is maintained around the face, we studied region-of-interest encodings (where the face is encoded at higher quality) as well as reduced frame rates (where fewer, better quality, frames are displayed every second). At all bit rates studied here, participants preferred moderate quality increases in the face region, sacrificing quality in other regions. They also preferred slightly lower frame rates because they yield better quality frames for a fixed bit rate. The limited processing power of cell phones is a serious concern because a real-time video encoder and decoder will be needed. Choosing less complex settings for the encoder can reduce encoding time, but will affect video quality. We studied the intelligibility effects of this tradeoff and found that we can significantly speed up encoding time without severely affecting intelligibility. These results show promise for real-time access to the current low-bandwidth cell phone network through sign-language-specific encoding techniques.

  19. High resolution, high frame rate video technology development plan and the near-term system conceptual design

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Ziemke, Robert A.

    1990-01-01

    The objective of the High Resolution, High Frame Rate Video Technology (HHVT) development effort is to provide technology advancements to remove constraints on the amount of high speed, detailed optical data recorded and transmitted for microgravity science and application experiments. These advancements will enable the development of video systems capable of high resolution, high frame rate video data recording, processing, and transmission. Techniques such as multichannel image scan, video parameter tradeoff, and the use of dual recording media were identified as methods of making the most efficient use of the near-term technology.

  20. Global motion compensated visual attention-based video watermarking

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Oakes, Matthew; Bhowmik, Deepayan; Abhayaratne, Charith

    2016-11-01

    Imperceptibility and robustness are two key but complementary requirements of any watermarking algorithm. Low-strength watermarking yields high imperceptibility but exhibits poor robustness. High-strength watermarking schemes achieve good robustness but often suffer from embedding distortions resulting in poor visual quality in host media. This paper proposes a unique video watermarking algorithm that offers a fine balance between imperceptibility and robustness using motion compensated wavelet-based visual attention model (VAM). The proposed VAM includes spatial cues for visual saliency as well as temporal cues. The spatial modeling uses the spatial wavelet coefficients while the temporal modeling accounts for both local and global motion to arrive at the spatiotemporal VAM for video. The model is then used to develop a video watermarking algorithm, where a two-level watermarking weighting parameter map is generated from the VAM saliency maps using the saliency model and data are embedded into the host image according to the visual attentiveness of each region. By avoiding higher strength watermarking in the visually attentive region, the resulting watermarked video achieves high perceived visual quality while preserving high robustness. The proposed VAM outperforms the state-of-the-art video visual attention methods in joint saliency detection and low computational complexity performance. For the same embedding distortion, the proposed visual attention-based watermarking achieves up to 39% (nonblind) and 22% (blind) improvement in robustness against H.264/AVC compression, compared to existing watermarking methodology that does not use the VAM. The proposed visual attention-based video watermarking results in visual quality similar to that of low-strength watermarking and a robustness similar to those of high-strength watermarking.

  1. Economic Delivery of Video Teletraining.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Sand, Mary; Chandler, Nick

    1995-01-01

    Discusses video teletraining as an alternative to traditional classroom education in terms of cost and program effectiveness; understanding the technology; support required to develop and deliver quality instruction; and the instructional design. (AEF)

  2. A unified framework of unsupervised subjective optimized bit allocation for multiple video object coding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Chen, Zhenzhong; Han, Junwei; Ngan, King Ngi

    2005-10-01

    MPEG-4 treats a scene as a composition of several objects or so-called video object planes (VOPs) that are separately encoded and decoded. Such a flexible video coding framework makes it possible to code different video object with different distortion scale. It is necessary to analyze the priority of the video objects according to its semantic importance, intrinsic properties and psycho-visual characteristics such that the bit budget can be distributed properly to video objects to improve the perceptual quality of the compressed video. This paper aims to provide an automatic video object priority definition method based on object-level visual attention model and further propose an optimization framework for video object bit allocation. One significant contribution of this work is that the human visual system characteristics are incorporated into the video coding optimization process. Another advantage is that the priority of the video object can be obtained automatically instead of fixing weighting factors before encoding or relying on the user interactivity. To evaluate the performance of the proposed approach, we compare it with traditional verification model bit allocation and the optimal multiple video object bit allocation algorithms. Comparing with traditional bit allocation algorithms, the objective quality of the object with higher priority is significantly improved under this framework. These results demonstrate the usefulness of this unsupervised subjective quality lifting framework.

  3. HealthTrust: a social network approach for retrieving online health videos.

    PubMed

    Fernandez-Luque, Luis; Karlsen, Randi; Melton, Genevieve B

    2012-01-31

    Social media are becoming mainstream in the health domain. Despite the large volume of accurate and trustworthy health information available on social media platforms, finding good-quality health information can be difficult. Misleading health information can often be popular (eg, antivaccination videos) and therefore highly rated by general search engines. We believe that community wisdom about the quality of health information can be harnessed to help create tools for retrieving good-quality social media content. To explore approaches for extracting metrics about authoritativeness in online health communities and how these metrics positively correlate with the quality of the content. We designed a metric, called HealthTrust, that estimates the trustworthiness of social media content (eg, blog posts or videos) in a health community. The HealthTrust metric calculates reputation in an online health community based on link analysis. We used the metric to retrieve YouTube videos and channels about diabetes. In two different experiments, health consumers provided 427 ratings of 17 videos and professionals gave 162 ratings of 23 videos. In addition, two professionals reviewed 30 diabetes channels. HealthTrust may be used for retrieving online videos on diabetes, since it performed better than YouTube Search in most cases. Overall, of 20 potential channels, HealthTrust's filtering allowed only 3 bad channels (15%) versus 8 (40%) on the YouTube list. Misleading and graphic videos (eg, featuring amputations) were more commonly found by YouTube Search than by searches based on HealthTrust. However, some videos from trusted sources had low HealthTrust scores, mostly from general health content providers, and therefore not highly connected in the diabetes community. When comparing video ratings from our reviewers, we found that HealthTrust achieved a positive and statistically significant correlation with professionals (Pearson r₁₀ = .65, P = .02) and a trend toward

  4. HealthTrust: A Social Network Approach for Retrieving Online Health Videos

    PubMed Central

    Karlsen, Randi; Melton, Genevieve B

    2012-01-01

    Background Social media are becoming mainstream in the health domain. Despite the large volume of accurate and trustworthy health information available on social media platforms, finding good-quality health information can be difficult. Misleading health information can often be popular (eg, antivaccination videos) and therefore highly rated by general search engines. We believe that community wisdom about the quality of health information can be harnessed to help create tools for retrieving good-quality social media content. Objectives To explore approaches for extracting metrics about authoritativeness in online health communities and how these metrics positively correlate with the quality of the content. Methods We designed a metric, called HealthTrust, that estimates the trustworthiness of social media content (eg, blog posts or videos) in a health community. The HealthTrust metric calculates reputation in an online health community based on link analysis. We used the metric to retrieve YouTube videos and channels about diabetes. In two different experiments, health consumers provided 427 ratings of 17 videos and professionals gave 162 ratings of 23 videos. In addition, two professionals reviewed 30 diabetes channels. Results HealthTrust may be used for retrieving online videos on diabetes, since it performed better than YouTube Search in most cases. Overall, of 20 potential channels, HealthTrust’s filtering allowed only 3 bad channels (15%) versus 8 (40%) on the YouTube list. Misleading and graphic videos (eg, featuring amputations) were more commonly found by YouTube Search than by searches based on HealthTrust. However, some videos from trusted sources had low HealthTrust scores, mostly from general health content providers, and therefore not highly connected in the diabetes community. When comparing video ratings from our reviewers, we found that HealthTrust achieved a positive and statistically significant correlation with professionals (Pearson r 10

  5. Optimal erasure protection for scalably compressed video streams with limited retransmission.

    PubMed

    Taubman, David; Thie, Johnson

    2005-08-01

    This paper shows how the priority encoding transmission (PET) framework may be leveraged to exploit both unequal error protection and limited retransmission for RD-optimized delivery of streaming media. Previous work on scalable media protection with PET has largely ignored the possibility of retransmission. Conversely, the PET framework has not been harnessed by the substantial body of previous work on RD optimized hybrid forward error correction/automatic repeat request schemes. We limit our attention to sources which can be modeled as independently compressed frames (e.g., video frames), where each element in the scalable representation of each frame can be transmitted in one or both of two transmission slots. An optimization algorithm determines the level of protection which should be assigned to each element in each slot, subject to transmission bandwidth constraints. To balance the protection assigned to elements which are being transmitted for the first time with those which are being retransmitted, the proposed algorithm formulates a collection of hypotheses concerning its own behavior in future transmission slots. We show how the PET framework allows for a decoupled optimization algorithm with only modest complexity. Experimental results obtained with Motion JPEG2000 compressed video demonstrate that substantial performance benefits can be obtained using the proposed framework.

  6. An Innovative Streaming Video System With a Point-of-View Head Camera Transmission of Surgeries to Smartphones and Tablets: An Educational Utility.

    PubMed

    Chaves, Rafael Oliveira; de Oliveira, Pedro Armando Valente; Rocha, Luciano Chaves; David, Joacy Pedro Franco; Ferreira, Sanmari Costa; Santos, Alex de Assis Santos Dos; Melo, Rômulo Müller Dos Santos; Yasojima, Edson Yuzur; Brito, Marcus Vinicius Henriques

    2017-10-01

    In order to engage medical students and residents from public health centers to utilize the telemedicine features of surgery on their own smartphones and tablets as an educational tool, an innovative streaming system was developed with the purpose of streaming live footage from open surgeries to smartphones and tablets, allowing the visualization of the surgical field from the surgeon's perspective. The current study aims to describe the results of an evaluation on level 1 of Kirkpatrick's Model for Evaluation of the streaming system usage during gynecological surgeries, based on the perception of medical students and gynecology residents. Consisted of a live video streaming (from the surgeon's point of view) of gynecological surgeries for smartphones and tablets, one for each volunteer. The volunteers were able to connect to the local wireless network, created by the streaming system, through an access password and watch the video transmission on a web browser on their smartphones. Then, they answered a Likert-type questionnaire containing 14 items about the educational applicability of the streaming system, as well as comparing it to watching an in loco procedure. This study is formally approved by the local ethics commission (Certificate No. 53175915.7.0000.5171/2016). Twenty-one volunteers participated, totalizing 294 items answered, in which 94.2% were in agreement with the items affirmative, 4.1% were neutral, and only 1.7% answers corresponded to negative impressions. Cronbach's α was .82, which represents a good reliability level. Spearman's coefficients were highly significant in 4 comparisons and moderately significant in the other 20 comparisons. This study presents a local streaming video system of live surgeries to smartphones and tablets and shows its educational utility, low cost, and simple usage, which offers convenience and satisfactory image resolution, thus being potentially applicable in surgical teaching.

  7. Effects of a clinical pathway for video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) on quality and cost of care.

    PubMed

    Schwarzbach, Matthias H M; Ronellenfitsch, Ulrich; Wang, Qian; Rössner, Eric D; Denz, Christof; Post, Stefan; Hohenberger, Peter

    2010-04-01

    The purpose of this study was to evaluate effects of a clinical pathway (CP) for video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) on process quality, outcome quality, and hospital costs. We implemented a CP for VATS and compared 34 patients treated with CP to 77 patients treated without CP. Indicators for process quality were duration of catheter placement, pain intensity, respiratory exercising, and mobilization. Outcome quality was measured through morbidity, mortality, reoperations, and readmissions. Cost of hospital stay was calculated using an imputed daily rate. Foley catheters were removed significantly earlier after CP implementation. All patients on CP were mobilized and received pulmonary exercising on the operation day. Pain levels were low after CP implementation. Median hospital stay significantly reduced by 5 days. Perioperative outcome quality remained unchanged. Costs significantly diminished by 1,510 Euro per stay. CP implementation had positive effects on process quality. Specifically, catheter management was improved and a good pain control achieved. Patients benefited from shortened stay and were treated at lower cost. A clear effect on outcome quality was not found. CPs are a promising tool for quality improvement and cost containment in thoracic surgery.

  8. Video Tutorial of Continental Food

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nurani, A. S.; Juwaedah, A.; Mahmudatussa'adah, A.

    2018-02-01

    This research is motivated by the belief in the importance of media in a learning process. Media as an intermediary serves to focus on the attention of learners. Selection of appropriate learning media is very influential on the success of the delivery of information itself both in terms of cognitive, affective and skills. Continental food is a course that studies food that comes from Europe and is very complex. To reduce verbalism and provide more real learning, then the tutorial media is needed. Media tutorials that are audio visual can provide a more concrete learning experience. The purpose of this research is to develop tutorial media in the form of video. The method used is the development method with the stages of analyzing the learning objectives, creating a story board, validating the story board, revising the story board and making video tutorial media. The results show that the making of storyboards should be very thorough, and detailed in accordance with the learning objectives to reduce errors in video capture so as to save time, cost and effort. In video capturing, lighting, shooting angles, and soundproofing make an excellent contribution to the quality of tutorial video produced. In shooting should focus more on tools, materials, and processing. Video tutorials should be interactive and two-way.

  9. Experimental application of simulation tools for evaluating UAV video change detection

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Saur, Günter; Bartelsen, Jan

    2015-10-01

    Change detection is one of the most important tasks when unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are used for video reconnaissance and surveillance. In this paper, we address changes on short time scale, i.e. the observations are taken within time distances of a few hours. Each observation is a short video sequence corresponding to the near-nadir overflight of the UAV above the interesting area and the relevant changes are e.g. recently added or removed objects. The change detection algorithm has to distinguish between relevant and non-relevant changes. Examples for non-relevant changes are versatile objects like trees and compression or transmission artifacts. To enable the usage of an automatic change detection within an interactive workflow of an UAV video exploitation system, an evaluation and assessment procedure has to be performed. Large video data sets which contain many relevant objects with varying scene background and altering influence parameters (e.g. image quality, sensor and flight parameters) including image metadata and ground truth data are necessary for a comprehensive evaluation. Since the acquisition of real video data is limited by cost and time constraints, from our point of view, the generation of synthetic data by simulation tools has to be considered. In this paper the processing chain of Saur et al. (2014) [1] and the interactive workflow for video change detection is described. We have selected the commercial simulation environment Virtual Battle Space 3 (VBS3) to generate synthetic data. For an experimental setup, an example scenario "road monitoring" has been defined and several video clips have been produced with varying flight and sensor parameters and varying objects in the scene. Image registration and change mask extraction, both components of the processing chain, are applied to corresponding frames of different video clips. For the selected examples, the images could be registered, the modelled changes could be extracted and the

  10. YouTube Videos on Botulinum Toxin A for Wrinkles: A Useful Resource for Patient Education.

    PubMed

    Wong, Katharine; Doong, Judy; Trang, Trinh; Joo, Sarah; Chien, Anna L

    2017-12-01

    Patients interested in botulinum toxin type A (BTX-A) for wrinkles search for videos on YouTube, but little is known about the quality and reliability of the content. The authors examined the quality, reliability, content, and target audience of YouTube videos on BTX for wrinkles. In this cross-sectional study, the term "Botox" was searched on YouTube. Sixty relevant videos in English were independently categorized by 2 reviewers as useful informational, misleading informational, useful patient view, or misleading patient view. Disagreements were settled by a third reviewer. Videos were rated on the Global Quality Scale (GQS) (1 = poor, 5 = excellent). Sixty-three percent of the BTX YouTube videos were useful informational (GQS = 4.4 ± 0.7), 33% as useful patient view (GQS = 3.21 ± 1.2), 2% as misleading informational (GQS = 1), and 2% as misleading patient view (GQS = 2.5). The large number of useful videos, high reliability, and the wide range of content covered suggests that those who search for antiwrinkle BTX videos on YouTube are likely to view high-quality content. This suggests that YouTube may be a good source of videos to recommend for patients interested in BTX.

  11. Background-Modeling-Based Adaptive Prediction for Surveillance Video Coding.

    PubMed

    Zhang, Xianguo; Huang, Tiejun; Tian, Yonghong; Gao, Wen

    2014-02-01

    The exponential growth of surveillance videos presents an unprecedented challenge for high-efficiency surveillance video coding technology. Compared with the existing coding standards that were basically developed for generic videos, surveillance video coding should be designed to make the best use of the special characteristics of surveillance videos (e.g., relative static background). To do so, this paper first conducts two analyses on how to improve the background and foreground prediction efficiencies in surveillance video coding. Following the analysis results, we propose a background-modeling-based adaptive prediction (BMAP) method. In this method, all blocks to be encoded are firstly classified into three categories. Then, according to the category of each block, two novel inter predictions are selectively utilized, namely, the background reference prediction (BRP) that uses the background modeled from the original input frames as the long-term reference and the background difference prediction (BDP) that predicts the current data in the background difference domain. For background blocks, the BRP can effectively improve the prediction efficiency using the higher quality background as the reference; whereas for foreground-background-hybrid blocks, the BDP can provide a better reference after subtracting its background pixels. Experimental results show that the BMAP can achieve at least twice the compression ratio on surveillance videos as AVC (MPEG-4 Advanced Video Coding) high profile, yet with a slightly additional encoding complexity. Moreover, for the foreground coding performance, which is crucial to the subjective quality of moving objects in surveillance videos, BMAP also obtains remarkable gains over several state-of-the-art methods.

  12. YouTube videos as a teaching tool and patient resource for infantile spasms.

    PubMed

    Fat, Mary Jane Lim; Doja, Asif; Barrowman, Nick; Sell, Erick

    2011-07-01

    The purpose of this study was to assess YouTube videos for their efficacy as a patient resource for infantile spasms. Videos were searched using the terms infantile spasm, spasm, epileptic spasm, and West syndrome. The top 25 videos under each term were selected according to set criteria. Technical quality, diagnosis of infantile spasms, and suitability as a teaching resource were assessed by 2 neurologists using the Medical Video Rating Scale. There were 5858 videos found. Of the 100 top videos, 46% did not meet selection criteria. Mean rating for technical quality was 4.0 of 5 for rater 1 and 3.9 of 5 for rater 2. Raters found 60% and 64% of videos to accurately portray infantile spasms, respectively, with significant agreement (Cohen κ coefficient = 0.75, P < .001). Ten videos were considered excellent examples (grading of 5 of 5) by at least 1 rater. YouTube may be used as an excellent patient resource for infantile spasms if guided search practices are followed.

  13. Temporal compressive imaging for video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhou, Qun; Zhang, Linxia; Ke, Jun

    2018-01-01

    In many situations, imagers are required to have higher imaging speed, such as gunpowder blasting analysis and observing high-speed biology phenomena. However, measuring high-speed video is a challenge to camera design, especially, in infrared spectrum. In this paper, we reconstruct a high-frame-rate video from compressive video measurements using temporal compressive imaging (TCI) with a temporal compression ratio T=8. This means that, 8 unique high-speed temporal frames will be obtained from a single compressive frame using a reconstruction algorithm. Equivalently, the video frame rates is increased by 8 times. Two methods, two-step iterative shrinkage/threshold (TwIST) algorithm and the Gaussian mixture model (GMM) method, are used for reconstruction. To reduce reconstruction time and memory usage, each frame of size 256×256 is divided into patches of size 8×8. The influence of different coded mask to reconstruction is discussed. The reconstruction qualities using TwIST and GMM are also compared.

  14. Statistical analysis of subjective preferences for video enhancement

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Woods, Russell L.; Satgunam, PremNandhini; Bronstad, P. Matthew; Peli, Eli

    2010-02-01

    Measuring preferences for moving video quality is harder than for static images due to the fleeting and variable nature of moving video. Subjective preferences for image quality can be tested by observers indicating their preference for one image over another. Such pairwise comparisons can be analyzed using Thurstone scaling (Farrell, 1999). Thurstone (1927) scaling is widely used in applied psychology, marketing, food tasting and advertising research. Thurstone analysis constructs an arbitrary perceptual scale for the items that are compared (e.g. enhancement levels). However, Thurstone scaling does not determine the statistical significance of the differences between items on that perceptual scale. Recent papers have provided inferential statistical methods that produce an outcome similar to Thurstone scaling (Lipovetsky and Conklin, 2004). Here, we demonstrate that binary logistic regression can analyze preferences for enhanced video.

  15. An efficient approach for video information retrieval

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Dong, Daoguo; Xue, Xiangyang

    2005-01-01

    Today, more and more video information can be accessed through internet, satellite, etc.. Retrieving specific video information from large-scale video database has become an important and challenging research topic in the area of multimedia information retrieval. In this paper, we introduce a new and efficient index structure OVA-File, which is a variant of VA-File. In OVA-File, the approximations close to each other in data space are stored in close positions of the approximation file. The benefit is that only a part of approximations close to the query vector need to be visited to get the query result. Both shot query algorithm and video clip algorithm are proposed to support video information retrieval efficiently. The experimental results showed that the queries based on OVA-File were much faster than that based on VA-File with small loss of result quality.

  16. User-assisted video segmentation system for visual communication

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wu, Zhengping; Chen, Chun

    2002-01-01

    Video segmentation plays an important role for efficient storage and transmission in visual communication. In this paper, we introduce a novel video segmentation system using point tracking and contour formation techniques. Inspired by the results from the study of the human visual system, we intend to solve the video segmentation problem into three separate phases: user-assisted feature points selection, feature points' automatic tracking, and contour formation. This splitting relieves the computer of ill-posed automatic segmentation problems, and allows a higher level of flexibility of the method. First, the precise feature points can be found using a combination of user assistance and an eigenvalue-based adjustment. Second, the feature points in the remaining frames are obtained using motion estimation and point refinement. At last, contour formation is used to extract the object, and plus a point insertion process to provide the feature points for next frame's tracking.

  17. Region-of-interest determination and bit-rate conversion for H.264 video transcoding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Huang, Shu-Fen; Chen, Mei-Juan; Tai, Kuang-Han; Li, Mian-Shiuan

    2013-12-01

    This paper presents a video bit-rate transcoder for baseline profile in H.264/AVC standard to fit the available channel bandwidth for the client when transmitting video bit-streams via communication channels. To maintain visual quality for low bit-rate video efficiently, this study analyzes the decoded information in the transcoder and proposes a Bayesian theorem-based region-of-interest (ROI) determination algorithm. In addition, a curve fitting scheme is employed to find the models of video bit-rate conversion. The transcoded video will conform to the target bit-rate by re-quantization according to our proposed models. After integrating the ROI detection method and the bit-rate transcoding models, the ROI-based transcoder allocates more coding bits to ROI regions and reduces the complexity of the re-encoding procedure for non-ROI regions. Hence, it not only keeps the coding quality but improves the efficiency of the video transcoding for low target bit-rates and makes the real-time transcoding more practical. Experimental results show that the proposed framework gets significantly better visual quality.

  18. Presentation of 3D Scenes Through Video Example.

    PubMed

    Baldacci, Andrea; Ganovelli, Fabio; Corsini, Massimiliano; Scopigno, Roberto

    2017-09-01

    Using synthetic videos to present a 3D scene is a common requirement for architects, designers, engineers or Cultural Heritage professionals however it is usually time consuming and, in order to obtain high quality results, the support of a film maker/computer animation expert is necessary. We introduce an alternative approach that takes the 3D scene of interest and an example video as input, and automatically produces a video of the input scene that resembles the given video example. In other words, our algorithm allows the user to "replicate" an existing video, on a different 3D scene. We build on the intuition that a video sequence of a static environment is strongly characterized by its optical flow, or, in other words, that two videos are similar if their optical flows are similar. We therefore recast the problem as producing a video of the input scene whose optical flow is similar to the optical flow of the input video. Our intuition is supported by a user-study specifically designed to verify this statement. We have successfully tested our approach on several scenes and input videos, some of which are reported in the accompanying material of this paper.

  19. Use of FEC coding to improve statistical multiplexing performance for video transport over ATM networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kurceren, Ragip; Modestino, James W.

    1998-12-01

    The use of forward error-control (FEC) coding, possibly in conjunction with ARQ techniques, has emerged as a promising approach for video transport over ATM networks for cell-loss recovery and/or bit error correction, such as might be required for wireless links. Although FEC provides cell-loss recovery capabilities it also introduces transmission overhead which can possibly cause additional cell losses. A methodology is described to maximize the number of video sources multiplexed at a given quality of service (QoS), measured in terms of decoded cell loss probability, using interlaced FEC codes. The transport channel is modelled as a block interference channel (BIC) and the multiplexer as single server, deterministic service, finite buffer supporting N users. Based upon an information-theoretic characterization of the BIC and large deviation bounds on the buffer overflow probability, the described methodology provides theoretically achievable upper limits on the number of sources multiplexed. Performance of specific coding techniques using interlaced nonbinary Reed-Solomon (RS) codes and binary rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes is illustrated.

  20. Network-aware scalable video monitoring system for emergency situations with operator-managed fidelity control

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Al Hadhrami, Tawfik; Nightingale, James M.; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos

    2014-05-01

    In emergency situations, the ability to remotely monitor unfolding events using high-quality video feeds will significantly improve the incident commander's understanding of the situation and thereby aids effective decision making. This paper presents a novel, adaptive video monitoring system for emergency situations where the normal communications network infrastructure has been severely impaired or is no longer operational. The proposed scheme, operating over a rapidly deployable wireless mesh network, supports real-time video feeds between first responders, forward operating bases and primary command and control centers. Video feeds captured on portable devices carried by first responders and by static visual sensors are encoded in H.264/SVC, the scalable extension to H.264/AVC, allowing efficient, standard-based temporal, spatial, and quality scalability of the video. A three-tier video delivery system is proposed, which balances the need to avoid overuse of mesh nodes with the operational requirements of the emergency management team. In the first tier, the video feeds are delivered at a low spatial and temporal resolution employing only the base layer of the H.264/SVC video stream. Routing in this mode is designed to employ all nodes across the entire mesh network. In the second tier, whenever operational considerations require that commanders or operators focus on a particular video feed, a `fidelity control' mechanism at the monitoring station sends control messages to the routing and scheduling agents in the mesh network, which increase the quality of the received picture using SNR scalability while conserving bandwidth by maintaining a low frame rate. In this mode, routing decisions are based on reliable packet delivery with the most reliable routes being used to deliver the base and lower enhancement layers; as fidelity is increased and more scalable layers are transmitted they will be assigned to routes in descending order of reliability. The third tier

  1. Practical, Real-Time, and Robust Watermarking on the Spatial Domain for High-Definition Video Contents

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kim, Kyung-Su; Lee, Hae-Yeoun; Im, Dong-Hyuck; Lee, Heung-Kyu

    Commercial markets employ digital right management (DRM) systems to protect valuable high-definition (HD) quality videos. DRM system uses watermarking to provide copyright protection and ownership authentication of multimedia contents. We propose a real-time video watermarking scheme for HD video in the uncompressed domain. Especially, our approach is in aspect of practical perspectives to satisfy perceptual quality, real-time processing, and robustness requirements. We simplify and optimize human visual system mask for real-time performance and also apply dithering technique for invisibility. Extensive experiments are performed to prove that the proposed scheme satisfies the invisibility, real-time processing, and robustness requirements against video processing attacks. We concentrate upon video processing attacks that commonly occur in HD quality videos to display on portable devices. These attacks include not only scaling and low bit-rate encoding, but also malicious attacks such as format conversion and frame rate change.

  2. Feasibility study of utilizing ultraportable projectors for endoscopic video display (with videos).

    PubMed

    Tang, Shou-Jiang; Fehring, Amanda; Mclemore, Mac; Griswold, Michael; Wang, Wanmei; Paine, Elizabeth R; Wu, Ruonan; To, Filip

    2014-10-01

    Modern endoscopy requires video display. Recent miniaturized, ultraportable projectors are affordable, durable, and offer quality image display. Explore feasibility of using ultraportable projectors in endoscopy. Prospective bench-top comparison; clinical feasibility study. Masked comparison study of images displayed via 2 Samsung ultraportable light-emitting diode projectors (pocket-sized SP-HO3; pico projector SP-P410M) and 1 Microvision Showwx-II Laser pico projector. BENCH-TOP FEASIBILITY STUDY: Prerecorded endoscopic video was streamed via computer. CLINICAL COMPARISON STUDY: Live high-definition endoscopy video was simultaneously displayed through each processor onto a standard liquid crystal display monitor and projected onto a portable, pull-down projection screen. Endoscopists, endoscopy nurses, and technicians rated video images; ratings were analyzed by linear mixed-effects regression models with random intercepts. All projectors were easy to set up, adjust, focus, and operate, with no real-time lapse for any. Bench-top study outcomes: Samsung pico preferred to Laser pico, overall rating 1.5 units higher (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.7-2.4), P < .001; Samsung pocket preferred to Laser pico, 3.3 units higher (95% CI = 2.4-4.1), P < .001; Samsung pocket preferred to Samsung pico, 1.7 units higher (95% CI = 0.9-2.5), P < .001. The clinical comparison study confirmed the Samsung pocket projector as best, with a higher overall rating of 2.3 units (95% CI = 1.6-3.0), P < .001, than Samsung pico. Low brightness currently limits pico projector use in clinical endoscopy. The pocket projector, with higher brightness levels (170 lumens), is clinically useful. Continued improvements to ultraportable projectors will supply a needed niche in endoscopy through portability, reduced cost, and equal or better image quality. © The Author(s) 2013.

  3. Virtual viewpoint synthesis in multi-view video system

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Fang; Yang, Shiqiang

    2005-07-01

    In this paper, we present a virtual viewpoint video synthesis algorithm to satisfy the following three aims: low computing consuming; real time interpolation and acceptable video quality. In contrast with previous technologies, this method obtain incompletely 3D structure using neighbor video sources instead of getting total 3D information with all video sources, so that the computation is reduced greatly. So we demonstrate our interactive multi-view video synthesis algorithm in a personal computer. Furthermore, adopting the method of choosing feature points to build the correspondence between the frames captured by neighbor cameras, we need not require camera calibration. Finally, our method can be used when the angle between neighbor cameras is 25-30 degrees that it is much larger than common computer vision experiments. In this way, our method can be applied into many applications such as sports live, video conference, etc.

  4. A Novel Approach to High Definition, High-Contrast Video Capture in Abdominal Surgery

    PubMed Central

    Cosman, Peter H.; Shearer, Christopher J.; Hugh, Thomas J.; Biankin, Andrew V.; Merrett, Neil D.

    2007-01-01

    Objective: The aim of this study was to define the best available option for video capture of surgical procedures for educational and archival purposes, with a view to identifying methods of capturing high-quality footage and identifying common pitfalls. Summary Background Data: Several options exist for those who wish to record operative surgical techniques on video. While high-end equipment is an unnecessary expense for most surgical units, several techniques are readily available that do not require industrial-grade audiovisual recording facilities, but not all are suited to every surgical application. Methods: We surveyed and evaluated the available technology for video capture in surgery. Our evaluation included analyses of video resolution, depth of field, contrast, exposure, image stability, and frame composition, as well as considerations of cost, accessibility, utility, feasibility, and economies of scale. Results: Several video capture options were identified, and the strengths and shortcomings of each were catalogued. None of the commercially available options was deemed suitable for high-quality video capture of abdominal surgical procedures. A novel application of off-the-shelf technology was devised to address these issues. Conclusions: Excellent quality video capture of surgical procedures within deep body cavities is feasible using commonly available equipment and technology, with minimal technical difficulty. PMID:17414600

  5. An Attention-Information-Based Spatial Adaptation Framework for Browsing Videos via Mobile Devices

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Li, Houqiang; Wang, Yi; Chen, Chang Wen

    2007-12-01

    With the growing popularity of personal digital assistant devices and smart phones, more and more consumers are becoming quite enthusiastic to appreciate videos via mobile devices. However, limited display size of the mobile devices has been imposing significant barriers for users to enjoy browsing high-resolution videos. In this paper, we present an attention-information-based spatial adaptation framework to address this problem. The whole framework includes two major parts: video content generation and video adaptation system. During video compression, the attention information in video sequences will be detected using an attention model and embedded into bitstreams with proposed supplement-enhanced information (SEI) structure. Furthermore, we also develop an innovative scheme to adaptively adjust quantization parameters in order to simultaneously improve the quality of overall encoding and the quality of transcoding the attention areas. When the high-resolution bitstream is transmitted to mobile users, a fast transcoding algorithm we developed earlier will be applied to generate a new bitstream for attention areas in frames. The new low-resolution bitstream containing mostly attention information, instead of the high-resolution one, will be sent to users for display on the mobile devices. Experimental results show that the proposed spatial adaptation scheme is able to improve both subjective and objective video qualities.

  6. Design of video interface conversion system based on FPGA

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhao, Heng; Wang, Xiang-jun

    2014-11-01

    This paper presents a FPGA based video interface conversion system that enables the inter-conversion between digital and analog video. Cyclone IV series EP4CE22F17C chip from Altera Corporation is used as the main video processing chip, and single-chip is used as the information interaction control unit between FPGA and PC. The system is able to encode/decode messages from the PC. Technologies including video decoding/encoding circuits, bus communication protocol, data stream de-interleaving and de-interlacing, color space conversion and the Camera Link timing generator module of FPGA are introduced. The system converts Composite Video Broadcast Signal (CVBS) from the CCD camera into Low Voltage Differential Signaling (LVDS), which will be collected by the video processing unit with Camera Link interface. The processed video signals will then be inputted to system output board and displayed on the monitor.The current experiment shows that it can achieve high-quality video conversion with minimum board size.

  7. Two-terminal video coding.

    PubMed

    Yang, Yang; Stanković, Vladimir; Xiong, Zixiang; Zhao, Wei

    2009-03-01

    Following recent works on the rate region of the quadratic Gaussian two-terminal source coding problem and limit-approaching code designs, this paper examines multiterminal source coding of two correlated, i.e., stereo, video sequences to save the sum rate over independent coding of both sequences. Two multiterminal video coding schemes are proposed. In the first scheme, the left sequence of the stereo pair is coded by H.264/AVC and used at the joint decoder to facilitate Wyner-Ziv coding of the right video sequence. The first I-frame of the right sequence is successively coded by H.264/AVC Intracoding and Wyner-Ziv coding. An efficient stereo matching algorithm based on loopy belief propagation is then adopted at the decoder to produce pixel-level disparity maps between the corresponding frames of the two decoded video sequences on the fly. Based on the disparity maps, side information for both motion vectors and motion-compensated residual frames of the right sequence are generated at the decoder before Wyner-Ziv encoding. In the second scheme, source splitting is employed on top of classic and Wyner-Ziv coding for compression of both I-frames to allow flexible rate allocation between the two sequences. Experiments with both schemes on stereo video sequences using H.264/AVC, LDPC codes for Slepian-Wolf coding of the motion vectors, and scalar quantization in conjunction with LDPC codes for Wyner-Ziv coding of the residual coefficients give a slightly lower sum rate than separate H.264/AVC coding of both sequences at the same video quality.

  8. Tele-Education: Teaching over the Telephone with Slow-Scan Video.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Kelleher, Kathleen

    1983-01-01

    This report describes educational applications of slow-scan television (SSTV) teleconferencing, which uses a video signal generated from a standard, low-cost, industrial television camera and compressed to a bandwidth suitable for transmission over telephone lines. Following a brief explanation of the capabilities of SSTV and the required…

  9. Resolution enhancement of low-quality videos using a high-resolution frame

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Pham, Tuan Q.; van Vliet, Lucas J.; Schutte, Klamer

    2006-01-01

    This paper proposes an example-based Super-Resolution (SR) algorithm of compressed videos in the Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) domain. Input to the system is a Low-Resolution (LR) compressed video together with a High-Resolution (HR) still image of similar content. Using a training set of corresponding LR-HR pairs of image patches from the HR still image, high-frequency details are transferred from the HR source to the LR video. The DCT-domain algorithm is much faster than example-based SR in spatial domain 6 because of a reduction in search dimensionality, which is a direct result of the compact and uncorrelated DCT representation. Fast searching techniques like tree-structure vector quantization 16 and coherence search1 are also key to the improved efficiency. Preliminary results on MJPEG sequence show promising result of the DCT-domain SR synthesis approach.

  10. Iterative Refinement of Transmission Map for Stereo Image Defogging Using a Dual Camera Sensor.

    PubMed

    Kim, Heegwang; Park, Jinho; Park, Hasil; Paik, Joonki

    2017-12-09

    Recently, the stereo imaging-based image enhancement approach has attracted increasing attention in the field of video analysis. This paper presents a dual camera-based stereo image defogging algorithm. Optical flow is first estimated from the stereo foggy image pair, and the initial disparity map is generated from the estimated optical flow. Next, an initial transmission map is generated using the initial disparity map. Atmospheric light is then estimated using the color line theory. The defogged result is finally reconstructed using the estimated transmission map and atmospheric light. The proposed method can refine the transmission map iteratively. Experimental results show that the proposed method can successfully remove fog without color distortion. The proposed method can be used as a pre-processing step for an outdoor video analysis system and a high-end smartphone with a dual camera system.

  11. Iterative Refinement of Transmission Map for Stereo Image Defogging Using a Dual Camera Sensor

    PubMed Central

    Park, Jinho; Park, Hasil

    2017-01-01

    Recently, the stereo imaging-based image enhancement approach has attracted increasing attention in the field of video analysis. This paper presents a dual camera-based stereo image defogging algorithm. Optical flow is first estimated from the stereo foggy image pair, and the initial disparity map is generated from the estimated optical flow. Next, an initial transmission map is generated using the initial disparity map. Atmospheric light is then estimated using the color line theory. The defogged result is finally reconstructed using the estimated transmission map and atmospheric light. The proposed method can refine the transmission map iteratively. Experimental results show that the proposed method can successfully remove fog without color distortion. The proposed method can be used as a pre-processing step for an outdoor video analysis system and a high-end smartphone with a dual camera system. PMID:29232826

  12. Real-time unmanned aircraft systems surveillance video mosaicking using GPU

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Camargo, Aldo; Anderson, Kyle; Wang, Yi; Schultz, Richard R.; Fevig, Ronald A.

    2010-04-01

    Digital video mosaicking from Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) is being used for many military and civilian applications, including surveillance, target recognition, border protection, forest fire monitoring, traffic control on highways, monitoring of transmission lines, among others. Additionally, NASA is using digital video mosaicking to explore the moon and planets such as Mars. In order to compute a "good" mosaic from video captured by a UAS, the algorithm must deal with motion blur, frame-to-frame jitter associated with an imperfectly stabilized platform, perspective changes as the camera tilts in flight, as well as a number of other factors. The most suitable algorithms use SIFT (Scale-Invariant Feature Transform) to detect the features consistent between video frames. Utilizing these features, the next step is to estimate the homography between two consecutives video frames, perform warping to properly register the image data, and finally blend the video frames resulting in a seamless video mosaick. All this processing takes a great deal of resources of resources from the CPU, so it is almost impossible to compute a real time video mosaic on a single processor. Modern graphics processing units (GPUs) offer computational performance that far exceeds current CPU technology, allowing for real-time operation. This paper presents the development of a GPU-accelerated digital video mosaicking implementation and compares it with CPU performance. Our tests are based on two sets of real video captured by a small UAS aircraft; one video comes from Infrared (IR) and Electro-Optical (EO) cameras. Our results show that we can obtain a speed-up of more than 50 times using GPU technology, so real-time operation at a video capture of 30 frames per second is feasible.

  13. Viewers' perceptions of a YouTube music therapy session video.

    PubMed

    Gregory, Dianne; Gooding, Lori G

    2013-01-01

    Recent research revealed diverse content and varying levels of quality in YouTube music therapy videos and prompted questions about viewers' discrimination abilities. This study compares ratings of a YouTube music therapy session video by viewers with different levels of music therapy expertise to determine video elements related to perceptions of representational quality. Eighty-one participants included 25 novices (freshmen and sophomores in an introductory music therapy course), 25 pre-interns (seniors and equivalency students who had completed all core Music Therapy courses), 26 professionals (MT-BC or MT-BC eligibility) with a mean of 1.75 years of experience, and an expert panel of 5 MT-BC professionals with a mean of 11 years of experience in special education. After viewing a music therapy special education video that in previous research met basic competency criteria and professional standards of the American Music Therapy Association, participants completed a 16-item questionnaire. Novices' ratings were more positive (less discriminating) compared to experienced viewers' neutral or negative ratings. Statistical analysis (ANOVA) of novice, pre-intern, and professional ratings of all items revealed significant differences p, .05) for specific therapy content and for a global rating of representational quality. Experienced viewers' ratings were similar to the expert panel's ratings. Content analysis of viewers' reasons for their representational quality ratings corroborated ratings of therapy-specific content. A video that combines and clearly depicts therapy objectives, client improvement, and the effectiveness of music within a therapeutic intervention best represent the music therapy profession in a public social platform like YouTube.

  14. National Plant Diagnostic Network, Taxonomic training videos: Introduction to Aphids - Part 1

    USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

    Training is a critical part of aphid (Hemiptera: Aphididae) identification. This video provides visual instruction on important subject areas for aphid examination and identification. Aphid topics such as classification, morphology, plant disease transmission, and references are discussed. This dis...

  15. Video coding for 3D-HEVC based on saliency information

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yu, Fang; An, Ping; Yang, Chao; You, Zhixiang; Shen, Liquan

    2016-11-01

    As an extension of High Efficiency Video Coding ( HEVC), 3D-HEVC has been widely researched under the impetus of the new generation coding standard in recent years. Compared with H.264/AVC, its compression efficiency is doubled while keeping the same video quality. However, its higher encoding complexity and longer encoding time are not negligible. To reduce the computational complexity and guarantee the subjective quality of virtual views, this paper presents a novel video coding method for 3D-HEVC based on the saliency informat ion which is an important part of Human Visual System (HVS). First of all, the relationship between the current coding unit and its adjacent units is used to adjust the maximum depth of each largest coding unit (LCU) and determine the SKIP mode reasonably. Then, according to the saliency informat ion of each frame image, the texture and its corresponding depth map will be divided into three regions, that is, salient area, middle area and non-salient area. Afterwards, d ifferent quantization parameters will be assigned to different regions to conduct low complexity coding. Finally, the compressed video will generate new view point videos through the renderer tool. As shown in our experiments, the proposed method saves more bit rate than other approaches and achieves up to highest 38% encoding time reduction without subjective quality loss in compression or rendering.

  16. Video streaming with SHVC to HEVC transcoding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gudumasu, Srinivas; He, Yuwen; Ye, Yan; Xiu, Xiaoyu

    2015-09-01

    This paper proposes an efficient Scalable High efficiency Video Coding (SHVC) to High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) transcoder, which can reduce the transcoding complexity significantly, and provide a desired trade-off between the transcoding complexity and the transcoded video quality. To reduce the transcoding complexity, some of coding information, such as coding unit (CU) depth, prediction mode, merge mode, motion vector information, intra direction information and transform unit (TU) depth information, in the SHVC bitstream are mapped and transcoded to single layer HEVC bitstream. One major difficulty in transcoding arises when trying to reuse the motion information from SHVC bitstream since motion vectors referring to inter-layer reference (ILR) pictures cannot be reused directly in transcoding. Reusing motion information obtained from ILR pictures for those prediction units (PUs) will reduce the complexity of the SHVC transcoder greatly but a significant reduction in the quality of the picture is observed. Pictures corresponding to the intra refresh pictures in the base layer (BL) will be coded as P pictures in enhancement layer (EL) in the SHVC bitstream; and directly reusing the intra information from the BL for transcoding will not get a good coding efficiency. To solve these problems, various transcoding technologies are proposed. The proposed technologies offer different trade-offs between transcoding speed and transcoding quality. They are implemented on the basis of reference software SHM-6.0 and HM-14.0 for the two layer spatial scalability configuration. Simulations show that the proposed SHVC software transcoder reduces the transcoding complexity by up to 98-99% using low complexity transcoding mode when compared with cascaded re-encoding method. The transcoder performance at various bitrates with different transcoding modes are compared in terms of transcoding speed and transcoded video quality.

  17. Temporal flicker reduction and denoising in video using sparse directional transforms

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kanumuri, Sandeep; Guleryuz, Onur G.; Civanlar, M. Reha; Fujibayashi, Akira; Boon, Choong S.

    2008-08-01

    The bulk of the video content available today over the Internet and over mobile networks suffers from many imperfections caused during acquisition and transmission. In the case of user-generated content, which is typically produced with inexpensive equipment, these imperfections manifest in various ways through noise, temporal flicker and blurring, just to name a few. Imperfections caused by compression noise and temporal flicker are present in both studio-produced and user-generated video content transmitted at low bit-rates. In this paper, we introduce an algorithm designed to reduce temporal flicker and noise in video sequences. The algorithm takes advantage of the sparse nature of video signals in an appropriate transform domain that is chosen adaptively based on local signal statistics. When the signal corresponds to a sparse representation in this transform domain, flicker and noise, which are spread over the entire domain, can be reduced easily by enforcing sparsity. Our results show that the proposed algorithm reduces flicker and noise significantly and enables better presentation of compressed videos.

  18. Portable and wide-range solid-state transmission densitometer for quality control in film radiography

    PubMed Central

    Aramburo, Javier Morales; Gonzalez, Sigifredo Solano; Toledo, Jorge Toledo

    2010-01-01

    In biology, materials science, radiography quality control or film dosimetry in radiotherapy, a transmission densitometer is useful for measurements of optical density. The design proposed here is oriented to quality control in radiographic films. The instrument described here utilizes low-cost solid-state devices and is easy to construct. The use of 1-watt white light-emitting diode in this densitometer enables low power consumption and a cold light source. Moreover, the instrument does not need a reference light, which results in decreasing the number of parts and reducing the overall size of the apparatus. PMID:20927222

  19. Testing the Effects of the Addition of Videos to a Website Promoting Environmental Breast Cancer Risk Reduction Practices: Are Videos Worth It?

    PubMed Central

    Perrault, Evan K.; Silk, Kami J.

    2013-01-01

    Searching for ways to reach wider audiences in more comprehensible ways, health promotion agencies might add videos to their current web offerings. While potentially costly and time consuming to create, the effect of these videos on websites has not received much attention. This study translated research about the potential breast cancer risk for young girls associated with the household chemical PFOA into two websites mothers with young daughters were randomly assigned to view (website with videos vs. website without videos). Results revealed participants in the video condition found the advocated risk protective behaviors easier to perform and stated they were more likely to perform them than those in the non-video condition. Approximately 15 days after exposure, those in the video condition performed on average one more protective behavior than those in the non-video condition. Results also suggest that agencies’ efforts should focus on creating one quality video to place on a homepage, as video views declined the deeper people navigated into the site. Behaviors advocated should also be ones that can have lasting impacts with one-time actions, as effects wore away over time. Additional strategies are discussed for health promoters seeking to create videos to add to their current websites. PMID:25143661

  20. Teaching Corporate Culture Using Interactive Video Training.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Gardner, P. R.

    The Westinghouse Hanford Company Total Quality Program includes the development of Hanford General Employee Training (HGET), an interactive video course. The commitment to total quality is developed in both new and requalifying employees by requiring them to make positive choices when confronted with real life scenarios showing violations of…

  1. High Resolution, High Frame Rate Video Technology

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1990-01-01

    Papers and working group summaries presented at the High Resolution, High Frame Rate Video (HHV) Workshop are compiled. HHV system is intended for future use on the Space Shuttle and Space Station Freedom. The Workshop was held for the dual purpose of: (1) allowing potential scientific users to assess the utility of the proposed system for monitoring microgravity science experiments; and (2) letting technical experts from industry recommend improvements to the proposed near-term HHV system. The following topics are covered: (1) State of the art in the video system performance; (2) Development plan for the HHV system; (3) Advanced technology for image gathering, coding, and processing; (4) Data compression applied to HHV; (5) Data transmission networks; and (6) Results of the users' requirements survey conducted by NASA.

  2. Digital video technologies and their network requirements

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    R. P. Tsang; H. Y. Chen; J. M. Brandt

    1999-11-01

    Coded digital video signals are considered to be one of the most difficult data types to transport due to their real-time requirements and high bit rate variability. In this study, the authors discuss the coding mechanisms incorporated by the major compression standards bodies, i.e., JPEG and MPEG, as well as more advanced coding mechanisms such as wavelet and fractal techniques. The relationship between the applications which use these coding schemes and their network requirements are the major focus of this study. Specifically, the authors relate network latency, channel transmission reliability, random access speed, buffering and network bandwidth with the variousmore » coding techniques as a function of the applications which use them. Such applications include High-Definition Television, Video Conferencing, Computer-Supported Collaborative Work (CSCW), and Medical Imaging.« less

  3. YouTube videos as a source of medical information during the Ebola hemorrhagic fever epidemic.

    PubMed

    Nagpal, Sajan Jiv Singh; Karimianpour, Ahmadreza; Mukhija, Dhruvika; Mohan, Diwakar; Brateanu, Andrei

    2015-01-01

    The content and quality of medical information available on video sharing websites such as YouTube is not known. We analyzed the source and quality of medical information about Ebola hemorrhagic fever (EHF) disseminated on YouTube and the video characteristics that influence viewer behavior. An inquiry for the search term 'Ebola' was made on YouTube. The first 100 results were arranged in decreasing order of "relevance" using the default YouTube algorithm. Videos 1-50 and 51-100 were allocated to a high relevance (HR), and a low relevance (LR) video group, respectively. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to assess the predictors of a video being included in the HR vs. LR groups. Fourteen videos were excluded because they were parodies, songs or stand-up comedies (n = 11), not in English (n = 2) or a remaining part of a previous video (n = 1). Two scales, the video information and quality and index and the medical information and content index (MICI) assessed the overall quality, and the medical content of the videos, respectively. There were no videos from hospitals or academic medical centers. Videos in the HR group had a higher median number of views (186,705 vs. 43,796, p < 0.001), more 'likes' (1119 vs. 224, p < 0.001), channel subscriptions (208 vs. 32, p < 0.001), and 'shares' (519 vs. 98, p < 0.001). Multivariable logistic regression showed that only the 'clinical symptoms' component of the MICI scale was associated with a higher likelihood of a video being included in the HR vs. LR group.(OR 1.86, 95 % CI 1.06-3.28, p = 0.03). YouTube videos presenting clinical symptoms of infectious diseases during epidemics are more likely to be included in the HR group and influence viewers behavior.

  4. Scalable gastroscopic video summarization via similar-inhibition dictionary selection.

    PubMed

    Wang, Shuai; Cong, Yang; Cao, Jun; Yang, Yunsheng; Tang, Yandong; Zhao, Huaici; Yu, Haibin

    2016-01-01

    This paper aims at developing an automated gastroscopic video summarization algorithm to assist clinicians to more effectively go through the abnormal contents of the video. To select the most representative frames from the original video sequence, we formulate the problem of gastroscopic video summarization as a dictionary selection issue. Different from the traditional dictionary selection methods, which take into account only the number and reconstruction ability of selected key frames, our model introduces the similar-inhibition constraint to reinforce the diversity of selected key frames. We calculate the attention cost by merging both gaze and content change into a prior cue to help select the frames with more high-level semantic information. Moreover, we adopt an image quality evaluation process to eliminate the interference of the poor quality images and a segmentation process to reduce the computational complexity. For experiments, we build a new gastroscopic video dataset captured from 30 volunteers with more than 400k images and compare our method with the state-of-the-arts using the content consistency, index consistency and content-index consistency with the ground truth. Compared with all competitors, our method obtains the best results in 23 of 30 videos evaluated based on content consistency, 24 of 30 videos evaluated based on index consistency and all videos evaluated based on content-index consistency. For gastroscopic video summarization, we propose an automated annotation method via similar-inhibition dictionary selection. Our model can achieve better performance compared with other state-of-the-art models and supplies more suitable key frames for diagnosis. The developed algorithm can be automatically adapted to various real applications, such as the training of young clinicians, computer-aided diagnosis or medical report generation. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  5. Experimental design and analysis of JND test on coded image/video

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lin, Joe Yuchieh; Jin, Lina; Hu, Sudeng; Katsavounidis, Ioannis; Li, Zhi; Aaron, Anne; Kuo, C.-C. Jay

    2015-09-01

    The visual Just-Noticeable-Difference (JND) metric is characterized by the detectable minimum amount of two visual stimuli. Conducting the subjective JND test is a labor-intensive task. In this work, we present a novel interactive method in performing the visual JND test on compressed image/video. JND has been used to enhance perceptual visual quality in the context of image/video compression. Given a set of coding parameters, a JND test is designed to determine the distinguishable quality level against a reference image/video, which is called the anchor. The JND metric can be used to save coding bitrates by exploiting the special characteristics of the human visual system. The proposed JND test is conducted using a binary-forced choice, which is often adopted to discriminate the difference in perception in a psychophysical experiment. The assessors are asked to compare coded image/video pairs and determine whether they are of the same quality or not. A bisection procedure is designed to find the JND locations so as to reduce the required number of comparisons over a wide range of bitrates. We will demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed JND test, report experimental results on the image and video JND tests.

  6. Deriving video content type from HEVC bitstream semantics

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nightingale, James; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos; Goma, Sergio R.

    2014-05-01

    As network service providers seek to improve customer satisfaction and retention levels, they are increasingly moving from traditional quality of service (QoS) driven delivery models to customer-centred quality of experience (QoE) delivery models. QoS models only consider metrics derived from the network however, QoE models also consider metrics derived from within the video sequence itself. Various spatial and temporal characteristics of a video sequence have been proposed, both individually and in combination, to derive methods of classifying video content either on a continuous scale or as a set of discrete classes. QoE models can be divided into three broad categories, full reference, reduced reference and no-reference models. Due to the need to have the original video available at the client for comparison, full reference metrics are of limited practical value in adaptive real-time video applications. Reduced reference metrics often require metadata to be transmitted with the bitstream, while no-reference metrics typically operate in the decompressed domain at the client side and require significant processing to extract spatial and temporal features. This paper proposes a heuristic, no-reference approach to video content classification which is specific to HEVC encoded bitstreams. The HEVC encoder already makes use of spatial characteristics to determine partitioning of coding units and temporal characteristics to determine the splitting of prediction units. We derive a function which approximates the spatio-temporal characteristics of the video sequence by using the weighted averages of the depth at which the coding unit quadtree is split and the prediction mode decision made by the encoder to estimate spatial and temporal characteristics respectively. Since the video content type of a sequence is determined by using high level information parsed from the video stream, spatio-temporal characteristics are identified without the need for full decoding and can

  7. Otoplasty Online Information: A Comprehensive Analysis of the Websites and Videos that Patients View Regarding Cosmetic Ear Surgery.

    PubMed

    Nissan, Michael E; Gupta, Amar; Rayess, Hani; Black, Kevin Z; Carron, Michael

    2018-02-01

    Physicians should be aware of both websites and videos available online regarding the otoplasty procedure to provide quality care. This study systematically analyzes the authorships, reliability, quality, and readability of the websites, as well as the authorships and primary objectives of the videos regarding otoplasty. Validated instruments were used to analyze the reliability, quality, and readability of websites, and videos were systematically categorized and analyzed. A Google search was conducted, and the first five pages of results were included in this study. After excluding unrelated websites, the remaining 44 websites were categorized by authorship (physician, patient, academic, or unaffiliated) and were analyzed using the validated DISCERN instrument for reliability and quality, as well as various other validated instruments to measure readability. A YouTube search was also conducted, and the first 50 relevant videos were included in the study. These videos were categorized by authorship and their primary objective. Website authorships were physician-dominated. Reliability, quality, and overall DISCERN score differ between the four authorship groups by a statistically significant margin (Kruskall-Wallis test, p  < 0.05). Unaffiliated websites were the most reliable, and physician websites were the least reliable. Academic websites were of the highest quality, and patient websites were of the lowest quality. Readability did not differ significantly between the groups, though the readability measurements made showed a general lack of material easily readable by the general public. YouTube was likewise dominated by physician-authored videos. While the physician-authored videos sought mainly to inform and to advertise, patient-authored videos sought mainly to provide the patient's perspective. Academic organizations showed very little representation on YouTube, and the YouTube views on otoplasty videos were dominated by the top 20 videos, which

  8. Assessment of satellite communications quality study. Addendum 1: Impact of propagation delay on data transmission

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Campanella, S. J.; Chitre, D. M.

    1988-01-01

    The single factor that irrevocably distinguishes geostationary satellite telephony transmission from terrestrial transmission is the greater propagation delay over satellite links. This difference has always provoked vigorous debate over the impact of delay on the subscribers using services incorporating satellite links. The issue is addressed from a variety of directions including human factors studies, laboratory subjective tests that evaluate delay with and without echo, and field tests that obtain data on the opinion of subscribers regarding the quality of service of operational circuits in both national U.S. domestic and international trans-Atlantic network. The tests involved the use of both echo suppressors and echo cancellers.

  9. Record Desktop Activity as Streaming Videos for Asynchronous, Video-Based Collaborative Learning.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Chang, Chih-Kai

    As Web-based courses using videos have become popular in recent years, the issue of managing audiovisual aids has become noteworthy. The contents of audiovisual aids may include a lecture, an interview, a featurette, an experiment, etc. The audiovisual aids of Web-based courses are transformed into the streaming format that can make the quality of…

  10. 78 FR 52195 - Announcement of Requirements and Registration for “Healthy Young America Video Contest”

    Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

    2013-08-22

    ... Registration for ``Healthy Young America Video Contest'' AGENCY: Office of the Secretary, Assistant Secretary...-sponsoring the ``Healthy Young America'' Video Contest with two primary goals: First, directly reaching the uninsured population through video views and votes; and second, the production of high-quality videos that...

  11. Use of remote video microscopy (telepathology) as an adjunct to neurosurgical frozen section consultation.

    PubMed

    Becker, R L; Specht, C S; Jones, R; Rueda-Pedraza, M E; O'Leary, T J

    1993-08-01

    We investigated the use of remote video microscopy (telepathology) to assist in the diagnosis of 52 neurosurgical frozen section cases. The TelMed system (Discovery Medical Systems, Overland Park, KS), in which the referring pathologist selects appropriate fields for transmission to the consultant, was used for the study. There was a high degree of concordance between the diagnosis rendered on the basis of transmitted video images and that rendered on the basis of direct evaluation of frozen sections; however, in seven cases there was substantial disagreement. Remote evaluation was associated with a more rapid consultation from the standpoint of the consultant, who spent approximately 2 minutes less per case when using remote microscopy; this was achieved at the expense of considerably greater effort on the part of the referring pathologist, who spent approximately 16 minutes per case selecting an average of 4.5 images for transmission to the consultant. The use of remote video microscopy for pathology consultation is associated with a complex series of tradeoffs involving cost, information loss, and timeliness of consultation.

  12. Exploiting spatio-temporal characteristics of human vision for mobile video applications

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jillani, Rashad; Kalva, Hari

    2008-08-01

    Video applications on handheld devices such as smart phones pose a significant challenge to achieve high quality user experience. Recent advances in processor and wireless networking technology are producing a new class of multimedia applications (e.g. video streaming) for mobile handheld devices. These devices are light weight and have modest sizes, and therefore very limited resources - lower processing power, smaller display resolution, lesser memory, and limited battery life as compared to desktop and laptop systems. Multimedia applications on the other hand have extensive processing requirements which make the mobile devices extremely resource hungry. In addition, the device specific properties (e.g. display screen) significantly influence the human perception of multimedia quality. In this paper we propose a saliency based framework that exploits the structure in content creation as well as the human vision system to find the salient points in the incoming bitstream and adapt it according to the target device, thus improving the quality of new adapted area around salient points. Our experimental results indicate that the adaptation process that is cognizant of video content and user preferences can produce better perceptual quality video for mobile devices. Furthermore, we demonstrated how such a framework can affect user experience on a handheld device.

  13. Application of robust face recognition in video surveillance systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Zhang, De-xin; An, Peng; Zhang, Hao-xiang

    2018-03-01

    In this paper, we propose a video searching system that utilizes face recognition as searching indexing feature. As the applications of video cameras have great increase in recent years, face recognition makes a perfect fit for searching targeted individuals within the vast amount of video data. However, the performance of such searching depends on the quality of face images recorded in the video signals. Since the surveillance video cameras record videos without fixed postures for the object, face occlusion is very common in everyday video. The proposed system builds a model for occluded faces using fuzzy principal component analysis (FPCA), and reconstructs the human faces with the available information. Experimental results show that the system has very high efficiency in processing the real life videos, and it is very robust to various kinds of face occlusions. Hence it can relieve people reviewers from the front of the monitors and greatly enhances the efficiency as well. The proposed system has been installed and applied in various environments and has already demonstrated its power by helping solving real cases.

  14. Improving human object recognition performance using video enhancement techniques

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Whitman, Lucy S.; Lewis, Colin; Oakley, John P.

    2004-12-01

    Atmospheric scattering causes significant degradation in the quality of video images, particularly when imaging over long distances. The principle problem is the reduction in contrast due to scattered light. It is known that when the scattering particles are not too large compared with the imaging wavelength (i.e. Mie scattering) then high spatial resolution information may be contained within a low-contrast image. Unfortunately this information is not easily perceived by a human observer, particularly when using a standard video monitor. A secondary problem is the difficulty of achieving a sharp focus since automatic focus techniques tend to fail in such conditions. Recently several commercial colour video processing systems have become available. These systems use various techniques to improve image quality in low contrast conditions whilst retaining colour content. These systems produce improvements in subjective image quality in some situations, particularly in conditions of haze and light fog. There is also some evidence that video enhancement leads to improved ATR performance when used as a pre-processing stage. Psychological literature indicates that low contrast levels generally lead to a reduction in the performance of human observers in carrying out simple visual tasks. The aim of this paper is to present the results of an empirical study on object recognition in adverse viewing conditions. The chosen visual task was vehicle number plate recognition at long ranges (500 m and beyond). Two different commercial video enhancement systems are evaluated using the same protocol. The results show an increase in effective range with some differences between the different enhancement systems.

  15. National Plant Diagnostic Network, Taxonomic training videos: Introduction to Aphids - Part 2

    USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

    Training is a critical part of aphid (Hemiptera: Aphididae) identification. This video provides visual instruction on important subject areas for aphid regulatory issues. Here the subject of aphids as they relate to disease transmission, biology, identification, and pathways is addressed. Aphid topi...

  16. Adaptive compressed sensing of multi-view videos based on the sparsity estimation

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Yang, Senlin; Li, Xilong; Chong, Xin

    2017-11-01

    The conventional compressive sensing for videos based on the non-adaptive linear projections, and the measurement times is usually set empirically. As a result, the quality of videos reconstruction is always affected. Firstly, the block-based compressed sensing (BCS) with conventional selection for compressive measurements was described. Then an estimation method for the sparsity of multi-view videos was proposed based on the two dimensional discrete wavelet transform (2D DWT). With an energy threshold given beforehand, the DWT coefficients were processed with both energy normalization and sorting by descending order, and the sparsity of the multi-view video can be achieved by the proportion of dominant coefficients. And finally, the simulation result shows that, the method can estimate the sparsity of video frame effectively, and provides an active basis for the selection of compressive observation times. The result also shows that, since the selection of observation times is based on the sparsity estimated with the energy threshold provided, the proposed method can ensure the reconstruction quality of multi-view videos.

  17. Inservice Training of Primary Teachers Through Interactive Video Technology: An Indian Experience

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Maheshwari, A. N.; Raina, V. K.

    1998-01-01

    India has yet to achieve elementary education for all children. Among the centrally sponsored initiatives to improve education are Operation Blackboard, to provide sufficient teachers and buildings, Minimum Levels of Learning, which set achievement targets, and the Special Orientation Programme for Primary School Teachers (SOPT). This article focuses on the last of these and describes the new technology used to train teachers so that the losses in transmission inherent in the cascade model are avoided. Interactive Video Technology involving the Indira Gandhi Open University and the Indian Space Research Organisation was used experimentally in seven-day training courses for primary school teachers in 20 centres in Karnataka State, providing one-way video transmissions and telephone feedback to experts from the centres. The responses from teachers and their trainers indicate considerable potential for the exploitation of new technology where large numbers of teachers require training.

  18. Real-time attended home-polysomnography with telematic data transmission.

    PubMed

    Bruyneel, Marie; Van den Broecke, Sandra; Libert, Walter; Ninane, Vincent

    2013-08-01

    Home-polysomnography (HPSG) has been proposed as a cost-effective alternative for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) diagnosis. We assessed, in a feasibility study, whether telematic transmission using the Dream® and Sleepbox® technologies was associated with low HPSG failure rate. Patients referred by chest physicians for clinical suspicion of OSA underwent one HPSG, using Dream® and Sleepbox® (Medatec, Belgium), which is a wireless system able to communicate with Dream®, and with Internet through a wi-fi/3G interface. It is equipped with a digital infrared camera, and with a speaker/microphone system for bidirectional audio/video communication via Skype®. The Sleep Lab nurse performed a remote discontinuous monitoring of the PSG. In case of sensor loss, she called the patient who had been previously educated to replace the sensors. Twenty-one patients have been studied. 90% of the recordings were of excellent quality. We observed a 10% PSG failure rate: one failure of the Dream®, and one recording of poor quality. There were 2 successful Skype® interventions resulting in readjustment of the defective probes (nasal cannula and EEG). PSG signal visualization was possible in 90% of cases but Skype® connection was problematic in 19% of cases. However, patients could be reached by phone to solve the problem. Real-time attended HPSG through telematic data transmission is feasible and could be an interesting perspective to decrease the failure rate of home sleep studies, even if some technical aspects need to be improved. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  19. English-language videos on YouTube as a source of information on self-administer subcutaneous anti-tumour necrosis factor agent injections.

    PubMed

    Tolu, Sena; Yurdakul, Ozan Volkan; Basaran, Betul; Rezvani, Aylin

    2018-05-14

    The aim of this study was to evaluate the reliability, content, and quality of videos for patients available on YouTube for learning how to self-administer subcutaneous anti-tumour necrosis factor (TNF) injections. We searched for the terms Humira injection, Enbrel injection, Simponi injection, and Cimzia injection. Videos were categorised as useful information, misleading information, useful patient opinion, and misleading patient opinion by two physicians. Videos were rated for quality on a 5-point global quality scale (GQS; 1 = poor quality, 5 = excellent quality) and reliability and content using the 5-point DISCERN scale (higher scores represent greater reliability and more comprehensive videos). Of the 142 English videos, 24 (16.9%) videos were classified as useful information, 6 (4.2%) as misleading information, 47 (33.1%) as useful patient opinion, and 65 (45.8%) as misleading patient opinion. Useful videos were the most comprehensive and had the highest reliability and quality scores. The useful information and useful patient opinion videos had the highest numbers of views per day (median 8.32, IQR: 3.40-14.28 and 5.46, IQR: 3.06-14.44), as compared with 2.32, IQR: 1.63-6.26 for misleading information videos and 2.15, IQR: 1.17-7.43 for misleading patient opinion videos (p = 0.001). Almost all (91.5%) misleading videos were uploaded by individual users. There are a substantial number of English-language YouTube videos, with high quality, and rich content and reliability that can be sources of information on proper technique of anti-TNF self-injections. Physicians should direct patients to the reliable resources of information and educate them in online resource assessment, thereby improving treatment outcomes.

  20. Modeling of video compression effects on target acquisition performance

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Cha, Jae H.; Preece, Bradley; Espinola, Richard L.

    2009-05-01

    The effect of video compression on image quality was investigated from the perspective of target acquisition performance modeling. Human perception tests were conducted recently at the U.S. Army RDECOM CERDEC NVESD, measuring identification (ID) performance on simulated military vehicle targets at various ranges. These videos were compressed with different quality and/or quantization levels utilizing motion JPEG, motion JPEG2000, and MPEG-4 encoding. To model the degradation on task performance, the loss in image quality is fit to an equivalent Gaussian MTF scaled by the Structural Similarity Image Metric (SSIM). Residual compression artifacts are treated as 3-D spatio-temporal noise. This 3-D noise is found by taking the difference of the uncompressed frame, with the estimated equivalent blur applied, and the corresponding compressed frame. Results show good agreement between the experimental data and the model prediction. This method has led to a predictive performance model for video compression by correlating various compression levels to particular blur and noise input parameters for NVESD target acquisition performance model suite.

  1. Mississippi's New Forestry Best Management Practices Video

    Treesearch

    Andrew James Londo; John Benkert Auel

    2004-01-01

    Mississippi's latest version of forestry best management practices (BMPs) for water quality was released in 2000. In conjunction with this release, funds were obtained through a Section 319H grant from the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality to create a new BMPs video. Additional assistance was obtained from Georgia Pacific, PlumCreek, Weyerhaeuser,...

  2. A novel frame-level constant-distortion bit allocation for smooth H.264/AVC video quality

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Liu, Li; Zhuang, Xinhua

    2009-01-01

    It is known that quality fluctuation has a major negative effect on visual perception. In previous work, we introduced a constant-distortion bit allocation method [1] for H.263+ encoder. However, the method in [1] can not be adapted to the newest H.264/AVC encoder directly as the well-known chicken-egg dilemma resulted from the rate-distortion optimization (RDO) decision process. To solve this problem, we propose a new two stage constant-distortion bit allocation (CDBA) algorithm with enhanced rate control for H.264/AVC encoder. In stage-1, the algorithm performs RD optimization process with a constant quantization QP. Based on prediction residual signals from stage-1 and target distortion for smooth video quality purpose, the frame-level bit target is allocated by using a close-form approximations of ratedistortion relationship similar to [1], and a fast stage-2 encoding process is performed with enhanced basic unit rate control. Experimental results show that, compared with original rate control algorithm provided by H.264/AVC reference software JM12.1, the proposed constant-distortion frame-level bit allocation scheme reduces quality fluctuation and delivers much smoother PSNR on all testing sequences.

  3. High quality transmission Kikuchi diffraction analysis of deformed alloys - Case study

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Tokarski, Tomasz, E-mail: tokarski@agh.edu.pl

    Modern scanning electron microscopes (SEM) equipped with thermally assisted field emission guns (Schottky FEG) are capable of imaging with a resolution in the range of several nanometers or better. Simultaneously, the high electron beam current can be used, which enables fast chemical and crystallographic analysis with a higher resolution than is normally offered by SEM with a tungsten cathode. The current resolution that limits the EDS and EBSD analysis is related to materials' physics, particularly to the electron-specimen interaction volume. The application of thin, electron-transparent specimens, instead of bulk samples, improves the resolution and allows for the detailed analysis ofmore » very fine microstructural features. Beside the typical imaging mode, it is possible to use a standard EBSD camera in such a configuration that only transmitted and scattered electrons are detected. This modern approach was successfully applied to various materials giving rise to significant resolution improvement, especially for the light element magnesium based alloys. This paper presents an insight into the application of the transmission Kikuchi diffraction (TKD) technique applied to the most troublesome, heavily-deformed materials. In particular, the values of the highest possible acquisition rates for high resolution and high quality mapping were estimated within typical imaging conditions of stainless steel and magnesium-yttrium alloy. - Highlights: •Monte Carlo simulations were used to simulate EBSD camera intensity for various measuring conditions. •Transmission Kikuchi diffraction parameters were evaluated for highly deformed, light and heavy elements based alloys. •High quality maps with 20 nm spatial resolution were acquired for Mg and Fe based alloys. •High speed TKD measurements were performed at acquisition rates comparable to the reflection EBSD.« less

  4. A real-time remote video streaming platform for ultrasound imaging.

    PubMed

    Ahmadi, Mehdi; Gross, Warren J; Kadoury, Samuel

    2016-08-01

    Ultrasound is a viable imaging technology in remote and resources-limited areas. Ultrasonography is a user-dependent skill which depends on a high degree of training and hands-on experience. However, there is a limited number of skillful sonographers located in remote areas. In this work, we aim to develop a real-time video streaming platform which allows specialist physicians to remotely monitor ultrasound exams. To this end, an ultrasound stream is captured and transmitted through a wireless network into remote computers, smart-phones and tablets. In addition, the system is equipped with a camera to track the position of the ultrasound probe. The main advantage of our work is using an open source platform for video streaming which gives us more control over streaming parameters than the available commercial products. The transmission delays of the system are evaluated for several ultrasound video resolutions and the results show that ultrasound videos close to the high-definition (HD) resolution can be received and displayed on an Android tablet with the delay of 0.5 seconds which is acceptable for accurate real-time diagnosis.

  5. Video streaming into the mainstream.

    PubMed

    Garrison, W

    2001-12-01

    Changes in Internet technology are making possible the delivery of a richer mixture of media through data streaming. High-quality, dynamic content, such as video and audio, can be incorporated into Websites simply, flexibly and interactively. Technologies such as G3 mobile communication, ADSL, cable and satellites enable new ways of delivering medical services, information and learning. Systems such as Quicktime, Windows Media and Real Video provide reliable data streams as video-on-demand and users can tailor the experience to their own interests. The Learning Development Centre at the University of Portsmouth have used streaming technologies together with e-learning tools such as dynamic HTML, Flash, 3D objects and online assessment successfully to deliver on-line course content in economics and earth science. The Lifesign project--to develop, catalogue and stream health sciences media for teaching--is described and future medical applications are discussed.

  6. Wireless OAM transmission system based on elliptical microstrip patch antenna.

    PubMed

    Chen, Jia Jia; Lu, Qian Nan; Dong, Fei Fei; Yang, Jing Jing; Huang, Ming

    2016-05-30

    The multiplexing transmission has always been a focus of attention for communication technology. In this paper, the radiation characteristics of circular microstrip patch antenna was firstly analyzed based on cavity model theory, and then spiral beams carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) were generated, using elliptical microstrip patch antenna, with a single feed probe instead of a standard circular patch with two feedpoints. Moreover, by combining the proposed elliptic microstrip patch antenna with Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP), a wireless OAM transmission system was established and the real-time transmission of text, image and video in a real channel environment was realized. Since the wireless OAM transmission has the advantage of good safety and high spectrum utilization efficiency, this work has theoretical significance and potential application.

  7. Near-toll quality digital speech transmission in the mobile satellite service

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Townes, S. A.; Divsalar, D.

    1986-01-01

    This paper discusses system considerations for near-toll quality digital speech transmission in a 5 kHz mobile satellite system channel. Tradeoffs are shown for power performance versus delay for a 4800 bps speech compression system in conjunction with a 16 state rate 2/3 trellis coded 8PSK modulation system. The suggested system has an additional 150 ms of delay beyond the propagation delay and requires an E(b)/N(0) of about 7 dB for a Ricean channel assumption with line-of-sight to diffuse component ratio of 10 assuming ideal synchronization. An additional loss of 2 to 3 dB is expected for synchronization in fading environment.

  8. Spatial resampling of IDR frames for low bitrate video coding with HEVC

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hosking, Brett; Agrafiotis, Dimitris; Bull, David; Easton, Nick

    2015-03-01

    As the demand for higher quality and higher resolution video increases, many applications fail to meet this demand due to low bandwidth restrictions. One factor contributing to this problem is the high bitrate requirement of the intra-coded Instantaneous Decoding Refresh (IDR) frames featuring in all video coding standards. Frequent coding of IDR frames is essential for error resilience in order to prevent the occurrence of error propagation. However, as each one consumes a huge portion of the available bitrate, the quality of future coded frames is hindered by high levels of compression. This work presents a new technique, known as Spatial Resampling of IDR Frames (SRIF), and shows how it can increase the rate distortion performance by providing a higher and more consistent level of video quality at low bitrates.

  9. Extended image differencing for change detection in UAV video mosaics

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Saur, Günter; Krüger, Wolfgang; Schumann, Arne

    2014-03-01

    Change detection is one of the most important tasks when using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) for video reconnaissance and surveillance. We address changes of short time scale, i.e. the observations are taken in time distances from several minutes up to a few hours. Each observation is a short video sequence acquired by the UAV in near-nadir view and the relevant changes are, e.g., recently parked or moved vehicles. In this paper we extend our previous approach of image differencing for single video frames to video mosaics. A precise image-to-image registration combined with a robust matching approach is needed to stitch the video frames to a mosaic. Additionally, this matching algorithm is applied to mosaic pairs in order to align them to a common geometry. The resulting registered video mosaic pairs are the input of the change detection procedure based on extended image differencing. A change mask is generated by an adaptive threshold applied to a linear combination of difference images of intensity and gradient magnitude. The change detection algorithm has to distinguish between relevant and non-relevant changes. Examples for non-relevant changes are stereo disparity at 3D structures of the scene, changed size of shadows, and compression or transmission artifacts. The special effects of video mosaicking such as geometric distortions and artifacts at moving objects have to be considered, too. In our experiments we analyze the influence of these effects on the change detection results by considering several scenes. The results show that for video mosaics this task is more difficult than for single video frames. Therefore, we extended the image registration by estimating an elastic transformation using a thin plate spline approach. The results for mosaics are comparable to that of single video frames and are useful for interactive image exploitation due to a larger scene coverage.

  10. Medical Ultrasound Video Coding with H.265/HEVC Based on ROI Extraction

    PubMed Central

    Wu, Yueying; Liu, Pengyu; Gao, Yuan; Jia, Kebin

    2016-01-01

    High-efficiency video compression technology is of primary importance to the storage and transmission of digital medical video in modern medical communication systems. To further improve the compression performance of medical ultrasound video, two innovative technologies based on diagnostic region-of-interest (ROI) extraction using the high efficiency video coding (H.265/HEVC) standard are presented in this paper. First, an effective ROI extraction algorithm based on image textural features is proposed to strengthen the applicability of ROI detection results in the H.265/HEVC quad-tree coding structure. Second, a hierarchical coding method based on transform coefficient adjustment and a quantization parameter (QP) selection process is designed to implement the otherness encoding for ROIs and non-ROIs. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed optimization strategy significantly improves the coding performance by achieving a BD-BR reduction of 13.52% and a BD-PSNR gain of 1.16 dB on average compared to H.265/HEVC (HM15.0). The proposed medical video coding algorithm is expected to satisfy low bit-rate compression requirements for modern medical communication systems. PMID:27814367

  11. Medical Ultrasound Video Coding with H.265/HEVC Based on ROI Extraction.

    PubMed

    Wu, Yueying; Liu, Pengyu; Gao, Yuan; Jia, Kebin

    2016-01-01

    High-efficiency video compression technology is of primary importance to the storage and transmission of digital medical video in modern medical communication systems. To further improve the compression performance of medical ultrasound video, two innovative technologies based on diagnostic region-of-interest (ROI) extraction using the high efficiency video coding (H.265/HEVC) standard are presented in this paper. First, an effective ROI extraction algorithm based on image textural features is proposed to strengthen the applicability of ROI detection results in the H.265/HEVC quad-tree coding structure. Second, a hierarchical coding method based on transform coefficient adjustment and a quantization parameter (QP) selection process is designed to implement the otherness encoding for ROIs and non-ROIs. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed optimization strategy significantly improves the coding performance by achieving a BD-BR reduction of 13.52% and a BD-PSNR gain of 1.16 dB on average compared to H.265/HEVC (HM15.0). The proposed medical video coding algorithm is expected to satisfy low bit-rate compression requirements for modern medical communication systems.

  12. Subjective evaluation of next-generation video compression algorithms: a case study

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    De Simone, Francesca; Goldmann, Lutz; Lee, Jong-Seok; Ebrahimi, Touradj; Baroncini, Vittorio

    2010-08-01

    This paper describes the details and the results of the subjective quality evaluation performed at EPFL, as a contribution to the effort of the Joint Collaborative Team on Video Coding (JCT-VC) for the definition of the next-generation video coding standard. The performance of 27 coding technologies have been evaluated with respect to two H.264/MPEG-4 AVC anchors, considering high definition (HD) test material. The test campaign involved a total of 494 naive observers and took place over a period of four weeks. While similar tests have been conducted as part of the standardization process of previous video coding technologies, the test campaign described in this paper is by far the most extensive in the history of video coding standardization. The obtained subjective quality scores show high consistency and support an accurate comparison of the performance of the different coding solutions.

  13. Video requirements for remote medical diagnosis

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Davis, J. G.

    1974-01-01

    Minimal television system requirements for medical telediagnosis were studied. The experiment was conducted with the aid of a simulated telemedicine system. The first step involved making high quality videotape recordings of actual medical examinations conducted by a skilled nurse under the direction of a physician watching on closed circuit television. These recordings formed the baseline for the study. Next, these videotape recordings were electronically degraded to simulate television systems of less than broadcast quality. Finally, the baseline and degraded video recordings were shown (via a statistically randomized procedure) to a large number of physicians who attempted to reach a correct medical diagnosis and to visually recognize key physical signs for each patient. By careful scoring and analysis of the results of these viewings, the pictorial and diagnostic limitations as a function of technical video characteristics were to be defined.

  14. Examining the Quality of Preservice Science Teachers' Written Reflections When Using Video Recordings, Audio Recordings, and Memories of a Teaching Event

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Calandra, Brendan; Brantley-Dias, Laurie; Yerby, Johnathan; Demir, Kadir

    2018-01-01

    A group of preservice science teachers edited video footage of their practice teaching to identify and isolate critical incidents. They then wrote guided reflection papers on those critical incidents using different forms of media prompts while they wrote. The authors used a counterbalanced research design to compare the quality of writing that…

  15. Video-based face recognition via convolutional neural networks

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bao, Tianlong; Ding, Chunhui; Karmoshi, Saleem; Zhu, Ming

    2017-06-01

    Face recognition has been widely studied recently while video-based face recognition still remains a challenging task because of the low quality and large intra-class variation of video captured face images. In this paper, we focus on two scenarios of video-based face recognition: 1)Still-to-Video(S2V) face recognition, i.e., querying a still face image against a gallery of video sequences; 2)Video-to-Still(V2S) face recognition, in contrast to S2V scenario. A novel method was proposed in this paper to transfer still and video face images to an Euclidean space by a carefully designed convolutional neural network, then Euclidean metrics are used to measure the distance between still and video images. Identities of still and video images that group as pairs are used as supervision. In the training stage, a joint loss function that measures the Euclidean distance between the predicted features of training pairs and expanding vectors of still images is optimized to minimize the intra-class variation while the inter-class variation is guaranteed due to the large margin of still images. Transferred features are finally learned via the designed convolutional neural network. Experiments are performed on COX face dataset. Experimental results show that our method achieves reliable performance compared with other state-of-the-art methods.

  16. Film grain noise modeling in advanced video coding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Oh, Byung Tae; Kuo, C.-C. Jay; Sun, Shijun; Lei, Shawmin

    2007-01-01

    A new technique for film grain noise extraction, modeling and synthesis is proposed and applied to the coding of high definition video in this work. The film grain noise is viewed as a part of artistic presentation by people in the movie industry. On one hand, since the film grain noise can boost the natural appearance of pictures in high definition video, it should be preserved in high-fidelity video processing systems. On the other hand, video coding with film grain noise is expensive. It is desirable to extract film grain noise from the input video as a pre-processing step at the encoder and re-synthesize the film grain noise and add it back to the decoded video as a post-processing step at the decoder. Under this framework, the coding gain of the denoised video is higher while the quality of the final reconstructed video can still be well preserved. Following this idea, we present a method to remove film grain noise from image/video without distorting its original content. Besides, we describe a parametric model containing a small set of parameters to represent the extracted film grain noise. The proposed model generates the film grain noise that is close to the real one in terms of power spectral density and cross-channel spectral correlation. Experimental results are shown to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed scheme.

  17. Educational Video Recording and Editing for The Hand Surgeon

    PubMed Central

    Rehim, Shady A.; Chung, Kevin C.

    2016-01-01

    Digital video recordings are increasingly used across various medical and surgical disciplines including hand surgery for documentation of patient care, resident education, scientific presentations and publications. In recent years, the introduction of sophisticated computer hardware and software technology has simplified the process of digital video production and improved means of disseminating large digital data files. However, the creation of high quality surgical video footage requires basic understanding of key technical considerations, together with creativity and sound aesthetic judgment of the videographer. In this article we outline the practical steps involved with equipment preparation, video recording, editing and archiving as well as guidance for the choice of suitable hardware and software equipment. PMID:25911212

  18. Digital cinema video compression

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Husak, Walter

    2003-05-01

    The Motion Picture Industry began a transition from film based distribution and projection to digital distribution and projection several years ago. Digital delivery and presentation offers the prospect to increase the quality of the theatrical experience for the audience, reduce distribution costs to the distributors, and create new business opportunities for the theater owners and the studios. Digital Cinema also presents an opportunity to provide increased flexibility and security of the movies for the content owners and the theater operators. Distribution of content via electronic means to theaters is unlike any of the traditional applications for video compression. The transition from film-based media to electronic media represents a paradigm shift in video compression techniques and applications that will be discussed in this paper.

  19. Action change detection in video using a bilateral spatial-temporal constraint

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Tian, Jing; Chen, Li

    2016-08-01

    Action change detection in video aims to detect action discontinuity in video. The silhouettes-based features are desirable for action change detection. This paper studies the problem of silhouette-quality assessment. For that, a non-reference approach without the need for ground truth is proposed in this paper to evaluate the quality of silhouettes, by exploiting both the boundary contrast of the silhouettes in the spatial domain and the consistency of the silhouettes in the temporal domain. This is in contrast to that either only spatial information or only temporal information of silhouettes is exploited in conventional approaches. Experiments are conducted using artificially generated degraded silhouettes to show that the proposed approach outperforms conventional approaches to achieve more accurate quality assessment. Furthermore, experiments are performed to show that the proposed approach is able to improve the accuracy performance of conventional action change approaches in two human action video data-sets. The average runtime of the proposed approach for Weizmann action video data-set is 0.08 second for one frame using Matlab programming language. It is computationally efficient and potential to real-time implementations.

  20. Development of a video tampering dataset for forensic investigation.

    PubMed

    Ismael Al-Sanjary, Omar; Ahmed, Ahmed Abdullah; Sulong, Ghazali

    2016-09-01

    Forgery is an act of modifying a document, product, image or video, among other media. Video tampering detection research requires an inclusive database of video modification. This paper aims to discuss a comprehensive proposal to create a dataset composed of modified videos for forensic investigation, in order to standardize existing techniques for detecting video tampering. The primary purpose of developing and designing this new video library is for usage in video forensics, which can be consciously associated with reliable verification using dynamic and static camera recognition. To the best of the author's knowledge, there exists no similar library among the research community. Videos were sourced from YouTube and by exploring social networking sites extensively by observing posted videos and rating their feedback. The video tampering dataset (VTD) comprises a total of 33 videos, divided among three categories in video tampering: (1) copy-move, (2) splicing, and (3) swapping-frames. Compared to existing datasets, this is a higher number of tampered videos, and with longer durations. The duration of every video is 16s, with a 1280×720 resolution, and a frame rate of 30 frames per second. Moreover, all videos possess the same formatting quality (720p(HD).avi). Both temporal and spatial video features were considered carefully during selection of the videos, and there exists complete information related to the doctored regions in every modified video in the VTD dataset. This database has been made publically available for research on splicing, Swapping frames, and copy-move tampering, and, as such, various video tampering detection issues with ground truth. The database has been utilised by many international researchers and groups of researchers. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  1. Combinations of Quality and Frequency of Immunization Activities to Stop and Prevent Poliovirus Transmission in the High-Risk Area of Northwest Nigeria

    PubMed Central

    Duintjer Tebbens, Radboud J.; Pallansch, Mark A.; Wassilak, Steven G. F.; Cochi, Stephen L.; Thompson, Kimberly M.

    2015-01-01

    Background Frequent supplemental immunization activities (SIAs) with the oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) represent the primary strategy to interrupt poliovirus transmission in the last endemic areas. Materials and Methods Using a differential-equation based poliovirus transmission model tailored to high-risk areas in Nigeria, we perform one-way and multi-way sensitivity analyses to demonstrate the impact of different assumptions about routine immunization (RI) and the frequency and quality of SIAs on population immunity to transmission and persistence or emergence of circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses (cVDPVs) after OPV cessation. Results More trivalent OPV use remains critical to avoid serotype 2 cVDPVs. RI schedules with or without inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) could significantly improve population immunity if coverage increases well above current levels in under-vaccinated subpopulations. Similarly, the impact of SIAs on overall population immunity and cVDPV risks depends on their ability to reach under-vaccinated groups (i.e., SIA quality). Lower SIA coverage in the under-vaccinated subpopulation results in a higher frequency of SIAs needed to maintain high enough population immunity to avoid cVDPVs after OPV cessation. Conclusions National immunization program managers in northwest Nigeria should recognize the benefits of increasing RI and SIA quality. Sufficiently improving RI coverage and improving SIA quality will reduce the frequency of SIAs required to stop and prevent future poliovirus transmission. Better information about the incremental costs to identify and reach under-vaccinated children would help determine the optimal balance between spending to increase SIA and RI quality and spending to increase SIA frequency. PMID:26068928

  2. Combinations of Quality and Frequency of Immunization Activities to Stop and Prevent Poliovirus Transmission in the High-Risk Area of Northwest Nigeria.

    PubMed

    Duintjer Tebbens, Radboud J; Pallansch, Mark A; Wassilak, Steven G F; Cochi, Stephen L; Thompson, Kimberly M

    2015-01-01

    Frequent supplemental immunization activities (SIAs) with the oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) represent the primary strategy to interrupt poliovirus transmission in the last endemic areas. Using a differential-equation based poliovirus transmission model tailored to high-risk areas in Nigeria, we perform one-way and multi-way sensitivity analyses to demonstrate the impact of different assumptions about routine immunization (RI) and the frequency and quality of SIAs on population immunity to transmission and persistence or emergence of circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses (cVDPVs) after OPV cessation. More trivalent OPV use remains critical to avoid serotype 2 cVDPVs. RI schedules with or without inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) could significantly improve population immunity if coverage increases well above current levels in under-vaccinated subpopulations. Similarly, the impact of SIAs on overall population immunity and cVDPV risks depends on their ability to reach under-vaccinated groups (i.e., SIA quality). Lower SIA coverage in the under-vaccinated subpopulation results in a higher frequency of SIAs needed to maintain high enough population immunity to avoid cVDPVs after OPV cessation. National immunization program managers in northwest Nigeria should recognize the benefits of increasing RI and SIA quality. Sufficiently improving RI coverage and improving SIA quality will reduce the frequency of SIAs required to stop and prevent future poliovirus transmission. Better information about the incremental costs to identify and reach under-vaccinated children would help determine the optimal balance between spending to increase SIA and RI quality and spending to increase SIA frequency.

  3. Concept-oriented indexing of video databases: toward semantic sensitive retrieval and browsing.

    PubMed

    Fan, Jianping; Luo, Hangzai; Elmagarmid, Ahmed K

    2004-07-01

    Digital video now plays an important role in medical education, health care, telemedicine and other medical applications. Several content-based video retrieval (CBVR) systems have been proposed in the past, but they still suffer from the following challenging problems: semantic gap, semantic video concept modeling, semantic video classification, and concept-oriented video database indexing and access. In this paper, we propose a novel framework to make some advances toward the final goal to solve these problems. Specifically, the framework includes: 1) a semantic-sensitive video content representation framework by using principal video shots to enhance the quality of features; 2) semantic video concept interpretation by using flexible mixture model to bridge the semantic gap; 3) a novel semantic video-classifier training framework by integrating feature selection, parameter estimation, and model selection seamlessly in a single algorithm; and 4) a concept-oriented video database organization technique through a certain domain-dependent concept hierarchy to enable semantic-sensitive video retrieval and browsing.

  4. Tele-Assessment of the Berg Balance Scale: Effects of Transmission Characteristics.

    PubMed

    Venkataraman, Kavita; Morgan, Michelle; Amis, Kristopher A; Landerman, Lawrence R; Koh, Gerald C; Caves, Kevin; Hoenig, Helen

    2017-04-01

    To compare Berg Balance Scale (BBS) rating using videos with differing transmission characteristics with direct in-person rating. Repeated-measures study for the assessment of the BBS in 8 configurations: in person, high-definition video with slow motion review, standard-definition videos with varying bandwidths and frame rates (768 kilobytes per second [kbps] videos at 8, 15, and 30 frames per second [fps], 30 fps videos at 128, 384, and 768 kbps). Medical center. Patients with limitations (N=45) in ≥1 of 3 specific aspects of motor function: fine motor coordination, gross motor coordination, and gait and balance. Not applicable. Ability to rate the BBS in person and using videos with differing bandwidths and frame rates in frontal and lateral views. Compared with in-person rating (7%), 18% (P=.29) of high-definition videos and 37% (P=.03) of standard-definition videos could not be rated. Interrater reliability for the high-definition videos was .96 (95% confidence interval, .94-.97). Rating failure proportions increased from 20% in videos with the highest bandwidth to 60% (P<.001) in videos with the lowest bandwidth, with no significant differences in proportions across frame rate categories. Both frontal and lateral views were critical for successful rating using videos, with 60% to 70% (P<.001) of videos unable to be rated on a single view. Although there is some loss of information when using videos to rate the BBS compared to in-person ratings, it is feasible to reliably rate the BBS remotely in standard clinical spaces. However, optimal video rating requires frontal and lateral views for each assessment, high-definition video with high bandwidth, and the ability to carry out slow motion review. Copyright © 2016 American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

  5. Are Health Videos from Hospitals, Health Organizations, and Active Users Available to Health Consumers? An Analysis of Diabetes Health Video Ranking in YouTube.

    PubMed

    Fernandez-Llatas, Carlos; Traver, Vicente; Borras-Morell, Jose-Enrique; Martinez-Millana, Antonio; Karlsen, Randi

    2017-01-01

    Health consumers are increasingly using the Internet to search for health information. The existence of overloaded, inaccurate, obsolete, or simply incorrect health information available on the Internet is a serious obstacle for finding relevant and good-quality data that actually helps patients. Search engines of multimedia Internet platforms are thought to help users to find relevant information according to their search. But, is the information recovered by those search engines from quality sources? Is the health information uploaded from reliable sources, such as hospitals and health organizations, easily available to patients? The availability of videos is directly related to the ranking position in YouTube search. The higher the ranking of the information is, the more accessible it is. The aim of this study is to analyze the ranking evolution of diabetes health videos on YouTube in order to discover how videos from reliable channels, such as hospitals and health organizations, are evolving in the ranking. The analysis was done by tracking the ranking of 2372 videos on a daily basis during a 30-day period using 20 diabetes-related queries. Our conclusions are that the current YouTube algorithm favors the presence of reliable videos in upper rank positions in diabetes-related searches.

  6. Are Health Videos from Hospitals, Health Organizations, and Active Users Available to Health Consumers? An Analysis of Diabetes Health Video Ranking in YouTube

    PubMed Central

    Borras-Morell, Jose-Enrique; Martinez-Millana, Antonio; Karlsen, Randi

    2017-01-01

    Health consumers are increasingly using the Internet to search for health information. The existence of overloaded, inaccurate, obsolete, or simply incorrect health information available on the Internet is a serious obstacle for finding relevant and good-quality data that actually helps patients. Search engines of multimedia Internet platforms are thought to help users to find relevant information according to their search. But, is the information recovered by those search engines from quality sources? Is the health information uploaded from reliable sources, such as hospitals and health organizations, easily available to patients? The availability of videos is directly related to the ranking position in YouTube search. The higher the ranking of the information is, the more accessible it is. The aim of this study is to analyze the ranking evolution of diabetes health videos on YouTube in order to discover how videos from reliable channels, such as hospitals and health organizations, are evolving in the ranking. The analysis was done by tracking the ranking of 2372 videos on a daily basis during a 30-day period using 20 diabetes-related queries. Our conclusions are that the current YouTube algorithm favors the presence of reliable videos in upper rank positions in diabetes-related searches. PMID:28243314

  7. Joint source-channel coding for motion-compensated DCT-based SNR scalable video.

    PubMed

    Kondi, Lisimachos P; Ishtiaq, Faisal; Katsaggelos, Aggelos K

    2002-01-01

    In this paper, we develop an approach toward joint source-channel coding for motion-compensated DCT-based scalable video coding and transmission. A framework for the optimal selection of the source and channel coding rates over all scalable layers is presented such that the overall distortion is minimized. The algorithm utilizes universal rate distortion characteristics which are obtained experimentally and show the sensitivity of the source encoder and decoder to channel errors. The proposed algorithm allocates the available bit rate between scalable layers and, within each layer, between source and channel coding. We present the results of this rate allocation algorithm for video transmission over a wireless channel using the H.263 Version 2 signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) scalable codec for source coding and rate-compatible punctured convolutional (RCPC) codes for channel coding. We discuss the performance of the algorithm with respect to the channel conditions, coding methodologies, layer rates, and number of layers.

  8. A professional and cost effective digital video editing and image storage system for the operating room.

    PubMed

    Scollato, A; Perrini, P; Benedetto, N; Di Lorenzo, N

    2007-06-01

    We propose an easy-to-construct digital video editing system ideal to produce video documentation and still images. A digital video editing system applicable to many video sources in the operating room is described in detail. The proposed system has proved easy to use and permits one to obtain videography quickly and easily. Mixing different streams of video input from all the devices in use in the operating room, the application of filters and effects produces a final, professional end-product. Recording on a DVD provides an inexpensive, portable and easy-to-use medium to store or re-edit or tape at a later time. From stored videography it is easy to extract high-quality, still images useful for teaching, presentations and publications. In conclusion digital videography and still photography can easily be recorded by the proposed system, producing high-quality video recording. The use of firewire ports provides good compatibility with next-generation hardware and software. The high standard of quality makes the proposed system one of the lowest priced products available today.

  9. Video Use in Teacher Education: A Survey of Teacher-Educators' Practices across Disciplines

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Arya, Poonam; Christ, Tanya; Chiu, Ming Ming

    2016-01-01

    Video methods utilize tenets of high quality teacher education and support education students' learning and application of learning to teaching practices. However, how frequently video is used in teacher education, and in what ways is unknown. Therefore, this study used survey data to identify the extent to which 94 teacher-educators used video in…

  10. Compression of stereoscopic video using MPEG-2

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Puri, A.; Kollarits, Richard V.; Haskell, Barry G.

    1995-10-01

    Many current as well as emerging applications in areas of entertainment, remote operations, manufacturing industry and medicine can benefit from the depth perception offered by stereoscopic video systems which employ two views of a scene imaged under the constraints imposed by human visual system. Among the many challenges to be overcome for practical realization and widespread use of 3D/stereoscopic systems are good 3D displays and efficient techniques for digital compression of enormous amounts of data while maintaining compatibility with normal video decoding and display systems. After a brief introduction to the basics of 3D/stereo including issues of depth perception, stereoscopic 3D displays and terminology in stereoscopic imaging and display, we present an overview of tools in the MPEG-2 video standard that are relevant to our discussion on compression of stereoscopic video, which is the main topic of this paper. Next, we outilne the various approaches for compression of stereoscopic video and then focus on compatible stereoscopic video coding using MPEG-2 Temporal scalability concepts. Compatible coding employing two different types of prediction structures become potentially possible, disparity compensated prediction and combined disparity and motion compensated predictions. To further improve coding performance and display quality, preprocessing for reducing mismatch between the two views forming stereoscopic video is considered. Results of simulations performed on stereoscopic video of normal TV resolution are then reported comparing the performance of two prediction structures with the simulcast solution. It is found that combined disparity and motion compensated prediction offers the best performance. Results indicate that compression of both views of stereoscopic video of normal TV resolution appears feasible in a total of 6 to 8 Mbit/s. We then discuss regarding multi-viewpoint video, a generalization of stereoscopic video. Finally, we describe

  11. Compression of stereoscopic video using MPEG-2

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Puri, Atul; Kollarits, Richard V.; Haskell, Barry G.

    1995-12-01

    Many current as well as emerging applications in areas of entertainment, remote operations, manufacturing industry and medicine can benefit from the depth perception offered by stereoscopic video systems which employ two views of a scene imaged under the constraints imposed by human visual system. Among the many challenges to be overcome for practical realization and widespread use of 3D/stereoscopic systems are good 3D displays and efficient techniques for digital compression of enormous amounts of data while maintaining compatibility with normal video decoding and display systems. After a brief introduction to the basics of 3D/stereo including issues of depth perception, stereoscopic 3D displays and terminology in stereoscopic imaging and display, we present an overview of tools in the MPEG-2 video standard that are relevant to our discussion on compression of stereoscopic video, which is the main topic of this paper. Next, we outline the various approaches for compression of stereoscopic video and then focus on compatible stereoscopic video coding using MPEG-2 Temporal scalability concepts. Compatible coding employing two different types of prediction structures become potentially possible, disparity compensated prediction and combined disparity and motion compensated predictions. To further improve coding performance and display quality, preprocessing for reducing mismatch between the two views forming stereoscopic video is considered. Results of simulations performed on stereoscopic video of normal TV resolution are then reported comparing the performance of two prediction structures with the simulcast solution. It is found that combined disparity and motion compensated prediction offers the best performance. Results indicate that compression of both views of stereoscopic video of normal TV resolution appears feasible in a total of 6 to 8 Mbit/s. We then discuss regarding multi-viewpoint video, a generalization of stereoscopic video. Finally, we describe

  12. Application of Bayesian a Priori Distributions for Vehicles' Video Tracking Systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Mazurek, Przemysław; Okarma, Krzysztof

    Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) helps to improve the quality and quantity of many car traffic parameters. The use of the ITS is possible when the adequate measuring infrastructure is available. Video systems allow for its implementation with relatively low cost due to the possibility of simultaneous video recording of a few lanes of the road at a considerable distance from the camera. The process of tracking can be realized through different algorithms, the most attractive algorithms are Bayesian, because they use the a priori information derived from previous observations or known limitations. Use of this information is crucial for improving the quality of tracking especially for difficult observability conditions, which occur in the video systems under the influence of: smog, fog, rain, snow and poor lighting conditions.

  13. Ground Isolation Circuit for Isolating a Transmission Line from Ground Interference

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Davidson, Craig A. (Inventor)

    1996-01-01

    This invention relates generally to a system for isolating ground interference from a transmission line, e.g., a ground isolation circuit for isolating a wideband transmission signal (such as a video signal) from ground by modulating the base signal on a carrier signal to permit the transmission signal to be isolated. In one embodiment, the circuit includes a pair of matched mixer circuits, each of which receives a carrier signal from the same oscillator circuit. The first mixer circuit also receives the baseband signal input, after appropriate conditioning, and modulates the baseband signal onto the carrier signal. In a preferred embodiment the carrier signal has a predetermined frequency which is at least two times the frequency of the baseband signal. The modulated signal (which can comprise an rf signal) is transmitted via an rf transmission line to the second mixer, which demodulates the rf signal to recover the baseband signal. Each port of the mixer connects to an isolation transformer to ensure isolation from ground interference. The circuit is considered to be of commercial value in that it can provide isolation between transmitting and receiving circuits, e.g., ground isolation for television circuits or high frequency transmitters, without the need for video transformers or optical isolators, thereby reducing the complexity, power consumption, and weight of the system.

  14. Non-line-of-sight (NLOS), secure, low-probability of intercept (LPI), antijam (AJ), high frequency (HF), real time video communication system

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Lupinetti, F.

    1988-01-01

    This paper outlines a video communication system capable of non-line-of-sight (NLOS), secure, low-probability of intercept (LPI), antijam, real time transmission and reception of video information in a tactical enviroment. An introduction to a class of ternary PN sequences is presented to familiarize the reader with yet another avenue for spreading and despreading baseband information. The use of the high frequency (HF) band (1.5 to 30 MHz) for real time video transmission is suggested to allow NLOS communication. The spreading of the baseband information by means of multiple nontrivially different ternary pseudonoise (PN) sequence is used in order to assure encryptionmore » of the signal, enhanced security, a good degree of LPI, and good antijam features. 18 refs., 3 figs., 1 tab.« less

  15. Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR) Software

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1999-01-01

    Two scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, atmospheric scientist Paul Meyer and solar physicist Dr. David Hathaway, developed promising new software, called Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR), which is illustrated in this Quick Time movie. VISAR is a computer algorithm that stabilizes camera motion in the horizontal and vertical as well as rotation and zoom effects producing clearer images of moving objects, smoothes jagged edges, enhances still images, and reduces video noise or snow. It could steady images of ultrasounds, which are infamous for their grainy, blurred quality. VISAR could also have applications in law enforcement, medical, and meteorological imaging. The software can be used for defense application by improving reconnaissance video imagery made by military vehicles, aircraft, and ships traveling in harsh, rugged environments.

  16. Video Image Stabilization and Registration (VISAR) Software

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    1999-01-01

    Two scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center,atmospheric scientist Paul Meyer and solar physicist Dr. David Hathaway, developed promising new software, called Video Image stabilization and Registration (VISAR), which is illustrated in this Quick Time movie. VISAR is a computer algorithm that stabilizes camera motion in the horizontal and vertical as well as rotation and zoom effects producing clearer images of moving objects, smoothes jagged edges, enhances still images, and reduces video noise or snow. It could steady images of ultrasounds, which are infamous for their grainy, blurred quality. VISAR could also have applications in law enforcement, medical, and meteorological imaging. The software can be used for defense application by improving reconnaissance video imagery made by military vehicles, aircraft, and ships traveling in harsh, rugged environments.

  17. Multiple Sensor Camera for Enhanced Video Capturing

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nagahara, Hajime; Kanki, Yoshinori; Iwai, Yoshio; Yachida, Masahiko

    A resolution of camera has been drastically improved under a current request for high-quality digital images. For example, digital still camera has several mega pixels. Although a video camera has the higher frame-rate, the resolution of a video camera is lower than that of still camera. Thus, the high-resolution is incompatible with the high frame rate of ordinary cameras in market. It is difficult to solve this problem by a single sensor, since it comes from physical limitation of the pixel transfer rate. In this paper, we propose a multi-sensor camera for capturing a resolution and frame-rate enhanced video. Common multi-CCDs camera, such as 3CCD color camera, has same CCD for capturing different spectral information. Our approach is to use different spatio-temporal resolution sensors in a single camera cabinet for capturing higher resolution and frame-rate information separately. We build a prototype camera which can capture high-resolution (2588×1958 pixels, 3.75 fps) and high frame-rate (500×500, 90 fps) videos. We also proposed the calibration method for the camera. As one of the application of the camera, we demonstrate an enhanced video (2128×1952 pixels, 90 fps) generated from the captured videos for showing the utility of the camera.

  18. Academic podcasting: quality media delivery.

    PubMed

    Tripp, Jacob S; Duvall, Scott L; Cowan, Derek L; Kamauu, Aaron W C

    2006-01-01

    A video podcast of the CME-approved University of Utah Department of Biomedical Informatics seminar was created in order to address issues with streaming video quality, take advantage of popular web-based syndication methods, and make the files available for convenient, subscription-based download. An RSS feed, which is automatically generated, contains links to the media files and allows viewers to easily subscribe to the weekly seminars in a format that guarantees consistent video quality.

  19. A video approach to interactive patient education.

    PubMed

    Maller, C E; Twitty, V J; Sauve, A

    1997-04-01

    A quality improvement model presents the stages of designing and producing a preoperative videotape for improved patient satisfaction outcomes. PACU nurses formed an interdisciplinary team of providers and patients to update an existing preoperative sound/slide program into video. Improved patient outcomes were reflected in greater availability, accessibility, and consistency of preoperative instruction. A videotape program for home viewing was instituted to reach out to the surgical patient population served by the Albuquerque Veterans Affairs Medical Center in New Mexico. A quality improvement storyboard approach to videotape production met Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organization (JCAHO) standards for interactive patient education at a recent JCAHO survey. Preliminary evaluative data from patients supports a growing appeal of videos to patients and family members as an additional preoperative teaching strategy for adult surgical patients.

  20. Fiber optic multiplex optical transmission system

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Bell, C. H. (Inventor)

    1977-01-01

    A multiplex optical transmission system which minimizes external interference while simultaneously receiving and transmitting video, digital data, and audio signals is described. Signals are received into subgroup mixers for blocking into respective frequency ranges. The outputs of these mixers are in turn fed to a master mixer which produces a composite electrical signal. An optical transmitter connected to the master mixer converts the composite signal into an optical signal and transmits it over a fiber optic cable to an optical receiver which receives the signal and converts it back to a composite electrical signal. A de-multiplexer is coupled to the output of the receiver for separating the composite signal back into composite video, digital data, and audio signals. A programmable optic patch board is interposed in the fiber optic cables for selectively connecting the optical signals to various receivers and transmitters.

  1. Evaluation of in-network adaptation of scalable high efficiency video coding (SHVC) in mobile environments

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nightingale, James; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos; Goma, Sergio

    2014-02-01

    High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC), the latest video compression standard (also known as H.265), can deliver video streams of comparable quality to the current H.264 Advanced Video Coding (H.264/AVC) standard with a 50% reduction in bandwidth. Research into SHVC, the scalable extension to the HEVC standard, is still in its infancy. One important area for investigation is whether, given the greater compression ratio of HEVC (and SHVC), the loss of packets containing video content will have a greater impact on the quality of delivered video than is the case with H.264/AVC or its scalable extension H.264/SVC. In this work we empirically evaluate the layer-based, in-network adaptation of video streams encoded using SHVC in situations where dynamically changing bandwidths and datagram loss ratios require the real-time adaptation of video streams. Through the use of extensive experimentation, we establish a comprehensive set of benchmarks for SHVC-based highdefinition video streaming in loss prone network environments such as those commonly found in mobile networks. Among other results, we highlight that packet losses of only 1% can lead to a substantial reduction in PSNR of over 3dB and error propagation in over 130 pictures following the one in which the loss occurred. This work would be one of the earliest studies in this cutting-edge area that reports benchmark evaluation results for the effects of datagram loss on SHVC picture quality and offers empirical and analytical insights into SHVC adaptation to lossy, mobile networking conditions.

  2. Compressed Video: An Interactive Tool To Encourage Students To Accept Distance Learning as an Alternative to Face-to-Face Instruction.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Mizell, Al P.; And Others

    Distance learning involves students and faculty engaged in interactive instructional settings when they are at different locations. Compressed video is the live transmission of two-way auditory and visual signals at the same time between sites at different locations. The use of compressed video has expanded in recent years, ranging from use by the…

  3. Video document

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Davies, Bob; Lienhart, Rainer W.; Yeo, Boon-Lock

    1999-08-01

    The metaphor of film and TV permeates the design of software to support video on the PC. Simply transplanting the non- interactive, sequential experience of film to the PC fails to exploit the virtues of the new context. Video ont eh PC should be interactive and non-sequential. This paper experiments with a variety of tools for using video on the PC that exploits the new content of the PC. Some feature are more successful than others. Applications that use these tools are explored, including primarily the home video archive but also streaming video servers on the Internet. The ability to browse, edit, abstract and index large volumes of video content such as home video and corporate video is a problem without appropriate solution in today's market. The current tools available are complex, unfriendly video editors, requiring hours of work to prepare a short home video, far more work that a typical home user can be expected to provide. Our proposed solution treats video like a text document, providing functionality similar to a text editor. Users can browse, interact, edit and compose one or more video sequences with the same ease and convenience as handling text documents. With this level of text-like composition, we call what is normally a sequential medium a 'video document'. An important component of the proposed solution is shot detection, the ability to detect when a short started or stopped. When combined with a spreadsheet of key frames, the host become a grid of pictures that can be manipulated and viewed in the same way that a spreadsheet can be edited. Multiple video documents may be viewed, joined, manipulated, and seamlessly played back. Abstracts of unedited video content can be produce automatically to create novel video content for export to other venues. Edited and raw video content can be published to the net or burned to a CD-ROM with a self-installing viewer for Windows 98 and Windows NT 4.0.

  4. Content-based video retrieval by example video clip

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Dimitrova, Nevenka; Abdel-Mottaleb, Mohamed

    1997-01-01

    This paper presents a novel approach for video retrieval from a large archive of MPEG or Motion JPEG compressed video clips. We introduce a retrieval algorithm that takes a video clip as a query and searches the database for clips with similar contents. Video clips are characterized by a sequence of representative frame signatures, which are constructed from DC coefficients and motion information (`DC+M' signatures). The similarity between two video clips is determined by using their respective signatures. This method facilitates retrieval of clips for the purpose of video editing, broadcast news retrieval, or copyright violation detection.

  5. A systematic review of usability test metrics for mobile video streaming apps

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hussain, Azham; Mkpojiogu, Emmanuel O. C.

    2016-08-01

    This paper presents the results of a systematic review regarding the usability test metrics for mobile video streaming apps. In the study, 238 studies were found, but only 51 relevant papers were eventually selected for the review. The study reveals that time taken for video streaming and the video quality were the two most popular metrics used in the usability tests for mobile video streaming apps. Besides, most of the studies concentrated on the usability of mobile TV as users are switching from traditional TV to mobile TV.

  6. Compressive Video Recovery Using Block Match Multi-Frame Motion Estimation Based on Single Pixel Cameras

    PubMed Central

    Bi, Sheng; Zeng, Xiao; Tang, Xin; Qin, Shujia; Lai, King Wai Chiu

    2016-01-01

    Compressive sensing (CS) theory has opened up new paths for the development of signal processing applications. Based on this theory, a novel single pixel camera architecture has been introduced to overcome the current limitations and challenges of traditional focal plane arrays. However, video quality based on this method is limited by existing acquisition and recovery methods, and the method also suffers from being time-consuming. In this paper, a multi-frame motion estimation algorithm is proposed in CS video to enhance the video quality. The proposed algorithm uses multiple frames to implement motion estimation. Experimental results show that using multi-frame motion estimation can improve the quality of recovered videos. To further reduce the motion estimation time, a block match algorithm is used to process motion estimation. Experiments demonstrate that using the block match algorithm can reduce motion estimation time by 30%. PMID:26950127

  7. Water surface modeling from a single viewpoint video.

    PubMed

    Li, Chuan; Pickup, David; Saunders, Thomas; Cosker, Darren; Marshall, David; Hall, Peter; Willis, Philip

    2013-07-01

    We introduce a video-based approach for producing water surface models. Recent advances in this field output high-quality results but require dedicated capturing devices and only work in limited conditions. In contrast, our method achieves a good tradeoff between the visual quality and the production cost: It automatically produces a visually plausible animation using a single viewpoint video as the input. Our approach is based on two discoveries: first, shape from shading (SFS) is adequate to capture the appearance and dynamic behavior of the example water; second, shallow water model can be used to estimate a velocity field that produces complex surface dynamics. We will provide qualitative evaluation of our method and demonstrate its good performance across a wide range of scenes.

  8. Dynamic frame resizing with convolutional neural network for efficient video compression

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Kim, Jaehwan; Park, Youngo; Choi, Kwang Pyo; Lee, JongSeok; Jeon, Sunyoung; Park, JeongHoon

    2017-09-01

    In the past, video codecs such as vc-1 and H.263 used a technique to encode reduced-resolution video and restore original resolution from the decoder for improvement of coding efficiency. The techniques of vc-1 and H.263 Annex Q are called dynamic frame resizing and reduced-resolution update mode, respectively. However, these techniques have not been widely used due to limited performance improvements that operate well only under specific conditions. In this paper, video frame resizing (reduced/restore) technique based on machine learning is proposed for improvement of coding efficiency. The proposed method features video of low resolution made by convolutional neural network (CNN) in encoder and reconstruction of original resolution using CNN in decoder. The proposed method shows improved subjective performance over all the high resolution videos which are dominantly consumed recently. In order to assess subjective quality of the proposed method, Video Multi-method Assessment Fusion (VMAF) which showed high reliability among many subjective measurement tools was used as subjective metric. Moreover, to assess general performance, diverse bitrates are tested. Experimental results showed that BD-rate based on VMAF was improved by about 51% compare to conventional HEVC. Especially, VMAF values were significantly improved in low bitrate. Also, when the method is subjectively tested, it had better subjective visual quality in similar bit rate.

  9. Video Denoising via Dynamic Video Layering

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Guo, Han; Vaswani, Namrata

    2018-07-01

    Video denoising refers to the problem of removing "noise" from a video sequence. Here the term "noise" is used in a broad sense to refer to any corruption or outlier or interference that is not the quantity of interest. In this work, we develop a novel approach to video denoising that is based on the idea that many noisy or corrupted videos can be split into three parts - the "low-rank layer", the "sparse layer", and a small residual (which is small and bounded). We show, using extensive experiments, that our denoising approach outperforms the state-of-the-art denoising algorithms.

  10. VideoANT: Extending Online Video Annotation beyond Content Delivery

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Hosack, Bradford

    2010-01-01

    This paper expands the boundaries of video annotation in education by outlining the need for extended interaction in online video use, identifying the challenges faced by existing video annotation tools, and introducing Video-ANT, a tool designed to create text-based annotations integrated within the time line of a video hosted online. Several…

  11. Transmission Kikuchi diffraction and transmission electron forescatter imaging of electropolished and FIB manufactured TEM specimens

    DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

    Zieliński, W., E-mail: wiziel@inmat.pw.edu.pl; Płociński, T.; Kurzydłowski, K.J.

    2015-06-15

    We present a study of the efficiency of the utility of scanning electron microscope (SEM)-based transmission methods for characterizing grain structure in thinned bulk metals. Foils of type 316 stainless steel were prepared by two methods commonly used for transmission electron microscopy — double-jet electropolishing and focused ion beam milling. A customized holder allowed positioning of the foils in a configuration appropriate for both transmission electron forward scatter diffraction, and for transmission imaging by the use of a forescatter detector with two diodes. We found that both crystallographic orientation maps and dark-field transmitted images could be obtained for specimens preparedmore » by either method. However, for both methods, preparation-induced artifacts may affect the quality or accuracy of transmission SEM data, especially those acquired by the use of transmission Kikuchi diffraction. Generally, the quality of orientation data was better for specimens prepared by electropolishing, due to the absence of ion-induced damage. - Highlights: • The transmission imaging and diffraction techniques are emerging in scanning electron microscopy (SEM) as promising new field of materials characterization. • The manuscript titled: “Transmission Kikuchi Diffraction and Transmission Electron Forescatter Imaging of Electropolished and FIB Manufactured TEM Specimens” documents how different specimen thinning procedures can effect efficiency of transmission Kikuchi diffraction and transmission electron forescatter imaging. • The abilities to make precision crystallographic orientation maps and dark-field images in transmission was studied on electropolished versus focus ion beam manufactured TEM specimens. • Depending on the need, electropolished and focused ion beam technique may produce suitable specimens for transmission imaging and diffraction in SEM.« less

  12. Interactive Video: Meeting the Ford Challenge.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Copeland, Peter

    Many companies using Statistical Process Control (SPC) in their manufacturing processes have found that, despite the training difficulties presented by the technique, the rewards of successful SPC include increased productivity, quality, and market leadership. The Ford Motor Company has developed its SPC training with interactive video, which…

  13. Potential usefulness of a video printer for producing secondary images from digitized chest radiographs

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Nishikawa, Robert M.; MacMahon, Heber; Doi, Kunio; Bosworth, Eric

    1991-05-01

    Communication between radiologists and clinicians could be improved if a secondary image (copy of the original image) accompanied the radiologic report. In addition, the number of lost original radiographs could be decreased, since clinicians would have less need to borrow films. The secondary image should be simple and inexpensive to produce, while providing sufficient image quality for verification of the diagnosis. We are investigating the potential usefulness of a video printer for producing copies of radiographs, i.e. images printed on thermal paper. The video printer we examined (Seikosha model VP-3500) can provide 64 shades of gray. It is capable of recording images up to 1,280 pixels by 1,240 lines and can accept any raster-type video signal. The video printer was characterized in terms of its linearity, contrast, latitude, resolution, and noise properties. The quality of video-printer images was also evaluated in an observer study using portable chest radiographs. We found that observers could confirm up to 90 of the reported findings in the thorax using video- printer images, when the original radiographs were of high quality. The number of verified findings was diminished when high spatial resolution was required (e.g. detection of a subtle pneumothorax) or when a low-contrast finding was located in the mediastinal area or below the diaphragm (e.g. nasogastric tubes).

  14. Feasibility of video codec algorithms for software-only playback

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Rodriguez, Arturo A.; Morse, Ken

    1994-05-01

    Software-only video codecs can provide good playback performance in desktop computers with a 486 or 68040 CPU running at 33 MHz without special hardware assistance. Typically, playback of compressed video can be categorized into three tasks: the actual decoding of the video stream, color conversion, and the transfer of decoded video data from system RAM to video RAM. By current standards, good playback performance is the decoding and display of video streams of 320 by 240 (or larger) compressed frames at 15 (or greater) frames-per- second. Software-only video codecs have evolved by modifying and tailoring existing compression methodologies to suit video playback in desktop computers. In this paper we examine the characteristics used to evaluate software-only video codec algorithms, namely: image fidelity (i.e., image quality), bandwidth (i.e., compression) ease-of-decoding (i.e., playback performance), memory consumption, compression to decompression asymmetry, scalability, and delay. We discuss the tradeoffs among these variables and the compromises that can be made to achieve low numerical complexity for software-only playback. Frame- differencing approaches are described since software-only video codecs typically employ them to enhance playback performance. To complement other papers that appear in this session of the Proceedings, we review methods derived from binary pattern image coding since these methods are amenable for software-only playback. In particular, we introduce a novel approach called pixel distribution image coding.

  15. Objective analysis of image quality of video image capture systems

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Rowberg, Alan H.

    1990-07-01

    As Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) technology has matured, video image capture has become a common way of capturing digital images from many modalities. While digital interfaces, such as those which use the ACR/NEMA standard, will become more common in the future, and are preferred because of the accuracy of image transfer, video image capture will be the dominant method in the short term, and may continue to be used for some time because of the low cost and high speed often associated with such devices. Currently, virtually all installed systems use methods of digitizing the video signal that is produced for display on the scanner viewing console itself. A series of digital test images have been developed for display on either a GE CT9800 or a GE Signa MRI scanner. These images have been captured with each of five commercially available image capture systems, and the resultant images digitally transferred on floppy disk to a PC1286 computer containing Optimast' image analysis software. Here the images can be displayed in a comparative manner for visual evaluation, in addition to being analyzed statistically. Each of the images have been designed to support certain tests, including noise, accuracy, linearity, gray scale range, stability, slew rate, and pixel alignment. These image capture systems vary widely in these characteristics, in addition to the presence or absence of other artifacts, such as shading and moire pattern. Other accessories such as video distribution amplifiers and noise filters can also add or modify artifacts seen in the captured images, often giving unusual results. Each image is described, together with the tests which were performed using them. One image contains alternating black and white lines, each one pixel wide, after equilibration strips ten pixels wide. While some systems have a slew rate fast enough to track this correctly, others blur it to an average shade of gray, and do not resolve the lines, or give

  16. HealthRecSys: A semantic content-based recommender system to complement health videos.

    PubMed

    Sanchez Bocanegra, Carlos Luis; Sevillano Ramos, Jose Luis; Rizo, Carlos; Civit, Anton; Fernandez-Luque, Luis

    2017-05-15

    The Internet, and its popularity, continues to grow at an unprecedented pace. Watching videos online is very popular; it is estimated that 500 h of video are uploaded onto YouTube, a video-sharing service, every minute and that, by 2019, video formats will comprise more than 80% of Internet traffic. Health-related videos are very popular on YouTube, but their quality is always a matter of concern. One approach to enhancing the quality of online videos is to provide additional educational health content, such as websites, to support health consumers. This study investigates the feasibility of building a content-based recommender system that links health consumers to reputable health educational websites from MedlinePlus for a given health video from YouTube. The dataset for this study includes a collection of health-related videos and their available metadata. Semantic technologies (such as SNOMED-CT and Bio-ontology) were used to recommend health websites from MedlinePlus. A total of 26 healths professionals participated in evaluating 253 recommended links for a total of 53 videos about general health, hypertension, or diabetes. The relevance of the recommended health websites from MedlinePlus to the videos was measured using information retrieval metrics such as the normalized discounted cumulative gain and precision at K. The majority of websites recommended by our system for health videos were relevant, based on ratings by health professionals. The normalized discounted cumulative gain was between 46% and 90% for the different topics. Our study demonstrates the feasibility of using a semantic content-based recommender system to enrich YouTube health videos. Evaluation with end-users, in addition to healthcare professionals, will be required to identify the acceptance of these recommendations in a nonsimulated information-seeking context.

  17. Video techniques and data compared with observation in emergency trauma care

    PubMed Central

    Mackenzie, C; Xiao, Y

    2003-01-01

    Video recording is underused in improving patient safety and understanding performance shaping factors in patient care. We report our experience of using video recording techniques in a trauma centre, including how to gain cooperation of clinicians for video recording of their workplace performance, identify strengths of video compared with observation, and suggest processes for consent and maintenance of confidentiality of video records. Video records are a rich source of data for documenting clinician performance which reveal safety and systems issues not identified by observation. Emergency procedures and video records of critical events identified patient safety, clinical, quality assurance, systems failures, and ergonomic issues. Video recording is a powerful feedback and training tool and provides a reusable record of events that can be repeatedly reviewed and used as research data. It allows expanded analyses of time critical events, trauma resuscitation, anaesthesia, and surgical tasks. To overcome some of the key obstacles in deploying video recording techniques, researchers should (1) develop trust with video recorded subjects, (2) obtain clinician participation for introduction of a new protocol or line of investigation, (3) report aggregated video recorded data and use clinician reviews for feedback on covert processes and cognitive analyses, and (4) involve multidisciplinary experts in medicine and nursing. PMID:14645896

  18. Experienced quality factors: qualitative evaluation approach to audiovisual quality

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Jumisko-Pyykkö, Satu; Häkkinen, Jukka; Nyman, Göte

    2007-02-01

    Subjective evaluation is used to identify impairment factors of multimedia quality. The final quality is often formulated via quantitative experiments, but this approach has its constraints, as subject's quality interpretations, experiences and quality evaluation criteria are disregarded. To identify these quality evaluation factors, this study examined qualitatively the criteria participants used to evaluate audiovisual video quality. A semi-structured interview was conducted with 60 participants after a subjective audiovisual quality evaluation experiment. The assessment compared several, relatively low audio-video bitrate ratios with five different television contents on mobile device. In the analysis, methodological triangulation (grounded theory, Bayesian networks and correspondence analysis) was applied to approach the qualitative quality. The results showed that the most important evaluation criteria were the factors of visual quality, contents, factors of audio quality, usefulness - followability and audiovisual interaction. Several relations between the quality factors and the similarities between the contents were identified. As a research methodological recommendation, the focus on content and usage related factors need to be further examined to improve the quality evaluation experiments.

  19. Low-Quality Housing Is Associated With Increased Risk of Malaria Infection: A National Population-Based Study From the Low Transmission Setting of Swaziland

    PubMed Central

    Dlamini, Nomcebo; Ntshalintshali, Nyasatu; Pindolia, Deepa; Allen, Regan; Nhlabathi, Nomcebo; Novotny, Joseph; Kang Dufour, Mi-Suk; Midekisa, Alemayehu; Gosling, Roly; LeMenach, Arnaud; Cohen, Justin; Dorsey, Grant; Greenhouse, Bryan; Kunene, Simon

    2017-01-01

    Abstract Background. Low-quality housing may confer risk of malaria infection, but evidence in low transmission settings is limited. Methods. To examine the relationship between individual level housing quality and locally acquired infection in children and adults, a population-based cross-sectional analysis was performed using existing surveillance data from the low transmission setting of Swaziland. From 2012 to 2015, cases were identified through standard diagnostics in health facilities and by loop-mediated isothermal amplification in active surveillance, with uninfected subjects being household members and neighbors. Housing was visually assessed in a home visit and then classified as low, high, or medium quality, based on housing components being traditional, modern, or both, respectively. Results. Overall, 11426 individuals were included in the study: 10960 uninfected and 466 infected (301 symptomatic and 165 asymptomatic). Six percent resided in low-quality houses, 26% in medium-quality houses, and 68% in high-quality houses. In adjusted models, low- and medium-quality construction was associated with increased risk of malaria compared with high-quality construction (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 2.11 and 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.26–3.53 for low vs high; AOR, 1.56 and 95% CI, 1.15–2.11 for medium vs high). The relationship was independent of vector control, which also conferred a protective effect (AOR, 0.67; 95% CI, .50–.90) for sleeping under an insecticide-treated bed net or a sprayed structure compared with neither. Conclusions. Our study adds to the limited literature on housing quality and malaria risk from low transmission settings. Housing improvements may offer an attractive and sustainable additional strategy to support countries in malaria elimination. PMID:28580365

  20. A new method for digital video documentation in surgical procedures and minimally invasive surgery.

    PubMed

    Wurnig, P N; Hollaus, P H; Wurnig, C H; Wolf, R K; Ohtsuka, T; Pridun, N S

    2003-02-01

    Documentation of surgical procedures is limited to the accuracy of description, which depends on the vocabulary and the descriptive prowess of the surgeon. Even analog video recording could not solve the problem of documentation satisfactorily due to the abundance of recorded material. By capturing the video digitally, most problems are solved in the circumstances described in this article. We developed a cheap and useful digital video capturing system that consists of conventional computer components. Video images and clips can be captured intraoperatively and are immediately available. The system is a commercial personal computer specially configured for digital video capturing and is connected by wire to the video tower. Filming was done with a conventional endoscopic video camera. A total of 65 open and endoscopic procedures were documented in an orthopedic and a thoracic surgery unit. The median number of clips per surgical procedure was 6 (range, 1-17), and the median storage volume was 49 MB (range, 3-360 MB) in compressed form. The median duration of a video clip was 4 min 25 s (range, 45 s to 21 min). Median time for editing a video clip was 12 min for an advanced user (including cutting, title for the movie, and compression). The quality of the clips renders them suitable for presentations. This digital video documentation system allows easy capturing of intraoperative video sequences in high quality. All possibilities of documentation can be performed. With the use of an endoscopic video camera, no compromises with respect to sterility and surgical elbowroom are necessary. The cost is much lower than commercially available systems, and setting changes can be performed easily without trained specialists.

  1. Video Elicitation Interviews: A Qualitative Research Method for Investigating Physician-Patient Interactions

    PubMed Central

    Henry, Stephen G.; Fetters, Michael D.

    2012-01-01

    We describe the concept and method of video elicitation interviews and provide practical guidance for primary care researchers who want to use this qualitative method to investigate physician-patient interactions. During video elicitation interviews, researchers interview patients or physicians about a recent clinical interaction using a video recording of that interaction as an elicitation tool. Video elicitation is useful because it allows researchers to integrate data about the content of physician-patient interactions gained from video recordings with data about participants’ associated thoughts, beliefs, and emotions gained from elicitation interviews. This method also facilitates investigation of specific events or moments during interactions. Video elicitation interviews are logistically demanding and time consuming, and they should be reserved for research questions that cannot be fully addressed using either standard interviews or video recordings in isolation. As many components of primary care fall into this category, high-quality video elicitation interviews can be an important method for understanding and improving physician-patient interactions in primary care. PMID:22412003

  2. Video elicitation interviews: a qualitative research method for investigating physician-patient interactions.

    PubMed

    Henry, Stephen G; Fetters, Michael D

    2012-01-01

    We describe the concept and method of video elicitation interviews and provide practical guidance for primary care researchers who want to use this qualitative method to investigate physician-patient interactions. During video elicitation interviews, researchers interview patients or physicians about a recent clinical interaction using a video recording of that interaction as an elicitation tool. Video elicitation is useful because it allows researchers to integrate data about the content of physician-patient interactions gained from video recordings with data about participants' associated thoughts, beliefs, and emotions gained from elicitation interviews. This method also facilitates investigation of specific events or moments during interactions. Video elicitation interviews are logistically demanding and time consuming, and they should be reserved for research questions that cannot be fully addressed using either standard interviews or video recordings in isolation. As many components of primary care fall into this category, high-quality video elicitation interviews can be an important method for understanding and improving physician-patient interactions in primary care.

  3. Immersive video for virtual tourism

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hernandez, Luis A.; Taibo, Javier; Seoane, Antonio J.

    2001-11-01

    This paper describes a new panoramic, 360 degree(s) video system and its use in a real application for virtual tourism. The development of this system has required to design new hardware for multi-camera recording, and software for video processing in order to elaborate the panorama frames and to playback the resulting high resolution video footage on a regular PC. The system makes use of new VR display hardware, such as WindowVR, in order to make the view dependent on the viewer's spatial orientation and so enhance immersiveness. There are very few examples of similar technologies and the existing ones are extremely expensive and/or impossible to be implemented on personal computers with acceptable quality. The idea of the system starts from the concept of Panorama picture, developed in technologies such as QuickTimeVR. This idea is extended to the concept of panorama frame that leads to panorama video. However, many problems are to be solved to implement this simple scheme. Data acquisition involves simultaneously footage recording in every direction, and latter processing to convert every set of frames in a single high resolution panorama frame. Since there is no common hardware capable of 4096x512 video playback at 25 fps rate, it must be stripped in smaller pieces which the system must manage to get the right frames of the right parts as the user movement demands it. As the system must be immersive, the physical interface to watch the 360 degree(s) video is a WindowVR, that is, a flat screen with an orientation tracker that the user holds in his hands, moving it like if it were a virtual window through which the city and its activity is being shown.

  4. Video Browsing on Handheld Devices

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Hürst, Wolfgang

    Recent improvements in processing power, storage space, and video codec development enable users now to playback video on their handheld devices in a reasonable quality. However, given the form factor restrictions of such a mobile device, screen size still remains a natural limit and - as the term "handheld" implies - always will be a critical resource. This is not only true for video but any data that is processed on such devices. For this reason, developers have come up with new and innovative ways to deal with large documents in such limited scenarios. For example, if you look at the iPhone, innovative techniques such as flicking have been introduced to skim large lists of text (e.g. hundreds of entries in your music collection). Automatically adapting the zoom level to, for example, the width of table cells when double tapping on the screen enables reasonable browsing of web pages that have originally been designed for large, desktop PC sized screens. A multi touch interface allows you to easily zoom in and out of large text documents and images using two fingers. In the next section, we will illustrate that advanced techniques to browse large video files have been developed in the past years, as well. However, if you look at state-of-the-art video players on mobile devices, normally just simple, VCR like controls are supported (at least at the time of this writing) that only allow users to just start, stop, and pause video playback. If supported at all, browsing and navigation functionality is often restricted to simple skipping of chapters via two single buttons for backward and forward navigation and a small and thus not very sensitive timeline slider.

  5. Pneumothorax effects on pulmonary acoustic transmission.

    PubMed

    Mansy, Hansen A; Balk, Robert A; Warren, William H; Royston, Thomas J; Dai, Zoujun; Peng, Ying; Sandler, Richard H

    2015-08-01

    Pneumothorax (PTX) is an abnormal accumulation of air between the lung and the chest wall. It is a relatively common and potentially life-threatening condition encountered in patients who are critically ill or have experienced trauma. Auscultatory signs of PTX include decreased breath sounds during the physical examination. The objective of this exploratory study was to investigate the changes in sound transmission in the thorax due to PTX in humans. Nineteen human subjects who underwent video-assisted thoracic surgery, during which lung collapse is a normal part of the surgery, participated in the study. After subjects were intubated and mechanically ventilated, sounds were introduced into their airways via an endotracheal tube. Sounds were then measured over the chest surface before and after lung collapse. PTX caused small changes in acoustic transmission for frequencies below 400 Hz. A larger decrease in sound transmission was observed from 400 to 600 Hz, possibly due to the stronger acoustic transmission blocking of the pleural air. At frequencies above 1 kHz, the sound waves became weaker and so did their changes with PTX. The study elucidated some of the possible mechanisms of sound propagation changes with PTX. Sound transmission measurement was able to distinguish between baseline and PTX states in this small patient group. Future studies are needed to evaluate this technique in a wider population. Copyright © 2015 the American Physiological Society.

  6. Pneumothorax effects on pulmonary acoustic transmission

    PubMed Central

    Balk, Robert A.; Warren, William H.; Royston, Thomas J.; Dai, Zoujun; Peng, Ying; Sandler, Richard H.

    2015-01-01

    Pneumothorax (PTX) is an abnormal accumulation of air between the lung and the chest wall. It is a relatively common and potentially life-threatening condition encountered in patients who are critically ill or have experienced trauma. Auscultatory signs of PTX include decreased breath sounds during the physical examination. The objective of this exploratory study was to investigate the changes in sound transmission in the thorax due to PTX in humans. Nineteen human subjects who underwent video-assisted thoracic surgery, during which lung collapse is a normal part of the surgery, participated in the study. After subjects were intubated and mechanically ventilated, sounds were introduced into their airways via an endotracheal tube. Sounds were then measured over the chest surface before and after lung collapse. PTX caused small changes in acoustic transmission for frequencies below 400 Hz. A larger decrease in sound transmission was observed from 400 to 600 Hz, possibly due to the stronger acoustic transmission blocking of the pleural air. At frequencies above 1 kHz, the sound waves became weaker and so did their changes with PTX. The study elucidated some of the possible mechanisms of sound propagation changes with PTX. Sound transmission measurement was able to distinguish between baseline and PTX states in this small patient group. Future studies are needed to evaluate this technique in a wider population. PMID:26023225

  7. Selective visual region of interest to enhance medical video conferencing

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Bonneau, Walt, Jr.; Read, Christopher J.; Shirali, Girish

    1998-06-01

    The continued economic pressure that is being placed upon the healthcare industry creates both challenge and opportunity to develop cost effective healthcare tools. Tools that provide improvements in the quality of medical care at the same time improve the distribution of efficient care will create product demand. Video Conferencing systems are one of the latest product technologies that are evolving their way into healthcare applications. The systems that provide quality Bi- directional video and imaging at the lowest system and communication cost are creating many possible options for the healthcare industry. A method to use only 128k bits/sec. of ISDN bandwidth while providing quality video images in selected regions will be applied to echocardiograms using a low cost video conferencing system operating within a basic rate ISDN line bandwidth. Within a given display area (frame) it has been observed that only selected informational areas of the frame of are of value when viewing for detail and precision within an image. Much in the same manner that a photograph is cropped. If a method to accomplish Region Of Interest (ROI) was applied to video conferencing using H.320 with H.263 (compression) and H.281 (camera control) international standards, medical image quality could be achieved in a cost-effective manner. For example, the cardiologist could be provided with a selectable three to eight end-point viewable ROI polygon that defines the ROI in the image. This is achieved by the video system calculating the selected regional end-points and creating an alpha mask to signify the importance of the ROI to the compression processor. This region is then applied to the compression algorithm in a manner that the majority of the video conferencing processor cycles are focused on the ROI of the image. An occasional update of the non-ROI area is processed to maintain total image coherence. The user could control the non-ROI area updates. Providing encoder side ROI

  8. Video Game Use in the Treatment of Amblyopia: Weighing the Risks of Addiction.

    PubMed

    Xu, Chaoying S; Chen, Jessica S; Adelman, Ron A

    2015-09-01

    Video games have surged in popularity due to their entertainment factor and, with recent innovation, their use in health care. This review explores the dual facets of video games in treating vision impairment in amblyopia as well as their potential for overuse and addiction. Specifically, this review examines video game addiction from a biopsychosocial perspective and relates the addictive qualities of video games with their use as a therapeutic treatment for amblyopia. Current literature supports both the identification of video game addiction as a disease, as well as the therapeutic potential of video games in clinical trials. We show the need for clinicians to be aware of the dangers associated with video game overuse and the need for future studies to examine the risks associated with their health care benefits.

  9. Video Game Use in the Treatment of Amblyopia: Weighing the Risks of Addiction

    PubMed Central

    Xu, Chaoying S.; Chen, Jessica S.; Adelman, Ron A.

    2015-01-01

    Video games have surged in popularity due to their entertainment factor and, with recent innovation, their use in health care. This review explores the dual facets of video games in treating vision impairment in amblyopia as well as their potential for overuse and addiction. Specifically, this review examines video game addiction from a biopsychosocial perspective and relates the addictive qualities of video games with their use as a therapeutic treatment for amblyopia. Current literature supports both the identification of video game addiction as a disease, as well as the therapeutic potential of video games in clinical trials. We show the need for clinicians to be aware of the dangers associated with video game overuse and the need for future studies to examine the risks associated with their health care benefits. PMID:26339215

  10. Video streaming in nursing education: bringing life to online education.

    PubMed

    Smith-Stoner, Marilyn; Willer, Ann

    2003-01-01

    Distance education is a standard form of instruction for many colleges of nursing. Web-based course and program content has been delivered primarily through text-based presentations such as PowerPoint slides and Web search activities. However, the rapid pace of technological innovation is making available more sophisticated forms of delivery such as video streaming. High-quality video streams, created at the instructor's desktop or in basic recording studios, can be produced that build on PowerPoint or create new media for use on the Web. The technology required to design, produce, and upload short video-streamed course content objects to the Internet is described. The preparation of materials, suggested production guidelines, and examples of information presented via desktop video methods are presented.

  11. Does training with 3D videos improve decision-making in team invasion sports?

    PubMed

    Hohmann, Tanja; Obelöer, Hilke; Schlapkohl, Nele; Raab, Markus

    2016-01-01

    We examined the effectiveness of video-based decision training in national youth handball teams. Extending previous research, we tested in Study 1 whether a three-dimensional (3D) video training group would outperform a two-dimensional (2D) group. In Study 2, a 3D training group was compared to a control group and a group trained with a traditional tactic board. In both studies, training duration was 6 weeks. Performance was measured in a pre- to post-retention design. The tests consisted of a decision-making task measuring quality of decisions (first and best option) and decision time (time for first and best option). The results of Study 1 showed learning effects and revealed that the 3D video group made faster first-option choices than the 2D group, but differences in the quality of options were not pronounced. The results of Study 2 revealed learning effects for both training groups compared to the control group, and faster choices in the 3D group compared to both other groups. Together, the results show that 3D video training is the most useful tool for improving choices in handball, but only in reference to decision time and not decision quality. We discuss the usefulness of a 3D video tool for training of decision-making skills outside the laboratory or gym.

  12. TV audio and video on the same channel

    NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

    Hopkins, J. B.

    1979-01-01

    Transmitting technique adds audio to video signal during vertical blanking interval. SIVI (signal in the vertical interval) is used by TV networks and stations to transmit cuing and automatic-switching tone signals to augment automatic and manual operations. It can also be used to transmit one-way instructional information, such as bulletin alerts, program changes, and commercial-cutaway aural cues from the networks to affiliates. Additonally, it can be used as extra sound channel for second-language transmission to biligual stations.

  13. Dashboard Videos

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Gleue, Alan D.; Depcik, Chris; Peltier, Ted

    2012-11-01

    Last school year, I had a web link emailed to me entitled "A Dashboard Physics Lesson." The link, created and posted by Dale Basier on his Lab Out Loud blog, illustrates video of a car's speedometer synchronized with video of the road. These two separate video streams are compiled into one video that students can watch and analyze. After seeing this website and video, I decided to create my own dashboard videos to show to my high school physics students. I have produced and synchronized 12 separate dashboard videos, each about 10 minutes in length, driving around the city of Lawrence, KS, and Douglas County, and posted them to a website.2 Each video reflects different types of driving: both positive and negative accelerations and constant speeds. As shown in Fig. 1, I was able to capture speed, distance, and miles per gallon from my dashboard instrumentation. By linking this with a stopwatch, each of these quantities can be graphed with respect to time. I anticipate and hope that teachers will find these useful in their own classrooms, i.e., having physics students watch the videos and create their own motion maps (distance-time, speed-time) for study.

  14. Advancement of thyroid surgery video recording: A comparison between two full HD head mounted video cameras.

    PubMed

    Ortensi, Andrea; Panunzi, Andrea; Trombetta, Silvia; Cattaneo, Alberto; Sorrenti, Salvatore; D'Orazi, Valerio

    2017-05-01

    The aim of this study was to test two different video cameras and recording systems used in thyroid surgery in our Department. This is meant to be an attempt to record the real point of view of the magnified vision of surgeon, so as to make the viewer aware of the difference with the naked eye vision. In this retrospective study, we recorded and compared twenty thyroidectomies performed using loupes magnification and microsurgical technique: ten were recorded with GoPro ® 4 Session action cam (commercially available) and ten with our new prototype of head mounted video camera. Settings were selected before surgery for both cameras. The recording time is about from 1 to 2 h for GoPro ® and from 3 to 5 h for our prototype. The average time of preparation to fit the camera on the surgeon's head and set the functionality is about 5 min for GoPro ® and 7-8 min for the prototype, mostly due to HDMI wiring cable. Videos recorded with the prototype require no further editing, which is mandatory for videos recorded with GoPro ® to highlight the surgical details. the present study showed that our prototype of video camera, compared with GoPro ® 4 Session, guarantees best results in terms of surgical video recording quality, provides to the viewer the exact perspective of the microsurgeon and shows accurately his magnified view through the loupes in thyroid surgery. These recordings are surgical aids for teaching and education and might be a method of self-analysis of surgical technique. Copyright © 2017 IJS Publishing Group Ltd. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  15. Chroma sampling and modulation techniques in high dynamic range video coding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Dai, Wei; Krishnan, Madhu; Topiwala, Pankaj

    2015-09-01

    High Dynamic Range and Wide Color Gamut (HDR/WCG) Video Coding is an area of intense research interest in the engineering community, for potential near-term deployment in the marketplace. HDR greatly enhances the dynamic range of video content (up to 10,000 nits), as well as broadens the chroma representation (BT.2020). The resulting content offers new challenges in its coding and transmission. The Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) of the International Standards Organization (ISO) is currently exploring coding efficiency and/or the functionality enhancements of the recently developed HEVC video standard for HDR and WCG content. FastVDO has developed an advanced approach to coding HDR video, based on splitting the HDR signal into a smoothed luminance (SL) signal, and an associated base signal (B). Both signals are then chroma downsampled to YFbFr 4:2:0 signals, using advanced resampling filters, and coded using the Main10 High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) standard, which has been developed jointly by ISO/IEC MPEG and ITU-T WP3/16 (VCEG). Our proposal offers both efficient coding, and backwards compatibility with the existing HEVC Main10 Profile. That is, an existing Main10 decoder can produce a viewable standard dynamic range video, suitable for existing screens. Subjective tests show visible improvement over the anchors. Objective tests show a sizable gain of over 25% in PSNR (RGB domain) on average, for a key set of test clips selected by the ISO/MPEG committee.

  16. Twelve tips for reducing production time and increasing long-term usability of instructional video.

    PubMed

    Norman, Marie K

    2017-08-01

    The use of instructional video is increasing across all disciplines and levels of education. Although video has a number of distinct advantages for course delivery and student learning, it can also be time-consuming and resource-intensive to produce, which imposes a burden on busy faculty. With video poised to play a larger role in medical education, we need strategies for streamlining video production and ensuring that the video we produce is of lasting value. This article draws on learning research and best practices in educational technology, along with the author's experience in online education and video production. It offers 12 practical tips for reducing the initial time investment in video production and creating video that can be reused long into the future. These tips can help faculty and departments create high-quality instructional video while using their time and resources more wisely.

  17. Adaptive format conversion for scalable video coding

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Wan, Wade K.; Lim, Jae S.

    2001-12-01

    The enhancement layer in many scalable coding algorithms is composed of residual coding information. There is another type of information that can be transmitted instead of (or in addition to) residual coding. Since the encoder has access to the original sequence, it can utilize adaptive format conversion (AFC) to generate the enhancement layer and transmit the different format conversion methods as enhancement data. This paper investigates the use of adaptive format conversion information as enhancement data in scalable video coding. Experimental results are shown for a wide range of base layer qualities and enhancement bitrates to determine when AFC can improve video scalability. Since the parameters needed for AFC are small compared to residual coding, AFC can provide video scalability at low enhancement layer bitrates that are not possible with residual coding. In addition, AFC can also be used in addition to residual coding to improve video scalability at higher enhancement layer bitrates. Adaptive format conversion has not been studied in detail, but many scalable applications may benefit from it. An example of an application that AFC is well-suited for is the migration path for digital television where AFC can provide immediate video scalability as well as assist future migrations.

  18. Empirical evaluation of H.265/HEVC-based dynamic adaptive video streaming over HTTP (HEVC-DASH)

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Irondi, Iheanyi; Wang, Qi; Grecos, Christos

    2014-05-01

    Real-time HTTP streaming has gained global popularity for delivering video content over Internet. In particular, the recent MPEG-DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP) standard enables on-demand, live, and adaptive Internet streaming in response to network bandwidth fluctuations. Meanwhile, emerging is the new-generation video coding standard, H.265/HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) promises to reduce the bandwidth requirement by 50% at the same video quality when compared with the current H.264/AVC standard. However, little existing work has addressed the integration of the DASH and HEVC standards, let alone empirical performance evaluation of such systems. This paper presents an experimental HEVC-DASH system, which is a pull-based adaptive streaming solution that delivers HEVC-coded video content through conventional HTTP servers where the client switches to its desired quality, resolution or bitrate based on the available network bandwidth. Previous studies in DASH have focused on H.264/AVC, whereas we present an empirical evaluation of the HEVC-DASH system by implementing a real-world test bed, which consists of an Apache HTTP Server with GPAC, an MP4Client (GPAC) with open HEVC-based DASH client and a NETEM box in the middle emulating different network conditions. We investigate and analyze the performance of HEVC-DASH by exploring the impact of various network conditions such as packet loss, bandwidth and delay on video quality. Furthermore, we compare the Intra and Random Access profiles of HEVC coding with the Intra profile of H.264/AVC when the correspondingly encoded video is streamed with DASH. Finally, we explore the correlation among the quality metrics and network conditions, and empirically establish under which conditions the different codecs can provide satisfactory performance.

  19. Development of a Coding Instrument to Assess the Quality and Content of Anti-Tobacco Video Games.

    PubMed

    Alber, Julia M; Watson, Anna M; Barnett, Tracey E; Mercado, Rebeccah; Bernhardt, Jay M

    2015-07-01

    Previous research has shown the use of electronic video games as an effective method for increasing content knowledge about the risks of drugs and alcohol use for adolescents. Although best practice suggests that theory, health communication strategies, and game appeal are important characteristics for developing games, no instruments are currently available to examine the quality and content of tobacco prevention and cessation electronic games. This study presents the systematic development of a coding instrument to measure the quality, use of theory, and health communication strategies of tobacco cessation and prevention electronic games. Using previous research and expert review, a content analysis coding instrument measuring 67 characteristics was developed with three overarching categories: type and quality of games, theory and approach, and type and format of messages. Two trained coders applied the instrument to 88 games on four platforms (personal computer, Nintendo DS, iPhone, and Android phone) to field test the instrument. Cohen's kappa for each item ranged from 0.66 to 1.00, with an average kappa value of 0.97. Future research can adapt this coding instrument to games addressing other health issues. In addition, the instrument questions can serve as a useful guide for evidence-based game development.

  20. Development of a Coding Instrument to Assess the Quality and Content of Anti-Tobacco Video Games

    PubMed Central

    Alber, Julia M.; Watson, Anna M.; Barnett, Tracey E.; Mercado, Rebeccah

    2015-01-01

    Abstract Previous research has shown the use of electronic video games as an effective method for increasing content knowledge about the risks of drugs and alcohol use for adolescents. Although best practice suggests that theory, health communication strategies, and game appeal are important characteristics for developing games, no instruments are currently available to examine the quality and content of tobacco prevention and cessation electronic games. This study presents the systematic development of a coding instrument to measure the quality, use of theory, and health communication strategies of tobacco cessation and prevention electronic games. Using previous research and expert review, a content analysis coding instrument measuring 67 characteristics was developed with three overarching categories: type and quality of games, theory and approach, and type and format of messages. Two trained coders applied the instrument to 88 games on four platforms (personal computer, Nintendo DS, iPhone, and Android phone) to field test the instrument. Cohen's kappa for each item ranged from 0.66 to 1.00, with an average kappa value of 0.97. Future research can adapt this coding instrument to games addressing other health issues. In addition, the instrument questions can serve as a useful guide for evidence-based game development. PMID:26167842

  1. High Speed Video Applications In The Pharmaceutical Industry

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Stapley, David

    1985-02-01

    The pursuit of quality is essential in the development and production of drugs. The pursuit of excellence is relentless, a never ending search. In the pharmaceutical industry, we all know and apply wide-ranging techniques to assure quality production. We all know that in reality none of these techniques are perfect for all situations. We have all experienced, the damaged foil, blister or tube, the missing leaflet, the 'hard to read' batch code. We are all aware of the need to supplement the traditional techniques of fault finding. This paper shows how high speed video systems can be applied to fully automated filling and packaging operations as a tool to aid the company's drive for high quality and productivity. The range of products involved totals some 350 in approximately 3,000 pack variants, encompassing creams, ointments, lotions, capsules, tablets, parenteral and sterile antibiotics. Pharmaceutical production demands diligence at all stages, with optimum use of the techniques offered by the latest technology. Figure 1 shows typical stages of pharmaceutical production in which quality must be assured, and highlights those stages where the use of high speed video systems have proved of value to date. The use of high speed video systems begins with the very first use of machine and materials: commissioning and validation, (the term used for determining that a process is capable of consistently producing the requisite quality) and continues to support inprocess monitoring, throughout the life of the plant. The activity of validation in the packaging environment is particularly in need of a tool to see the nature of high speed faults, no matter how infrequently they occur, so that informed changes can be made precisely and rapidly. The prime use of this tool is to ensure that machines are less sensitive to minor variations in component characteristics.

  2. Single-layer HDR video coding with SDR backward compatibility

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Lasserre, S.; François, E.; Le Léannec, F.; Touzé, D.

    2016-09-01

    The migration from High Definition (HD) TV to Ultra High Definition (UHD) is already underway. In addition to an increase of picture spatial resolution, UHD will bring more color and higher contrast by introducing Wide Color Gamut (WCG) and High Dynamic Range (HDR) video. As both Standard Dynamic Range (SDR) and HDR devices will coexist in the ecosystem, the transition from Standard Dynamic Range (SDR) to HDR will require distribution solutions supporting some level of backward compatibility. This paper presents a new HDR content distribution scheme, named SL-HDR1, using a single layer codec design and providing SDR compatibility. The solution is based on a pre-encoding HDR-to-SDR conversion, generating a backward compatible SDR video, with side dynamic metadata. The resulting SDR video is then compressed, distributed and decoded using standard-compliant decoders (e.g. HEVC Main 10 compliant). The decoded SDR video can be directly rendered on SDR displays without adaptation. Dynamic metadata of limited size are generated by the pre-processing and used to reconstruct the HDR signal from the decoded SDR video, using a post-processing that is the functional inverse of the pre-processing. Both HDR quality and artistic intent are preserved. Pre- and post-processing are applied independently per picture, do not involve any inter-pixel dependency, and are codec agnostic. Compression performance, and SDR quality are shown to be solidly improved compared to the non-backward and backward-compatible approaches, respectively using the Perceptual Quantization (PQ) and Hybrid Log Gamma (HLG) Opto-Electronic Transfer Functions (OETF).

  3. Influence of Telecommunication Modality, Internet Transmission Quality, and Accessories on Speech Perception in Cochlear Implant Users

    PubMed Central

    Koller, Roger; Guignard, Jérémie; Caversaccio, Marco; Kompis, Martin; Senn, Pascal

    2017-01-01

    Background Telecommunication is limited or even impossible for more than one-thirds of all cochlear implant (CI) users. Objective We sought therefore to study the impact of voice quality on speech perception with voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) under real and adverse network conditions. Methods Telephone speech perception was assessed in 19 CI users (15-69 years, average 42 years), using the German HSM (Hochmair-Schulz-Moser) sentence test comparing Skype and conventional telephone (public switched telephone networks, PSTN) transmission using a personal computer (PC) and a digital enhanced cordless telecommunications (DECT) telephone dual device. Five different Internet transmission quality modes and four accessories (PC speakers, headphones, 3.5 mm jack audio cable, and induction loop) were compared. As a secondary outcome, the subjective perceived voice quality was assessed using the mean opinion score (MOS). Results Speech telephone perception was significantly better (median 91.6%, P<.001) with Skype compared with PSTN (median 42.5%) under optimal conditions. Skype calls under adverse network conditions (data packet loss > 15%) were not superior to conventional telephony. In addition, there were no significant differences between the tested accessories (P>.05) using a PC. Coupling a Skype DECT phone device with an audio cable to the CI, however, resulted in higher speech perception (median 65%) and subjective MOS scores (3.2) than using PSTN (median 7.5%, P<.001). Conclusions Skype calls significantly improve speech perception for CI users compared with conventional telephony under real network conditions. Listening accessories do not further improve listening experience. Current Skype DECT telephone devices do not fully offer technical advantages in voice quality. PMID:28438727

  4. Multiple Generations on Video Tape Recorders.

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Wiens, Jacob H.

    Helical scan video tape recorders were tested for their dubbing characteristics in order to make selection data available to media personnel. The equipment, two recorders of each type tested, was submitted by the manufacturers. The test was designed to produce quality evaluations for three generations of a single tape, thereby encompassing all…

  5. Role of Video Games in Improving Health-Related Outcomes

    PubMed Central

    Primack, Brian A.; Carroll, Mary V.; McNamara, Megan; Klem, Mary Lou; King, Brandy; Rich, Michael O.; Chan, Chun W.; Nayak, Smita

    2012-01-01

    Context Video games represent a multibillion-dollar industry in the U.S. Although video gaming has been associated with many negative health consequences, it may also be useful for therapeutic purposes. The goal of this study was to determine whether video games may be useful in improving health outcomes. Evidence acquisition Literature searches were performed in February 2010 in six databases: the Center on Media and Child Health Database of Research, MEDLINE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials. Reference lists were hand-searched to identify additional studies. Only RCTs that tested the effect of video games on a positive, clinically relevant health consequence were included. Study selection criteria were strictly defined and applied by two researchers working independently. Study background information (e.g., location, funding source), sample data (e.g., number of study participants, demographics), intervention and control details, outcomes data, and quality measures were abstracted independently by two researchers. Evidence synthesis Of 1452 articles retrieved using the current search strategy, 38 met all criteria for inclusion. Eligible studies used video games to provide physical therapy, psychological therapy, improved disease self-management, health education, distraction from discomfort, increased physical activity, and skills training for clinicians. Among the 38 studies, a total of 195 health outcomes were examined. Video games improved 69% of psychological therapy outcomes, 59% of physical therapy outcomes, 50% of physical activity outcomes, 46% of clinician skills outcomes, 42% of health education outcomes, 42% of pain distraction outcomes, and 37% of disease self-management outcomes. Study quality was generally poor; for example, two thirds (66%) of studies had follow-up periods of <12 weeks, and only 11% of studies blinded researchers. Conclusions There is potential promise for video games to improve

  6. Digital Video (DV): A Primer for Developing an Enterprise Video Strategy

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Talovich, Thomas L.

    2002-09-01

    The purpose of this thesis is to provide an overview of digital video production and delivery. The thesis presents independent research demonstrating the educational value of incorporating video and multimedia content in training and education programs. The thesis explains the fundamental concepts associated with the process of planning, preparing, and publishing video content and assists in the development of follow-on strategies for incorporation of video content into distance training and education programs. The thesis provides an overview of the following technologies: Digital Video, Digital Video Editors, Video Compression, Streaming Video, and Optical Storage Media.

  7. Low-Quality Housing Is Associated With Increased Risk of Malaria Infection: A National Population-Based Study From the Low Transmission Setting of Swaziland.

    PubMed

    Dlamini, Nomcebo; Hsiang, Michelle S; Ntshalintshali, Nyasatu; Pindolia, Deepa; Allen, Regan; Nhlabathi, Nomcebo; Novotny, Joseph; Kang Dufour, Mi-Suk; Midekisa, Alemayehu; Gosling, Roly; LeMenach, Arnaud; Cohen, Justin; Dorsey, Grant; Greenhouse, Bryan; Kunene, Simon

    2017-01-01

    Low-quality housing may confer risk of malaria infection, but evidence in low transmission settings is limited. To examine the relationship between individual level housing quality and locally acquired infection in children and adults, a population-based cross-sectional analysis was performed using existing surveillance data from the low transmission setting of Swaziland. From 2012 to 2015, cases were identified through standard diagnostics in health facilities and by loop-mediated isothermal amplification in active surveillance, with uninfected subjects being household members and neighbors. Housing was visually assessed in a home visit and then classified as low, high, or medium quality, based on housing components being traditional, modern, or both, respectively. Overall, 11426 individuals were included in the study: 10960 uninfected and 466 infected (301 symptomatic and 165 asymptomatic). Six percent resided in low-quality houses, 26% in medium-quality houses, and 68% in high-quality houses. In adjusted models, low- and medium-quality construction was associated with increased risk of malaria compared with high-quality construction (adjusted odds ratio [AOR], 2.11 and 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.26-3.53 for low vs high; AOR, 1.56 and 95% CI, 1.15-2.11 for medium vs high). The relationship was independent of vector control, which also conferred a protective effect (AOR, 0.67; 95% CI, .50-.90) for sleeping under an insecticide-treated bed net or a sprayed structure compared with neither. Our study adds to the limited literature on housing quality and malaria risk from low transmission settings. Housing improvements may offer an attractive and sustainable additional strategy to support countries in malaria elimination. © The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Infectious Diseases Society of America.

  8. Video-based noncooperative iris image segmentation.

    PubMed

    Du, Yingzi; Arslanturk, Emrah; Zhou, Zhi; Belcher, Craig

    2011-02-01

    In this paper, we propose a video-based noncooperative iris image segmentation scheme that incorporates a quality filter to quickly eliminate images without an eye, employs a coarse-to-fine segmentation scheme to improve the overall efficiency, uses a direct least squares fitting of ellipses method to model the deformed pupil and limbic boundaries, and develops a window gradient-based method to remove noise in the iris region. A remote iris acquisition system is set up to collect noncooperative iris video images. An objective method is used to quantitatively evaluate the accuracy of the segmentation results. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of this method. The proposed method would make noncooperative iris recognition or iris surveillance possible.

  9. Participant satisfaction with appearance-based versus health-based educational videos promoting sunscreen use: a randomized controlled trial.

    PubMed

    Tuong, William; Armstrong, April W

    2015-02-16

    Increasing participant satisfaction with health interventions can improve compliance with recommended health behaviors and lead to better health outcomes. However, factors that influence participant satisfaction have not been well studied in dermatology-specific behavioral health interventions. We sought to assess participant satisfaction of either an appearance-based educational video or a health-based educational video promoting sunscreen use along dimensions of usefulness of educational content, message appeal, and presentation quality. In a randomized controlled trial, participants were randomized 1:1 to view an appearance-based video or a health-based video. After six weeks, participant satisfaction with the educational videos was assessed. Fifty high school students were enrolled and completed the study. Participant satisfaction ratings were assessed using a pre-tested 10-point assessment scale. The participants rated the usefulness of the appearance-based video (8.1 ± 1.2) significantly higher than the health-based video (6.4 ± 1.4, p<0.001). The message appeal of the appearance-based video (8.3 ± 1.0) was also significantly higher than the health-based video (6.6 ± 1.6, p<0.001). The presentation quality rating was similar between the appearance-based video (7.8 ± 1.3) and the health-based video (8.1 ± 1.3), p=0.676. Adolescents rated the appearance-based video higher than the health-based video in terms of usefulness of educational content and message appeal.

  10. Looking Tasks Online: Utilizing Webcams to Collect Video Data from Home

    PubMed Central

    Semmelmann, Kilian; Hönekopp, Astrid; Weigelt, Sarah

    2017-01-01

    Online experimentation is emerging as a new methodology within classical data acquisition in psychology. It allows for easy, fast, broad, and cheap data conduction from the comfort of people’s homes. To add another method to the array of available tools, here we used recent developments in web technology to investigate the technical feasibility of online HyperText Markup Language-5/JavaScript-based video data recording. We employed a preferential looking task with children between 4 and 24 months. Parents and their children participated from home through a three-stage process: First, interested adults registered and took pictures through a webcam-based photo application. In the second step, we edited the pictures and integrated them into the design. Lastly, participants returned to the website and the video data acquisition took place through their webcam. In sum, we were able to create and employ the video recording application with participants as young as 4 months old. Quality-wise, no participant had to be removed due to the framerate or quality of videos and only 7% of data was excluded due to behavioral factors (lack of concentration). Results-wise, interrater reliability of rated looking side (left/right) showed a high agreement between raters, Fleiss’ Kappa, κ = 0.97, which can be translated to sufficient data quality for further analyses. With regard to on-/off-screen attention attribution, we found that children lost interest after about 10 s after trial onset using a static image presentation or 60 s total experimental time. Taken together, we were able to show that online video data recording is possible and viable for developmental psychology and beyond. PMID:28955284

  11. Looking Tasks Online: Utilizing Webcams to Collect Video Data from Home.

    PubMed

    Semmelmann, Kilian; Hönekopp, Astrid; Weigelt, Sarah

    2017-01-01

    Online experimentation is emerging as a new methodology within classical data acquisition in psychology. It allows for easy, fast, broad, and cheap data conduction from the comfort of people's homes. To add another method to the array of available tools, here we used recent developments in web technology to investigate the technical feasibility of online HyperText Markup Language-5/JavaScript-based video data recording. We employed a preferential looking task with children between 4 and 24 months. Parents and their children participated from home through a three-stage process: First, interested adults registered and took pictures through a webcam-based photo application. In the second step, we edited the pictures and integrated them into the design. Lastly, participants returned to the website and the video data acquisition took place through their webcam. In sum, we were able to create and employ the video recording application with participants as young as 4 months old. Quality-wise, no participant had to be removed due to the framerate or quality of videos and only 7% of data was excluded due to behavioral factors (lack of concentration). Results-wise, interrater reliability of rated looking side (left/right) showed a high agreement between raters, Fleiss' Kappa, κ = 0.97, which can be translated to sufficient data quality for further analyses. With regard to on-/off-screen attention attribution, we found that children lost interest after about 10 s after trial onset using a static image presentation or 60 s total experimental time. Taken together, we were able to show that online video data recording is possible and viable for developmental psychology and beyond.

  12. Consumer-based technology for distribution of surgical videos for objective evaluation.

    PubMed

    Gonzalez, Ray; Martinez, Jose M; Lo Menzo, Emanuele; Iglesias, Alberto R; Ro, Charles Y; Madan, Atul K

    2012-08-01

    The Global Operative Assessment of Laparoscopic Skill (GOALS) is one validated metric utilized to grade laparoscopic skills and has been utilized to score recorded operative videos. To facilitate easier viewing of these recorded videos, we are developing novel techniques to enable surgeons to view these videos. The objective of this study is to determine the feasibility of utilizing widespread current consumer-based technology to assist in distributing appropriate videos for objective evaluation. Videos from residents were recorded via a direct connection from the camera processor via an S-video output via a cable into a hub to connect to a standard laptop computer via a universal serial bus (USB) port. A standard consumer-based video editing program was utilized to capture the video and record in appropriate format. We utilized mp4 format, and depending on the size of the file, the videos were scaled down (compressed), their format changed (using a standard video editing program), or sliced into multiple videos. Standard available consumer-based programs were utilized to convert the video into a more appropriate format for handheld personal digital assistants. In addition, the videos were uploaded to a social networking website and video sharing websites. Recorded cases of laparoscopic cholecystectomy in a porcine model were utilized. Compression was required for all formats. All formats were accessed from home computers, work computers, and iPhones without difficulty. Qualitative analyses by four surgeons demonstrated appropriate quality to grade for these formats. Our preliminary results show promise that, utilizing consumer-based technology, videos can be easily distributed to surgeons to grade via GOALS via various methods. Easy accessibility may help make evaluation of resident videos less complicated and cumbersome.

  13. Dashboard Videos

    ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

    Gleue, Alan D.; Depcik, Chris; Peltier, Ted

    2012-01-01

    Last school year, I had a web link emailed to me entitled "A Dashboard Physics Lesson." The link, created and posted by Dale Basier on his "Lab Out Loud" blog, illustrates video of a car's speedometer synchronized with video of the road. These two separate video streams are compiled into one video that students can watch and analyze. After seeing…

  14. Time-lapse video sysem used to study nesting gyrfalcons

    USGS Publications Warehouse

    Booms, Travis; Fuller, Mark R.

    2003-01-01

    We used solar-powered time-lapse video photography to document nesting Gyrfalcon (Falco rusticolus) food habits in central West Greenland from May to July in 2000 and 2001. We collected 2677.25 h of videotape from three nests, representing 94, 87, and 49% of the nestling period at each nest. The video recorded 921 deliveries of 832 prey items. We placed 95% of the items into prey categories. The image quality was good but did not reveal enough detail to identify most passerines to species. We found no evidence that Gyrfalcons were negatively affected by the video system after the initial camera set-up. The video system experienced some mechanical problems but proved reliable. The system likely can be used to effectively document the food habits and nesting behavior of other birds, especially those delivering large prey to a nest or other frequently used site.

  15. [Discharge from hospital into nursing home: conditions and quality of transmissions].

    PubMed

    Delabrière, Isabelle; Delzenne, Emmanuelle; Gaxatte, Cédric; Puisieux, François

    2014-01-01

    Nursing home residents are very old, with multiple comorbidities and disabled for activities of daily living (ADLs). Therefore, they have a higher risk of accidents as falls or fractures or acute diseases as infections, which require hospitalization. Care's coordination and sharing of informations between hospitals and nursing homes are often insufficient even with agreements. Thus, discharge to nursing homes after hospitalization may be difficult for old patients because of incomplete oral or written transmissions. To examine both protocols and the quality of the return to the nursing homes after an hospitalization for old residents. A prospective multicenter study done by collecting data about consecutive returns into their nursing home after an hospitalization of more than 24 hours of nursing home residents aged 65 years and more. Twenty-eight nursing homes of the North of France were enrolled in the study. During the 3 months period of the study, 246 discharges after an hospitalization of 24 hours or more were registered. 225 residents (165 women and 60 men), mean age 85.0 ± 7.2, were concerned. Most of them were ADLs disabled, with a dementia for 47.1% of them. The average length of hospitalization was 11.6 days. At the end of hospitalization, the notification of return, which was made only in 82% of cases, was announced in average 1.3 days before the discharge. Unfortunately, in 32% of cases, the notification was made the day of the discharge. Residents went back home indifferently any day of the week but more often the Friday and less often the weekend. The day and the hour of the planned discharge were respected in 79.1% of cases. In most cases, nursing home caregivers have considered that the clinical status was stable or improved compared to the previous one. However in 28% of cases, a loss of autonomy was found. Medical doctors wrote a letter of discharge in 85.8% of cases. Nurses gave written transmissions only in 41.9% of cases. Many points concerning

  16. Risk of transmission of sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease by surgical procedures: systematic reviews and quality of evidence.

    PubMed

    López, Fernando J García; Ruiz-Tovar, María; Almazán-Isla, Javier; Alcalde-Cabero, Enrique; Calero, Miguel; de Pedro-Cuesta, Jesús

    2017-10-01

    Sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (sCJD) is potentially transmissible to humans. This study aimed to summarise and rate the quality of the evidence of the association between surgery and sCJD. Firstly, we conducted systematic reviews and meta-analyses of case-control studies with major surgical procedures as exposures under study. To assess quality of evidence, we used the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluations (GRADE) approach. Secondly, we conducted a systematic review of sCJD case reports after sharing neurosurgical instruments. Thirteen case-control studies met the inclusion criteria for the systematic review of case-control studies. sCJD was positively associated with heart surgery, heart and vascular surgery and eye surgery, negatively associated with tonsillectomy and appendectomy, and not associated with neurosurgery or unspecified major surgery. The overall quality of evidence was rated as very low. A single case-control study with a low risk of bias found a strong association between surgery conducted more than 20 years before disease onset and sCJD. Seven cases were described as potentially transmitted by reused neurosurgical instruments. The association between surgery and sCJD remains uncertain. Measures currently recommended for preventing sCJD transmission should be strongly maintained. Future studies should focus on the potential association between sCJD and surgery undergone a long time previously.

  17. Reconstructing Interlaced High-Dynamic-Range Video Using Joint Learning.

    PubMed

    Inchang Choi; Seung-Hwan Baek; Kim, Min H

    2017-11-01

    For extending the dynamic range of video, it is a common practice to capture multiple frames sequentially with different exposures and combine them to extend the dynamic range of each video frame. However, this approach results in typical ghosting artifacts due to fast and complex motion in nature. As an alternative, video imaging with interlaced exposures has been introduced to extend the dynamic range. However, the interlaced approach has been hindered by jaggy artifacts and sensor noise, leading to concerns over image quality. In this paper, we propose a data-driven approach for jointly solving two specific problems of deinterlacing and denoising that arise in interlaced video imaging with different exposures. First, we solve the deinterlacing problem using joint dictionary learning via sparse coding. Since partial information of detail in differently exposed rows is often available via interlacing, we make use of the information to reconstruct details of the extended dynamic range from the interlaced video input. Second, we jointly solve the denoising problem by tailoring sparse coding to better handle additive noise in low-/high-exposure rows, and also adopt multiscale homography flow to temporal sequences for denoising. We anticipate that the proposed method will allow for concurrent capture of higher dynamic range video frames without suffering from ghosting artifacts. We demonstrate the advantages of our interlaced video imaging compared with the state-of-the-art high-dynamic-range video methods.

  18. Thematic video indexing to support video database retrieval and query processing

    NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

    Khoja, Shakeel A.; Hall, Wendy

    1999-08-01

    This paper presents a novel video database system, which caters for complex and long videos, such as documentaries, educational videos, etc. As compared to relatively structured format videos like CNN news or commercial advertisements, this database system has the capacity to work with long and unstructured videos.

  19. Video game addiction, ADHD symptomatology, and video game reinforcement.

    PubMed

    Mathews, Christine L; Morrell, Holly E R; Molle, Jon E

    2018-06-06

    Up to 23% of people who play video games report symptoms of addiction. Individuals with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may be at increased risk for video game addiction, especially when playing games with more reinforcing properties. The current study tested whether level of video game reinforcement (type of game) places individuals with greater ADHD symptom severity at higher risk for developing video game addiction. Adult video game players (N = 2,801; Mean age = 22.43, SD = 4.70; 93.30% male; 82.80% Caucasian) completed an online survey. Hierarchical multiple linear regression analyses were used to test type of game, ADHD symptom severity, and the interaction between type of game and ADHD symptomatology as predictors of video game addiction severity, after controlling for age, gender, and weekly time spent playing video games. ADHD symptom severity was positively associated with increased addiction severity (b = .73 and .68, ps < 0.001). Type of game played or preferred the most was not associated with addiction severity, ps > .05. The relationship between ADHD symptom severity and addiction severity did not depend on the type of video game played or preferred most, ps > .05. Gamers who have greater ADHD symptom severity may be at greater risk for developing symptoms of video game addiction and its negative consequences, regardless of type of video game played or preferred most. Individuals who report ADHD symptomatology and also identify as gamers may benefit from psychoeducation about the potential risk for problematic play.

  20. Integer-Linear-Programing Optimization in Scalable Video Multicast with Adaptive Modulation and Coding in Wireless Networks

    PubMed Central

    Lee, Chaewoo

    2014-01-01

    The advancement in wideband wireless network supports real time services such as IPTV and live video streaming. However, because of the sharing nature of the wireless medium, efficient resource allocation has been studied to achieve a high level of acceptability and proliferation of wireless multimedia. Scalable video coding (SVC) with adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) provides an excellent solution for wireless video streaming. By assigning different modulation and coding schemes (MCSs) to video layers, SVC can provide good video quality to users in good channel conditions and also basic video quality to users in bad channel conditions. For optimal resource allocation, a key issue in applying SVC in the wireless multicast service is how to assign MCSs and the time resources to each SVC layer in the heterogeneous channel condition. We formulate this problem with integer linear programming (ILP) and provide numerical results to show the performance under 802.16 m environment. The result shows that our methodology enhances the overall system throughput compared to an existing algorithm. PMID:25276862