A 3-D Telepresence Collaborative Working Environment
Li-Qun Xu, Bangjun Lei, E. Hendriks · Institution of Engineering and Technology eBooks · 2003
In this chapter we have discussed the recent trend in developing an advanced videoconferencing system that moves towards being a seamless integration of a real and virtual world environment with high-quality 3-D telepresence, while focusing on outlining the scope of research work and software system architecture for the VIRTUE project. The entire VIRTUE system design is flexible and conceived largely on the basis of exploiting state-of-the-art technologies in the computer vision, and image and video processing fields guided by the results of human factor studies, rather than physically placing multiple displays, cameras and human subjects. Specifically, we have chosen to demonstrate a core component for 3-D scene analysis, an efficient technique for robust disparity estimation from stereos of still and dynamic scenes, and its application in 3-D visualisation and videoconferencing applications when employing an image-based rendering approach for reconstructing new (and temporarily coherent) virtual views.