Writing a Proposal and Conference Organisation Paul Lewis

Today’s plan  What is a proposal?  Conference Themes  Types of proposal with examples  Deadlines  Questions  Proposal surgery and forming of the committee

What is a proposal?  Brief description of the paper you would like to write  Approx words  Should contain  Title  Idea of the type of paper  Brief description  You need to supply TWO distinct proposals, clearly indicating which is your first choice  Designed to help us avoid overlapping papers

Interactive MM Systems Conference Themes  1 Computer Games and Interactive Fiction  2 Virtual Worlds  3 Augmented and Mixed Reality  4 Emerging Representations and Display Technologies (e.g.3D, Holographic, Digital Paper)  5 Novel Interfaces ( e.g. touch, gesture, haptic)  6 Web and Mobile Multimedia

 Research Issues  Comparison  Experiences  Evaluation  Technical Briefing  Social Implications  NB there is a lot of overlap. For example, some activities may be evaluations in which you compare experiences!! Types of Paper

A Running Example  Interactive Image retrieval as an example of Multimedia retrieval  Issues include  Use of metadata  Use of Content  Types of feature vector  Types of indexing  Getting at the semantics

Research Issues For any topic in the interactive multimedia domain  Identify the current research issues  Review current research results  Evaluate the importance of this work.  (This involves reading the research literature – journals and conference papers)

Example: Research Issues in Interactive Image Retrieval  Bridging the semantic gap  Extracting useful representations from images  Using knowledge representation schemes to represent semantics of image  Developing a good HCI with relevance feedback

Comparison  Take two or more related technologies or different approaches to a particular problem  Compare and contrast them  advantages disadvantages etc

Example: Comparison Topics in Interactive Image Retrieval  Different approaches to image retrieval eg content based techniques vs metadata based techniques.  Different feature vectors for image representation (colour histograms or salient regions)  How do they differ in their functionality?  How do they differ in their philosophy?  What factors will affect which approach wins over the long term?

Experiences  Analyse the design of some multimedia software/courseware you have produced or used Or  Describe and assess some experiments you have conducted using interactive multimedia hardware, software or systems

Example: Experiences with Image Retrieval System  There are many experimental interactive image retrieval systems accessible on the web  You might try some of them and analyse the results you get. A bit like compare and contrast but with actual experience rather than just reading.  Or just choose one and study its performance. Describe your results.

Evaluation  Consider some multimedia interface or artefact  Conduct a scientific evaluation of its design

Example: Evaluation  Evaluate the effectiveness of relevance feedback in interactive image retrieval systems( by reading the literature or by experimenting with an actual system) and evaluate the performance.  Or Evaluate the effectiveness two virtual world systems. Important to identify the CRITERIA for evaluation.

Technical Briefing  Take a piece of interactive multimedia technology and provide an overview of key aspects of it  Its history  The design motivations  The technical details  Its evolution over time  The standards it adheres to  Its current state of the art  Its usage patterns

Example: Technical Briefing on Image Retrieval Systems  How have they evolved?  What is the current state of the art?  What are the key issues?  How are they being used?  Where is the technology heading? NB You must base your paper on academic sources

Social Implications  Analyse the social implications of some interactive MM technology.  NB: this can be the hardest type of paper  Your analysis will need to be fully supported by evidence from the research base

Example: Social Implications of interactive image Retrieval Systems  Is social tagging having an effect?  How are systems like Flickr and facebook influencing image retrieval?  Is image retrieval impacting on people’s lives?  What new social interactions have come about as a result of these technologies?  How might the world look in ten years time wrt this activity? You must base your paper on academic sources not just personal reflection

You’ll need a title Some from the past  What ever happened to Virtual Reality?  Digital and Interactive TV – Where does it fit in?  How advanced animation and artificial intelligence techniques can increase the realism of virtual graphical environments.  The Human and Computer Vision Gap: A survey of our proximity to the goal of computer vision  Steganography - Messages Hidden In Bits  GPRS and 3Gen: What Does the Future Hold for Multimedia on Mobile Devices  Implications of biometrics used in image processing for enhanced sporting performance.  Hurdles on the Highway: Are we Ready for Xanadu?  How Multimedia Has Affected And Will Affect Education And The Way We Learn.

To recap  Brief description of the paper you would like to write  Approx words  Should contain  Title  Idea of the type of proposal (Research Issues, Comparison, Experiences, Evaluation, Technical Briefing, or Social Implications)  Brief description  You need to supply TWO distinct proposals, clearly indicating which is your first choice.

Deadline Tuesday 22 rd October  Do not hand in late!!!  You lose marks

What to hand in?  TWO proposals to be provided  Use the School handin system  A simple text file please  Feedback will be given by  Proposal surgery during the next slot

Up Next  Initial Committee Meeting surgery Building 32 level 3 South End (airport lounge) outside David Millard’s office (room 3031) 2.00 pm  Proposal surgery Building 32 level 3 South End (airport lounge) outside David Millard’s office (room 3031) 2.30pm  Any Questions?

Conference Organisation  Choose and book the location  Plan the day (or afternoon)  Arrange any keynote speaker(s)  Choose papers to be presented orally and papers to be presented as posters  Plan finances  Arrange sponsorship via Joyce Lewis  Arrange publicity  Arrange website  Book food/drink  Local arrangements on the day (name badges, seating, projectors etc)

Conference Committees  General Chair  Programme Chair  Local Arrangements  Publicity  Webmaster  Finance  Catering

Conference Organisation  It is (almost) all in your hands  Useful contacts  Teresa Binks  Paul Lewis (particularly for contacting anyone outside the