Monitoring Human Visual Behavior during the Observation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) Videos

Vassilios Krassanakis,Vincent Ricordel,Matthieu Perreira Da Silva

doi:10.3390/drones2040036

Vassilios Krassanakis, Vincent Ricordel + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/drones2040036

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Abstract

The present article describes an experimental study towards the examination of human visual behavior during the observation of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) videos. Experimental performance is based on the collection and the quantitative & qualitative analysis of eye tracking data. The results highlight that UAV flight altitude serves as a dominant specification that affects the visual attention process, while the presence of sky in the video background seems to be the less affecting factor in this procedure. Additionally, the main surrounding environment, the main size of the observed object as well as the main perceived angle between UAV’s flight plain and ground appear to have an equivalent influence in observers’ visual reaction during the exploration of such stimuli. Moreover, the provided heatmap visualizations indicate the most salient locations in the used UAVs videos. All produced data (raw gaze data, fixation and saccade events, and heatmap visualizations) are freely distributed to the scientific community as a new dataset (EyeTrackUAV) that can be served as an objective ground truth in future studies.

Highlights

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) constitute fully or semi-autonomous aircrafts, equipped with several types of sensors [1].UAVs represent one of the main types of air drones while they may vary widely in terms of their size, configuration, and mission capabilities [2]
Surveillance systems may serve either as “forensic” monitoring systems, having as aim the detection of non-normal situation, or as “predictive” ones, detecting and analyzing pre-alarm signals [5]. These processes are mainly implemented through video-based analyses, while video surveillance systems are characterized by a set of abilities, which include the detection of objects’ presence in the field of view (FOV), as well as their classification [6]
Considering gaze data of all observers during the observation of all examined UAV video may constitute characteristic evidences about how people observe this special type of stimuli and can be served as an objective ground truth for possible comparison with other types of dynamic stimuli

Summary

Introduction

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) constitute fully or semi-autonomous aircrafts, equipped with several types of sensors (e.g., digital video sensor, infrared cameras, hyper-spectral sensors, etc.) [1].UAVs represent one of the main types of air drones while they may vary widely in terms of their size, configuration, and mission capabilities [2]. Surveillance systems may serve either as “forensic” monitoring systems, having as aim the detection of non-normal situation (based on video retrieval information processes), or as “predictive” ones, detecting and analyzing pre-alarm signals [5]. These processes are mainly implemented through video-based analyses, while video surveillance systems are characterized by a set of abilities, which include the detection of objects’ presence in the field of view (FOV), as well as their classification (including their activities) [6].

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Conclusion