Proceedings of the 2013 ACM international workshop on Immersive media experiences

Abstract

Immersive media has the potential for strong impact on users' emotions and their sense of presence and engagement. Increasingly, technology is supporting their involvement by capturing, producing, sharing and accessing information based on their perspectives and experiences, over the Internet, in social media, and through video on demand services using iTV. We have been witnessing an increase in the amount of content and number of devices for capturing, viewing and sensing, many of them portable and offering tremendous opportunities for immersion, user participation and personalization. The integration of different media formats, including 3D content, panoramic displays, multiviews, as well as the possibility of delivering and accessing content through different communication vehicles, promote the development of a new participatory paradigm and enable new perceptual user experiences that provide more realistic and immersive involvement. Immersion may be influenced by sensory modalities, surround effect, and vividness through resolution, and it conveys the user's conscious feeling of being inside the virtual world and the sense of belonging. It has an impact on the users and may be augmented by personalized and context-aware environments and content. The main objective of the Immersive Media Experiences Workshop, held in conjunction with the ACM Multimedia Conference 2013, is to bring together researchers, students, media producers, service providers and industry players in the area of emergent immersive media. The workshop provides a platform for a deep discussion on ongoing work, recent achievements and experiences. It is expected not only to consolidate experiences but also to identify aspects where strong collaboration among all the interested players is needed and to point towards future working directions. This first edition of the workshop attracted high quality submissions from research labs and universities around the world. Many of the papers presented at the workshop were motivated by real-life use cases and concrete application contexts, indicating practical relevance and applicability. These papers cover a broad number of relevant aspects that enable creating immersive experiences, including work in Perceptual Immersion aspects, Participatory and Collaborative approaches, Enabling Technologies and Field Trials in different areas. In addition, the program of the workshop includes one keynote speaker, Dr Adrian D. Cheok, giving a very motivating talk on multisensory approaches using smell and taste.