Building a Talking Head via Dynamic & 3D-Static, and Age- & Ethnically-Varied Databases: Perceptibility and Acceptability. This project will provide cutting edge realistic, perceptible talking head animation. Based on rich 3D face motion and static face databases, it will allow the study of the facial structure of specific groups of people, and the creation of a lasting cultural heritage of faces. Information in these databases will be useful for research in high-quality 3D face reconstruction ....Building a Talking Head via Dynamic & 3D-Static, and Age- & Ethnically-Varied Databases: Perceptibility and Acceptability. This project will provide cutting edge realistic, perceptible talking head animation. Based on rich 3D face motion and static face databases, it will allow the study of the facial structure of specific groups of people, and the creation of a lasting cultural heritage of faces. Information in these databases will be useful for research in high-quality 3D face reconstruction, with applications as wide as multimodal Biometric Identification, finding lost children, and security systems. The novel methods in this project will also advance auditory-visual speech and emotion research with particular commercial applications in telecommunications, human-machine interfaces, foreign language teaching, humanoid development, animation, and film.Read moreRead less
Special Research Initiatives - Grant ID: SR0354596
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$20,000.00
Summary
Perception and Action in Auditory Scenes (PAAS): Neural, Behavioural, Computational and Mechanical Systems. Auditory scenes are temporal and ephemeral yet pervasively influence human life. How humans negotiate such scenes has not been solved, a fact highlighted by attempts to build machines to respond to speech, warnings etc., in real-world situations with room reverberation, different talkers, and background noise. No one discipline can solve such problems. In this network outstanding researche ....Perception and Action in Auditory Scenes (PAAS): Neural, Behavioural, Computational and Mechanical Systems. Auditory scenes are temporal and ephemeral yet pervasively influence human life. How humans negotiate such scenes has not been solved, a fact highlighted by attempts to build machines to respond to speech, warnings etc., in real-world situations with room reverberation, different talkers, and background noise. No one discipline can solve such problems. In this network outstanding researchers from physical, medical, human, and social sciences with interests in speech, music and audition will provide insights into how humans and machines localize, recognize, interpret and produce auditory events, and advance frontier technologies, e.g., automatic speech recognition, hearing prostheses, auditory monitoring/warning systems.Read moreRead less
A Scalable Theory of Behavior Composition for Practical Engineering Models of Human Performance. Minimizing human error and maximizing human performance is a major design goal in safety critical systems. The development of methods for affordable human performance modeling has widespread applicability for evaluating user-system interfaces. The compositional method explored here has been shown to make accurate predictions reduce model development time by an order of magnitude. Large safety critica ....A Scalable Theory of Behavior Composition for Practical Engineering Models of Human Performance. Minimizing human error and maximizing human performance is a major design goal in safety critical systems. The development of methods for affordable human performance modeling has widespread applicability for evaluating user-system interfaces. The compositional method explored here has been shown to make accurate predictions reduce model development time by an order of magnitude. Large safety critical applications, such as military or air traffic control systems, would benefit greatly. The proposed work tests whether the compositional methods will scale to more complex domains. The work will be coordinated with Australian industry, academia, and government research efforts.Read moreRead less
Cognitive Modelling of Computer Games Pidgins. This project develops a pidgin language for use in computer games and models the way human users exploit such languages. It has implications also for computer assisted collaborative work and other educational or entertainment interactive environments like computer games. By developing mini-languages for games environments we can dramatically simplify the speech recognition problem and make recognition robust across different speech cultures and ba ....Cognitive Modelling of Computer Games Pidgins. This project develops a pidgin language for use in computer games and models the way human users exploit such languages. It has implications also for computer assisted collaborative work and other educational or entertainment interactive environments like computer games. By developing mini-languages for games environments we can dramatically simplify the speech recognition problem and make recognition robust across different speech cultures and backgrounds. We use protocol analysis and markup techniques for modelling dialogues between human player and reactive agents in computer games.Read moreRead less
How, What and Who in Human Communication: Movement of Face and Voice. The aim of this project is to identify the essential characteristics of tone, affect, and identity from face and voice using a combination of signal processing, biological, and behavioural techniques in order to develop a comprehensive model of auditory-visual speech processing and communication. This research will significantly improve understanding of the basis of auditory-visual perception and production in tonal languages ....How, What and Who in Human Communication: Movement of Face and Voice. The aim of this project is to identify the essential characteristics of tone, affect, and identity from face and voice using a combination of signal processing, biological, and behavioural techniques in order to develop a comprehensive model of auditory-visual speech processing and communication. This research will significantly improve understanding of the basis of auditory-visual perception and production in tonal languages and in affective communication, facilitate links between neurophysiological processes and auditory-visual speech processing; and contribute to applications in automatic person recognition, automatic speech recognition, text-to-speech systems, and talking head aids for the hearing impaired.Read moreRead less
Implicit transmission of embodied culture. Is a culturally diverse, yet socially integrated community possible? In multicultural societies such as Australia, this is a pressing and significant question. To form and maintain a vibrant and prosperous community in the face of globalization, it is essential to understand the fundamental processes by which cultures are formed and transformed in everyday social activities. This project examines one such process, implicit cultural transmission, propose ....Implicit transmission of embodied culture. Is a culturally diverse, yet socially integrated community possible? In multicultural societies such as Australia, this is a pressing and significant question. To form and maintain a vibrant and prosperous community in the face of globalization, it is essential to understand the fundamental processes by which cultures are formed and transformed in everyday social activities. This project examines one such process, implicit cultural transmission, proposed to function in the nonconscious transmission of cultural information. Understanding the dynamics of this subtle, yet pervasive, mode of cultural influence is central to a full appreciation of how one's own culture and those of others' integrate and flourish.Read moreRead less
Neurobiological computation using self organization. Despite their phenomenal power and speed there are many simple things that computers still cannot do, that humans, and indeed many animals, are able to perform effortlessly. The research outlined in this proposal aims to develop new, biologically inspired, computational approaches that attempt to bridge this gap. This research will help place Australia, despite its relatively small size, as a leading research community in the development of ....Neurobiological computation using self organization. Despite their phenomenal power and speed there are many simple things that computers still cannot do, that humans, and indeed many animals, are able to perform effortlessly. The research outlined in this proposal aims to develop new, biologically inspired, computational approaches that attempt to bridge this gap. This research will help place Australia, despite its relatively small size, as a leading research community in the development of the next wave of computing devices. The development of new and "more natural" approaches to computing will deliver large dividends to a range of social, economic and environmental problems.Read moreRead less
Performance Practice in New Interfaces for Realtime Electronic Music Performance. Results will be reported at national and international conferences both academic and commercial. Manuscripts will be prepared for submission to international refereed scholarly journals. Articles for rapid communication to a popular and commercial audience in areas of music technology, electronic arts, HCI and IT will also be prepared.
Behaviour of large networks of neurons in a functioning organ: a realistic computer-based model of the enteric nervous system. The organisation of the gut nervous system is well understood, but how nerve cells cooperate to control gut movements and secretions are matters of conjecture. We will test these conjectures by simulating the behaviour of the gut nervous system using an anatomically and physiologically realistic computer model to predict the way the gut responds to specific stimuli and t ....Behaviour of large networks of neurons in a functioning organ: a realistic computer-based model of the enteric nervous system. The organisation of the gut nervous system is well understood, but how nerve cells cooperate to control gut movements and secretions are matters of conjecture. We will test these conjectures by simulating the behaviour of the gut nervous system using an anatomically and physiologically realistic computer model to predict the way the gut responds to specific stimuli and test these predictions using novel methods for recording gut movements and nervous activity. This will provide the first complete description of how a mammalian nervous system generates complex behaviours and will provide substantial pointers to how other nervous systems achieve similar tasks.Read moreRead less
Talking with Robots: Evolving Grounded Language for Embodied Agents. The coming personal robot revolution will be built on robots that have real-world intelligence, with an ability to understand and communicate about the world in the way we humans do. This project extends a previous ARC project, which developed robot-friendly languages for naming places in the world. This new project will develop the robots' abilities and language to understand a comprehensive range of real world objects, places ....Talking with Robots: Evolving Grounded Language for Embodied Agents. The coming personal robot revolution will be built on robots that have real-world intelligence, with an ability to understand and communicate about the world in the way we humans do. This project extends a previous ARC project, which developed robot-friendly languages for naming places in the world. This new project will develop the robots' abilities and language to understand a comprehensive range of real world objects, places, actions, attributes and relationships. This project represents a major advance for Australia in the new and fast growing personal robot industry.Read moreRead less