Microsoft Research
Faculty Summit 2008
Zhengyou Zhang
Principal Researcher
Microsoft Research
A videoconferencing experience that creates the illusion
that the remote participants are in the same room with you.
- Wainhouse Research 2007
Cisco Telepresence $299k
HP Halo $425k + $18k/mo
Tandberg Experia $225k
Polycom RPX210M $269k + $18.5k/mo
Economic globalization and workforce mobilization
Customer Pains
 Product cycles dependent on remote teams
 Increased travel time and costs
 Energy consumption, CO2 production
Bandwidth & Hardware Costs
7-38-55% rule for communicating feelings and altitudes
7%: Verbal (Words, What you say)
38%: Vocal (Tone of voice, How you say them)
55%: Visual (Gaze, Facial expression, Body language)
Replicate experience people enjoy in face-to-face meeting
Dedicated camera-display-speaker for remote stand-in
Tailored to a single person  Correct spatial cues
Prototypes
Full Mesh Geometry
Make it more immersive?
Design user interface for both audio-visual and data?
Adapt to network conditions?
Combine HW & SW for better capture and rendering?
…
Provide virtual seating
Improve understanding
by remote participants
Decrease cognitive load
(cocktail party effect)
L
R
Listener
sorry, can’t demo in this room…
Computer-controllable lighting system
Automatically adjust light intensity
based on video analysis
Skin tone model
learned from hundreds of celebrity images
Optimization of face image quality
with physical parameters in the loop
Zicheng Liu
Rajesh Hegde
Qin Cai
Cha Zhang
Sasa Junuzovic
Christian Huitema
Jayman Dalal
Wanghong Yuan
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