EMMA and the University of East Anglia's SYS Consulting teamed up for this Networking Event which provided a unique insight into the work of UEA's School of Information Systems and some of the East of England's most innovative multimedia and ICT developments. This successful event was the first in a series of evening seminars to focus on local technology and research from the School of Information Systems. The evening was well received and praised by all who attended.

SPEAKERS & TOPICS

Professor David Arnold: Charismatic Project
The Charismatic Project has developed essential technologies enabling theatrical enjoyment of high fidelity virtual environments, populated by intelligent virtual humans. Through introduction of traditional speech and movement-based Performing Arts into Virtual Environments, via advanced forms of Avatars and Synthespians, Charismatic has created entirely new interactive entertainment forms as a paradigm for 21st Century drama.

Professor Andrew Bangham: PhotoArtMaster
The PhotoArtMaster package from Fo2Pix (the creative division of Segmentis Limited) is a revolutionary new way to create artistic pictures from digital photos. Leading-edge image processing research incorporating sieve technology has led to the development of two commercial products to generate artistic filters from digital photos.

Dr Stephen Cox: ViSiCAST
The ViSiCAST project uses virtual humans to provide deaf people with access to services in their preferred medium of sign language. One such project developed in collaboration with the UK Post Office, is a system that combines speech recognition technology and state of the art virtual human animation to enable Post Office workers to communicate with deaf customers.

Dr George Smith: School of Information Systems
Dr Smith will give an overview of the research in the School of Information Systems and how SYS Consulting has been formed to turn research projects into commercial products.

The Event also provided opportunities to network and do business along with a buffet supper.