Ambient Display using Musical Effects

The paper presents a novel approach to the peripheral display of information by applying audio effects to an arbitrary selection of music. We examine a specific instance: the communication of information about human affect, and construct a functioning prototype which captures behavioral activity level from the face and maps it to musical effects. Several audio effects are empirically evaluated as to their suitability for ambient display. We report measurements of the ambience, perceived affect, and pleasure of these effects. The findings support the hypothesis that musical effects are a promising method for ambient informational display. Categories and Subject Descriptors H.5.2[User Interfaces]: Auditory (non-speech) feedback; H.5.2 [User Interfaces]: Evaluation/methodology; I.2.10 [Vision and Scene Understanding]: Video analysis General Terms Design, Experimentation, Human Factors, Theory Keywords ambient display, affective computing, musical interface

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: IUI
• Authors: Luke Barrington, Michael J. Lyons, Dominique Diegmann, Shinji Abe
• Keywords: Ambient Display, Audio Effects, IUI 2006, Musical Effects, Software Engineering