MBase

The MBase system maintains a collection of video and provides access to it through different user interfaces (see figure on the right). A web-based browser presents directory listings of videos. The directories organize videos by content (e.g., staff meetings or conference reports) and sort them by date within each directory. Clicking on a video opens a player to play it. Another user interface presents a summary of a video in a format similar to a Japanese comic book, or Manga.

	MBase Interfaces

We enhance each video directory listing with representative frames to help recognize the desired video, and to provide access points into the video. The positions of the keyframes are marked by blue triangles along a mouse-sensitive time scale adjacent to the keyframe (see figure below). As the mouse moves over the time scale, the keyframe for the corresponding time is shown and the triangle for that keyframe turns red. This method shows only a single keyframe at a time, preserving screen space while making other frames accessible through simple mouse motion.

	10/30/98 Global Eye 40
	09/01/97 Dynomite
MBase Listing with Slider

	Metadata Media Player

After finding one or more videos in the directory listing, the user must still investigate the videos to find the relevant one(s). It is not simple to determine whether a long video contains desired information without watching it in its entirety. Our Metadata Media Player allows finer-grained access by taking advantage of the metadata extracted from the video. It represents a dynamic time-varying process (video) by a static display that can be taken in at a glance.

We use a number of media analysis techniques to derive useful information from sources such as audio and video. This information is displayed as a "confidence score" in which dark regions represent areas of high confidence for the presence of a feature such as an image of a Powerpoint slide. We also automatically determine a set of keyframes that describes an entire video clip well.

Mbase is being commercialized in Japan as MediaDEPO. A demo is available here (IE only, sorry).

Technical Contact: Andreas Girgensohn

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