Multimedia Systems Design

Unit1-Introduction
 Topics to be Covered
 Multimedia Applications (*****)
 Multimedia Systems Architecture (*****)
 Evolving Technologies for Multimedia systems (***)
 Defining objects for multimedia systems (***)
 Multimedia data Interface standards (****)
 What is Multimedia?
 Derived from the word “Multi” and “Media”
 Multi
 Many, Multiple,
 Media
 Tools that is used to represent or do a certain things,
delivery medium, a form of mass communication –
newspaper, magazine / tv.
 Distribution tool & information presentation – text,
graphic, voice, images, music and etc.
 Definition of Multimedia
 Multimedia is a combination of text, graphic, sound,
animation, and video that is delivered interactively to the
user by electronic or digitally manipulated means.

GRAPHIC
TEXT

VIDEO
AUDIO

ANIMATION
 Elements of Multimedia
TEXT
 A broad term for something that contains words to express
something.
 Text is the most basic element of multimedia.
 A good choice of words could help convey the intended
message to the users (keywords).
 Used in contents, menus, navigational buttons
 Example
GRAPHIC
 Two-dimensional figure or illustration
 Could be produced manually (by drawing, painting, carving,
etc.) or by computer graphics technology.
 Used in multimedia to show more clearly what a particular
information is all about (diagrams, picture).
 Example
AUDIO

 Produced by vibration, as perceived by the sense of hearing.

 In multimedia, audio could come in the form of speech,
sound effects and also music score.

 Example
ANIMATION

 The illusion of motion created by the consecutive display of

images of static elements.
 In multimedia, animation is used to further enhance /
enriched the experience of the user to further understand
the information conveyed to them.
 Example
VIDEO

 Is the technology of capturing, recording, processing,

transmitting, and reconstructing moving pictures.
 Video is more towards photo realistic image sequence /
live recording as in comparison to animation.
 Video also takes a lot of storage space. So plan carefully
before you are going to use it.
 Multimedia Elements
 Facsimile (or fax)
 Document Images
 Photographic Images
 Geographic Information System Maps
 Voice Commands
 Voice Synthesis
 Audio Messages
 Video Messages
 Full-motion Stored and Live Video
 Holographic Images
 Fractals
 Facsimile:- Facsimile transmission were the first practical means of
transmitting document images over a telephone line. The basic
technology, now widely used, has evolved to allow higher scanning
density for better-quality fax.
 Document Images:- Document images are used for storing
business document that must be retained for long time or may need to
be accessed by a large number of people. Providing multimedia access
to such documents removes the need for making several copies of the
original for storage or distribution.
 Photographic Images:- Photographic images are used frequently
for imaging systems that are used for identification such as security
badges, fingerprint cards, photo identification systems, bank signature
cards, patient medical histories, and so on. The requirements of
photographic images are much more intense than those for typed
documents.
 Geographic Information System Maps:- Known as GIS systems,
maps are created in GIS systems are being used widely for natural
resource and wild life management as well as urban planning. These
systems store the geographical information of the map along with a
database containing information relating highlighted map elements
with statistical or item information such as wildlife statistics or details
of the floor and rooms and workers in an office building
 Voice Commands:- Voice commands are primarily an input voice
recognition consideration. Voice commands allow hands free-usage of
computer applications by allowing command entry via a short voice
commands rather than a keyboard or a pointing device.
 Audio Messages:- Audio messages are substitute for text messages.
Computers equipped with micro phones can record a audio message
and embed it in or attach it to an electronic mail message.
 Voice Synthesis:- Voice synthesis is used for presenting the results
of an action to the user in a synthesized voice. Applications such as
patient monitoring system in a surgical theatre will be prime
beneficiaries.
 Video Messages :- Video messages can be embedded in or attached
to e-mail messages. Video messages can range from single snap shot
to full motion video clips. The storage and playback requirements are
even more complex for video messages.
 Full Motion Stored and Live Video:- Full motion video started
out as a very useful idea for online training and maintenance manuals.
The capability to use full-motion stored video for electronic mail or
live video for presentations and videoconferencing are important
evolutionary steps. Three dimensional video techniques are being
adapted to create the concept of virtual reality.
 Holographic Images:- Holography is defined as the means of creating
a unique photographic image without the use of lens. The photographic
recording of the image is called hologram, which is an unrecognized
form of pattern of stripes and whorls but which when illuminated by
coherent light as by a laser beam, organizes the laser light into a three
dimensional representation of the original objects. Holographic images
extend the concept of virtual reality by allowing the user to get “inside” a
part such as engine view and its operation from the inside.
 Fractals:- Fractals started as technology in the early 1980s but has
received serious attention only recently. This technology is based on
synthesizing and storing algorithms that describe the information.
Fractals are regular objects with a high degree of irregular shape. Fractals
are the decompressed images that result from a compression format that
uses arithmetic algorithms to define repeated patterns in the image.
 Multimedia Applications
 Document Imaging (scanning):- gives high speed of sharing,
ease of availability and longer life.
 Document imaging makes it possible to store, retrieve, and
manipulate very large volumes of drawings, documents, and other
graphical representations of data.
 Image processing and recognition:- used in DIP (digital
image processing) and biometric security.
 Unlike document image management, image processing involves
image recognition, image enhancement, image synthesis, and image
reconstruction.
 Examples of image processing systems applications include
recognition of image, as in factory floor quality assurance
systems, image enhancement, as in satellite systems, image
synthesis, image reconstruction, plastic surgery systems etc.
  Image enhancement: able to change different features of image
 Image animation: rapid display of sequence of images in order to
create an illusion of motion
 Image annotation: in which computer system automatically
assign meta-data in the form of captioning or keywords to a digital
image. I can be in single file or separate
 Full motion digital video :- A Full-Motion Video (FMV) is
the rapid display of a series of images by a computer in such a
way that the person viewing it perceives fluid movement.
 An FMV can consist of live action, animation, computer-
generated imagery or a combination of those formats. It
typically includes sound and can include text superimposed over
the video.
 As in the projection of motion pictures, full-motion video
images must be displayed at a rate of at least 24 frames per
second for the video to appear to be seamless and smooth.
 Most full-motion videos are displayed at 30 frames per second,
the same rate that television images are transmitted.
 Electronic messages :- In this context, electronic messages
are defined as any type of electronic communication data
structure.
 Typically this is an electronic mail, but it may also
include instant messages, audio messages (such as those
in VoIP), text messages, facsimile messages, or other user
collaboration protocol data structures.
 Optical character recognition (OCR) : convert
document image in editable word processing format like
in bar code reader.
 Digitizer : consists of a flat surface upon which we can
draw image with an attached stylus.
 Multimedia E-mailing : attachment of any
multimedia file with email.
 Multimedia System Architecture

APPLICATIONS

Graphical User Interface Multimedia Extensions

Operating System Software Drivers Multimedia driver support

System Hardware Add-on

(Multimedia enabled) Multimedia devices and
Peripherals
 Application Layer Performs compression and
decompression. Hence each architecture has application as the
first layer.
 Graphical User Interface Access of these applications
which will provide graphical user interface for users those
who will use the multimedia application.
 System Hardware Multimedia enables means on board
finicalities i.e. system hardware present with the machine.
Multimedia system should operate with or without special
hardware required for multimedia.
 Multimedia Extension It basically an extra finicality.
Example, due to web camera (add on) video – conferencing
(extension) is possible.
 Add-on devices and peripherals Include scanners,
video cameras, VCRs and sound equipment along with
their associated device controllers and encoding
hardware (such as DVI-JPEG or MPEG-encoded boards,
for all these devices special driver software is needed)
 Software Driver and Multimedia Driver Support
Software drivers are required, so that the application can
talk to devices. Use of software drivers allows the user
to interact with much wider range of peripherals and
system.
The other architectures available for Multimedia are IMA
architectural framework, Network Architecture for
Multimedia.
 Multimedia Architecture
 IMA Architecture Framework
 Interactive Multimedia Association (IMA) has a task group to
define the architectural framework for multimedia to provide
interoperability for multimedia products.
 Task group has two areas of concentration:
 the desktops (clients) and
 the servers
 Desktop focus is to define the interchange formats that allow
multimedia objects to displayed (or played) on any workstation
or personal computer (PC).
 Server focus is for defining the class libraries for multimedia
objects that would enable distributed multimedia application
across multivendor platforms.
 Task group’s role is to provide technological specification rather
than products.
 IMA is based on defining interfaces to a Multimedia Interface Bus
(MIB).
 MIB would be the interface between systems and multimedia
sources and would provide streaming I/O services, including
filters and translators.
 Multimedia Architecture Based on
Interface Bus
Application Application

Application Application
Compatibility Compatibility
Layer Layer
System System
compatibility compatibility
Layer Layer
Analog Analog
H/w layer H/w layer Device
Device
Multimedia Interface Bus

Object File Server CDROM Jukebox

WAN N/w file server
LAN
 Network Architecture for Multimedia System
 In multimedia system large volumes of image and video
message are being transferred.
 Transfers are executed over LANs as well as WANs and have
special networking requirement.
 Difficulties faced in traditional LAN is following :-
Bandwidth is limited
Poor SNR (Signal to noise ratio)
Error rate is high
 Network architecture uses task based approach in this
bandwidth provided to audio/video is maximum then followed
by image and text and also bandwidth allocation is dynamic.
 Evolving Technologies for Multimedia
System
• Hypermedia Documents
• Hypertext
• Hyper speech
• HDTV and UDTV
• 3-D Technologies and Holography
• Fuzzy Logic
• Digital Signal Processing
 Hypermedia and Hypermedia Document
 Hypermedia is a superset of hypertext. Hypermedia documents
contain links not only to other pieces of text, but also to other
forms of media - sounds, images, and movies.
 Images themselves can be selected to link to sounds or
documents. This means that browsers might not display a text
file, but might display images or sound or animations.
Hypermedia simply combines hypertext and multimedia.
 Some examples of Hypermedia might be:
 You are reading a text on the Japanese language. You select a
Japanese phrase, then hear the phrase as spoken in the native
tongue.
 You are viewing a company's floor plan, you select an office by
clicking on a room. The employee's name and picture appears
with a list of their current projects.
 Hypertext allows to link information together, create information
paths through a large volume of related text in document, annotate
existing text, and append notes.
 Hypertext documents contains automated cross-references to other
documents called hyperlinks.
 It allows fast and easy searching and reading of selected excerpts
through text spanning up to hundreds of thousands of pages.
 Most famous implementation of hypertext is World Wide Web
(WWW).
 Hypermedia vs. Multimedia :
 Hypertext is text with pointers to other text. Hypermedia is a
superset of hypertext. Hypermedia documents contain not only text
but also other digital formats - images, animation, video, and audio.
 Multimedia systems make use of various data formats, but need not
use the interactive techniques. Role of the user is more passive.
 Hyper Speech a mechanism to connect telephony voice
application that are deployed at different sites.
 For example , a mail message can be used to generate a hyper speech
file that a user can begin to navigate on a selective basis. Voice mail is
the another one.
 Fuzzy Logic form of many-valued logic derived from fuzzy set
theory to deal with reasoning that is fluid or approximate rather than
fixed and exact.
 It have a truth value that ranges in degree between 0 and 1. Basically
fuzzy logic is a subset of conventional (Boolean) logic that has been
extended to handle the concept of partial truth, where the truth value
may range between completely true and completely false.
 Used in industries to improve quality and reduce development time.
Also in consumer electronics, fuzzy improve time to market and helps
reduce cost.
 HDTV & UDTV :
HDTV
 Short for High-Definition Television, a new type of television
that provides much better resolution than current televisions
based on the NTSC standard.
 HDTV is a digital TV broadcasting format where the
broadcast transmits widescreen pictures with more detail and
quality than found in a standard analogue television, or other
digital television formats.
 HDTV is a type of Digital Television (DTV) broadcast, and is
considered to be the best quality DTV format available.
 UDTV:
 Ultra High Definition Television (or UHDTV, 4320p, and 8K)
is a digital video format currently proposed by NHK Science
& Technology Research Laboratories. It has roughly the same
resolution as IMAX, which is about 16 times the number of
pixels of existing HDTV (high-definition video). NHK
advocates this video format as Super Hi-Vision.
 Quad Full High Definition (QFHD) (3840×2160) is not the
same resolution as that of UHDTV and represents an
intermediate resolution mid-way between those of HDTV
and UHDTV.
 Digital signal Processing:-With the explosion of digital
communications and digital media, the need for methods to
process digital data is more important than ever.
 There is the mathematical concepts behind digital processing,
then on that with particular algorithms to do the work, and
finally will present the actual implementations of these
techniques in today's hardware and software systems.
 Many real-world algorithms are based on this techniques .
JPEG images, MP3 songs, MPEG-2 videos, and ZIP files are all
processed using digital processing techniques.
 3-D Technologies and Holography:- Holography is a
technique which enables three-dimensional images to be made.
 It involves the use of a laser, interference, diffraction,
light intensity recording and suitable illumination of the
recording.
 The image changes as the position and orientation of the viewing
system changes in exactly the same way as if the object were still
present, thus making the image appear three-dimensional.
 The holographic recording itself is not an image; it consists of an
apparently random structure of either varying intensity, density
or profile.
 Defining Objects of Multimedia
Systems
 Basic type of data can be text, image ( this includes all varieties of
still images, including document images, still video, fractals etc.),
audio or voice and full-motion videos.
 Text
 Images:-
 Visible
 Non-visible:- are those images that are not stored as images but
are displayed as images. Example of these include pressure gauges,
temperature gauges and other metering display.
 Abstract:- are really not images that ever existed as real-world
objects or representations. Rather, they are computer generated
images based on some arithmetic calculation. Like fractals,
mathematic formula or functions.
 Audio and Voice:- Stored audio and voice objects contain
compressed audio information. This can consists of music,
speech, voice, commands, telephone conversation, and so on.
 Full-Motion and Live Video:- are the most processing,
and storage-intensive components. In our definition, full-
motion video mostly refers to pre-stored video clips, while
live video, by its very definition, is live and must be
processed while it is being captured by the camera.
 Image Hierarchy
Object

Image

Visible Image Non-visible Image Abstract Image

(Math Functions)

Paintings Drawings Pressure Gauge

Discrete
Photographs Documents
Temperature Gauge Continuous
 Multimedia Data Interface
Standard
 Standardization for multimedia has been necessitated due to its
nature;
 it requires large storage volumes usually not available on user
workstations,
 shared hypermedia documents,
 a variety of storage platforms
 user workstations on the same network shared by multiple users,
 and availability of a wise range of applications from various vendors
that must play in these diverse environments.
 The standards are layered to allow individual layers to provide
technology advances without affecting other layer.
 For each layer there is a well defined set of interfaces.
Multimedia Data Interface Standards
 Device-Independent Bitmap (DIB)
 RIFF Device independent Bitmap (RDIB)
 Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI)
 Palette File Format (PAL)
 Rich Text Format (RTF)
 Waveform Audio File Format (WAVE)
 Windows Metafile Format (WMF)
 Multimedia Movie Format (MMM)
 Apple’s Movie Format
 DigitalVideo Command Set (DVCS)
 DigitalVideo Media Control Interface (DV-MCI)
 Vendor – Independent Messaging (VIM)
 Apple’s Audio Interchange File Format
 SDTS GIS Standard