CQ SUBMARINE

The Interface for Searching and Visualizing Videos based on Feelings of

Distance and Direction

Takeru Yoshihara

Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, 5322 Endo, Fujisawa, 252-8520, Kanagawa, Japan

Michiaki Yasumura

Faculty of Enviroment and Information Studies, Keio University, 5322 Endo, Fujisawa, 252-8520, Kanagawa, Japan

Keywords: Video, Feeling of Distance, Feeling of Direction, Ubiquitous Computing.

Abstract: In consequence of the progress of globalization in information technology, all information have been

uniformized without any attention to the place the contents were made. For example, we search for videos

and watch them in the same way on PC, even if some of them were made in our home cities, while others

were made abroad. Therefore, users can not feel the background of the contents, and they can not realize

essence of contents. In this research, we developed CQ Submarine which is the system for searching videos

based on feelings of distance and direction. In this system, users set the distance and direction from

themselves, then they can watch the videos which were made in the area where users set. This searching

process allow users to have imagination, aspiration, amazement, and discovery about that area. We also

made a demo of CQ Submarine at an exhibition on travel applications that was held in Tokyo in 2011, and

got a lot of feed backs from initial users.

1 INTRODUCTION

As a result of the progress of globalization in

information technology, a variety of video data have

been possible for us to get. Some people enjoy

entertaining contents such as movies and TV shows,

while others attend lectures of university by e-

learning. These services enable us to look into what

happens in the world sooner and closer.

However, on the other side of the coin, we

consider that these information are uniformized in

PC. For example, all videos are gathered and

displayed in the same way although one video was

recorded at our city, while another one was recorded

at a place 10000km from our cities. A couple of

decades ago, we had to spend time, money and some

efforts in order to look what happens in the world

and experience them. In this process, people could

have a variety of imagination, about each place.

Therefore, they could realize how far the places are

from their city, and how different the cultures are in

those places. We believe that contents should

contain the elements which we can get in searching

process such as imagination, aspiration, and

discoveries. In current process, as people normally

get contents directly on shortest path, they are not

allowed to have any imagination and aspiration

about unknown places. In fact, the number of young

Japanese people who travel abroad is decreasing

significantly in this decade.

In this research, we developed the searching

system for video and sounds which allows users to

have imagination, aspiration, amazement, and

discovery in the process of searching

2 CQ SUBMARINE

CQ Submarine is the system for obtaining the

information such as videos and sounds by setting the

distance and direction from the place where the user

is (Figure.1). Users set the distance from the place

where they are by the dial which is set on the upper

part of the device (Figure.2). Then, users set the

direction by rotating the device. After that, users can

watch the videos and listen to the sounds which are

795

Yoshihara T. and Yasumura M..

CQ SUBMARINE - The Interface for Searching and Visualizing Videos based on Feelings of Distance and Direction.

DOI: 10.5220/0003927107950798

In Proceedings of the International Conference on Computer Graphics Theory and Applications (IVAPP-2012), pages 795-798

ISBN: 978-989-8565-02-0

 2012 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)

recorded at that place. A maximum of 9 videos are

selected randomly from the area by the distance of

50km from the place where the user set, and play

inside of the chassis of the system (Figure.3). In

order to let the users feel the shift of the contents for

real, we adopt the metaphor of submarine's

periscope in which users look in the chassis. The

phrase of "CQ" which stands for "seek you" or "Call

for Quarters" came from the technical word of ham

radio. It is reflected in my own experience of

childhood in that I often heard my father's ham. I

always tune the frequency and could imagine how

the world is and have aspiration or amazement by

listening to the voice which came from abroad.

As getting a hint from my experience, in CQ

Submarine, users select the videos not actively and

directly but only vaguely by tuning the distance and

direction, therefore they are able to allow to prompt

speculation about how that place looks like.

Figure 1: The aspect of the system.

Figure 2: The dial for setting distance.

Figure 3: The videos playing inside the chassis.

3 IMPLEMENTATION

CQ submarine is comprised of three functions. The

first one is the device for setting direction and

distance, and we set an iPad on the top of the chassis

for this function. The second one is the device for

showing the videos, and we set a Mac Book Pro in

the chassis for this function. The last one is CQ

Submarine software which gathers geo-tagged

videos from YouTube API(Figure.4). CQ Submarine

software is running on Google App Engine.

Figure 4: The system configuration diagram.

4 USE CASE

There are two patterns of use cases. Firstly, users fix

the distance, and then control the direction with

watching videos. In this case, users can watch the

videos which are recorded in limited areas. For

example, it is expected that users can expand their

IVAPP 2012 - International Conference on Information Visualization Theory and Applications

796

knowledge about the region and discover something

by watching the videos recorded in the area just

nearby their homes. A lot of people treat the place as

dots, because they normally move by means of

transportation such as car, train, and bus in their city.

But this use case enables users to realize what

happens in several directions spatially. Secondly,

users fix the direction, and then change distance with

watching movies. In this case, users can realize the

transition of culture by expanding the distance. For

example, if Japanese users expand the distance

toward west, they can watch Japanese contents,

Chinese contents, European contents and so on in

sequence. As just described in these use cases, users

can obtain information with recognizing the space

around the world.

Figure 5: A use case at exhibition.

5 DISCUSSIONS

In order to get some initial user feedback, we made a

demo of CQ Submarine at an exhibition on travel

applications that was held in Tokyo in September

2011. In that exhibition, we received a variety of

opinions with some visitors using CQ Submarine

after that event. When users set the distance and

direction, most of them tend to decide the place such

as the their home city, the place where they travelled

before and so on in advance. Of course they missed

the point at first, however, they guessed which

country the current places were from the information

in the videos such as the look of people, buildings

and character. In this process, especially, users were

amazed when Japanese language changed to

Chinese, Turkish, and French by expanding the

distance from Japan to west. At last some users

reached the videos recoded at the place where they

intended at first. A lot of users were surprised that

their sense of distance and direction missed the

points of real.

6 RELATED WORKS

As a research which relates image browsing and

spatial location information, Snavery, Seitz, and

Szeliski presented “Photo Tourism “. This system

enables users to browse through Internet snap shots

that have been arranged into virtual 3D space by

finding similarities between the images. There are

also some web services such as “flickr” or

“panoramio” and “google maps” in which users can

browse pictures or videos on maps. These ideas

shows the value of browsing contents by relating

them to location information, however there are no

case which use distance and direction as an interface.

Some AR applications such as “Sekai Camera” or

“Layer” presents interface which uses real-world

experience, but they are different in that the area is

extremely small from our research.

7 CONCLUSIONS

Initial feed back from users indicates CQ Submarine

is useful to provide imagination, amazement and

discovery in searching process. This results indicate

that the concept of CQ Submarine is expected to

work for a variety of areas such as education,

tourism, and culturology. We believe that making

scope for imagination in searching process is a

useful activity that may lead to a variety of

innovative applications.

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