Vaddio HD PTZ Cameras Focus on Audience Facial Research |
| Audience research normally involves observation and recording techniques to capture what test subjects say and do in response to a movie, video, game or TV commercial. At Time Warner’s Medialab in Manhattan, CompView Audio Visual recently designed a video capture system that also helps measure what test subjects feel through what their faces reveal. Tom Yerkes was in charge of the project for CompView Audio Visual, and looked for a camera that would provide very clear, HD images over different distances, in areas with very different lighting and completely different colour temperatures. |
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The Medialab facility is new and designed to help producers from Time Warner’s subsidiaries create more compelling content for Warner Bros. movies, HBO television, CNN news broadcasts, Time Warner magazines, video games from the company’s Interactive Entertainment division, or trailers, television advertising and promotional websites. Medialab can also test how consumers view and engage with video, games and online content on devices ranging from smart phones and tablets all the way up to digital projection systems. The facility includes eight testing and two observation rooms, among them a living room set-up, a traditional focus group room, a usability lab where consumers can try out Time Warner products, a 47-seat theatre and a retail set where test shoppers can buy magazines and other merchandise. |
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A total of 22 Vaddio WallVIEW HD-19 CAT-5 pan/tilt/zoom cameras, each mounted in a ceiling dome, give the researchers close-up views of these interactions. The broadcast engineers at the facility, who work regularly with video cameras, were impressed with the system’s image quality. When combined with data from biometric devices that measure heart rate, respiration, motion and galvanic skin response, video from these cameras provide detailed insights about the emotions consumers experience when they’re watching or using a Time Warner product. To make this happen, HD images from the cameras, the media being tested, voice and program audio and data from the biometric devices are all sent to a multi-stream digital recording system as well as a total of 20 LED monitors in the observation rooms. Researchers can adjust each of the robotic cameras remotely, deciding when to zoom in on a subject’s face or hands. Depending on the lab used, other HD-19 cameras provide long shots of the group as a whole. |
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A very large 184 input by 184 output matrix switching system, also designed by CompView, allows Medialab staff to choose how the programming being tested, the camera sources and biometric data are routed to the testing labs, observation rooms and recording system. An important goal of the design team was to capture output from any device that might be brought into Medialab. Because many smart phones, handheld gaming systems and smart appliances do not have AV outputs, staff may aim one of the Vaddio cameras over the subject’s shoulder to capture what he or she is looking at. CompView technicians tied each of the HD-19 cameras into the switching matrix at Medialab via a Vaddio Quick-Connect Interface in the equipment room. Vaddio’s camera interface also allows them to send the video and control signals over inexpensive twisted-pair cable without compromising reliability or quality. The interface has a DVI output, and CompView connected that directly into the switching matrix. www.vaddio.com |
