Abstract: A method and an apparatus for navigating and manipulating a virtual object in a virtual space using a digital camera as an input device are described. The method comprises the following steps. A plurality of video frames are received and analyzed by a video data analyzer to determine whether a predetermined set of data is present. The predetermined set of data includes several variables. First, whether a person is present in the video frame. Second, if a person is present, then whether the person's head is visible in the video frame. If the person's head is visible, then the position of the person's head in 3-D space is determined and recorded. Finally, the orientation of the person's head in 3-D space is also determined. The third variable is to determine whether a hand or hands are visible. If a hand is visible, the position of the hand in 3-D space is determined and recorded. The orientation of the hand in 3-D space is then determined and recorded.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for constructing a digital filter from a set of data is described. The method comprises the following steps. A plurality of magnitude components of the set of data is encoded. A plurality of phase components of the set of data is encoded. The plurality of encoded magnitude components and encoded phase components are stored in a memory. The digital filter is constructed using the encoded magnitude components and encoded phase components from the memory.

Abstract: A method for determining the intensity value of a sound begins by determining if a listener location is within one of an ambient ellipse region and a localized ellipse region, the ambient ellipse region and the localized ellipse region sharing a common focus at an origin of the sound and sharing a common medial axis. The intensity value of the sound is set to an ambient intensity value when the listener location is within the ambient ellipse region. The intensity value of the sound is set to a localized intensity value when the listener location is within the localized ellipse region, and the intensity value of the sound is set to zero when the listener location is not within the localized ellipse region or the ambient ellipse region.

Abstract: A computer-readable medium stores sequences of instructions to be executed by a processor. These instructions cause the processor to perform the following steps to enhance 3-D localization of a speech source. A digital speech signal is received. The maximum frequency of the digital speech signal is determined. The sampling rate of the digital speech signal is increased. Next, wide-band Gaussian noise is added to the digital speech signal to create a wide-band digital speech signal with higher frequencies. Finally, the wide-band digital speech signal can be localized via an FIR (finite impulse response) filter.

Abstract: A real-time media driver for scheduling and mixing media in a multimedia environment. Implemented to operate in conjunction with a non-real-time operating system, the real-time media driver comprises a wave driver which controls a predominant percentage of the operations of the media hardware device and a mini-device driver which is software provided by the vendor of the media hardware device to support functions unique to the particular media hardware device. Furthermore, the real-time media driver comprises a media scheduler which (i) synchronizes multiple media streams prior to being input into a mixing/splitting device of the media scheduler; (ii) allows reconfiguration of attributes of media streams without loss of content prior to and after operations by the mixing/splitting device; and (iii) appropriately mixes media to produce multi-channel media according to a certain "prioritized sharing" policies.