Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar, initiating communication, capturing an image, detecting a face in the image, extracting features from the face, converting the facial features to avatar parameters, and transmitting at least one of the avatar selection or avatar parameters.

Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar, initiating communication, capturing an image, detecting a face in the image, extracting features from the face, converting the facial features to avatar parameters, and transmitting at least one of the avatar selection or avatar parameters.

Abstract: The present disclosure relates to methods for cooperative control of microcystis aeruginosa by using chub, bighead, catfish and daphnia, and belongs to the technical field of water treatment. The microcystis aeruginosa in a water body is controlled using a food chain relationship; the chub, the bighead, the catfish and the daphnia can directly eat the microcystis aeruginosa in a filtering manner; and meanwhile, the chub, the bighead and the catfish also can intake the daphnia, so as to indirectly consume the microcystis aeruginosa in the water body, wherein the fishes, the daphnia and the microcystis aeruginosa form the food chain relationship; in addition, the microcystis aeruginosa at the upper, middle and lower layers and a microcystis aeruginosa hypopus at the bottom layer can be controlled by fully utilizing the vertical spatial distribution difference of the three fishes in the water body.

Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar, initiating communication, capturing an image, detecting a face in the image, extracting features from the face, converting the facial features to avatar parameters, and transmitting at least one of the avatar selection or avatar parameters.

Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar; initiating communication; detecting a user input; identifying the user input; identifying an animation command based on the user input; generating avatar parameters; and transmitting at least one of the animation command and the avatar parameters.

Abstract: The present disclosure relates to methods for cooperative control of microcystis aeruginosa by using chub, bighead, catfish and daphnia, and belongs to the technical field of water treatment. The microcystis aeruginosa in a water body is controlled using a food chain relationship; the chub, the bighead, the catfish and the daphnia can directly eat the microcystis aeruginosa in a filtering manner; and meanwhile, the chub, the bighead and the catfish also can intake the daphnia, so as to indirectly consume the microcystis aeruginosa in the water body, wherein the fishes, the daphnia and the microcystis aeruginosa form the food chain relationship; in addition, the microcystis aeruginosa at the upper, middle and lower layers and a microcystis aeruginosa hypopus at the bottom layer can be controlled by fully utilizing the vertical spatial distribution difference of the three fishes in the water body.

Abstract: Methods, apparatuses, and articles associated with facial tracking and recognition are disclosed. In embodiments, facial images may be detected in video or still images and tracked. After normalization of the facial images, feature data may be extracted from selected regions of the faces to compare to associated feature data in known faces. The selected regions may be determined using a boosting machine learning processes over a set of known images. After extraction, individual two-class comparisons may be performed between corresponding feature data from regions on the tested facial images and from the known facial image. The individual two-class classifications may then be combined to determine a similarity score for the tested face and the known face. If the similarity score exceeds a threshold, an identification of the known face may be output or otherwise used. Additionally, tracking with voting may be performed on faces detected in video.

Abstract: Embodiments of a graphical mapping interface and method are provided herein for creating and displaying a schema map, which may be used by a data transformation system to perform a data transformation between at least one source schema and at least one target schema. According to one embodiment, the graphical mapping interface may generally comprise a main map window and a mini-map window. The main map window comprises a source schema region, which is adapted for displaying a graphical representation of a primary source schema defining a structure of a primary data source. The mini-map window is adapted for creating a mapping between one or more nodes of the primary source schema and one or more nodes of an intermediate target schema, and displaying a graphical representation of the mapping within the mini-map window.

Abstract: Detecting facial landmarks in a face detected in an image may be performed by first cropping a face rectangle region of the detected face in the image and generating an integral image based at least in part on the face rectangle region. Next, a cascade classifier may be executed for each facial landmark of the face rectangle region to produce one response image for each facial landmark based at least in part on the integral image. A plurality of Active Shape Model (ASM) initializations may be set up. ASM searching may be performed for each of the ASM initializations based at least in part on the response images, each ASM search resulting in a search result having a cost. Finally, a search result of the ASM searches having a lowest cost function may be selected, the selected search result indicating locations of the facial landmarks in the image.

Abstract: Avatars are animated using predetermined avatar images that are selected based on facial features of a user extracted from video of the user. A user's facial features are tracked in a live video, facial feature parameters are determined from the tracked features, and avatar images are selected based on the facial feature parameters. The selected images are then displayed are sent to another device for display. Selecting and displaying different avatar images as a user's facial movements change animates the avatar. An avatar image can be selected from a series of avatar images representing a particular facial movement, such as blinking. An avatar image can also be generated from multiple avatar feature images selected from multiple avatar feature image series associated with different regions of a user's face (eyes, mouth, nose, eyebrows), which allows different regions of the avatar to be animated independently.

Abstract: According to one embodiment of the invention, a method includes generating a person-name Information Gain (IG)-Tree and a relation IG-Tree from annotated data. The method also includes tagging and partial parsing of an input document. The names of the persons are extracted within the input document using the person-name IG-tree. Additionally, names of organizations are extracted within the input document. The method also includes extracting entity names that are not names of persons and organizations within the input document. Further, the relations between the identified entity names are extracted using the relation-IG-tree.

Abstract: Graphical mapping interface embodiments and method are provided for creating and displaying a schema map, which may be used by a data transformation system to perform a data transformation between at least one source schema and at least one target schema. According to one embodiment, the graphical mapping interface may comprise a source schema region for displaying a graphical representation of at least one source schema, a target schema region for displaying a graphical representation of at least one target schema, and a mapping region for displaying graphical representations of a plurality of links connecting the source nodes displayed in the source schema region to the target nodes displayed in the target schema region. The plurality of links may comprise at least one control link having at least one ECA rule associated therewith and at least one data link having at least one textual-based target field expression associated therewith.

Abstract: Low-dust animal litters made from one or more ingredients that function as an animal litter and one or more polyols that function to control dust in the litter are described herein. The low-dust animal litters are made by selecting one or more litter ingredients suitable for making an animal litter and combining the litter ingredients with one or more polyols, generally by applying the polyols to the surface of one or more ingredients before or during the process of combining the ingredients to produce the litter.

Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar, initiating communication, capturing an image, detecting a face in the image, extracting features from the face, converting the facial features to avatar parameters, and transmitting at least one of the avatar selection or avatar parameters.

Abstract: Generally this disclosure describes a video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar; initiating communication; detecting a user input; identifying the user input; identifying an animation command based on the user input; generating avatar parameters; and transmitting at least one of the animation command and the avatar parameters.

Abstract: Disclosed in some examples are various modifications to the shape regression technique for use in real-time applications, and methods, systems, and machine readable mediums which utilize the resulting facial landmark tracking methods.

Abstract: A video communication system that replaces actual live images of the participating users with animated avatars. A method may include selecting an avatar, initiating communication, capturing an image, detecting a face in the image, extracting features from the face, converting the facial features to avatar parameters, and transmitting at least one of the avatar selection or avatar parameters. The system is configured to allow a user to select a new avatar during active communication with a remote user.

Abstract: A system and method for selecting an advertisement to present to a consumer includes detecting facial regions in the image, identifying one or more consumer characteristics (mood, gender, age, etc.) of said consumer in the image, identifying one or more advertisements to present to the consumer based on a comparison of the consumer characteristics with an advertisement database including a plurality of advertisement profiles, and presenting a selected one of the identified advertisement to the consumer on a media device.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for capturing and representing 3D wireframe, color and shading of facial expressions are provided, wherein the method includes the following steps: storing a plurality of feature data sequences, each of the feature data sequences corresponding to one of the plurality of facial expressions; and retrieving one of the feature data sequences based on user facial feature data; and mapping the retrieved feature data sequence to an avatar face. The method may advantageously provide improvements in execution speed and communications bandwidth.

Abstract: Apparatuses, methods and storage medium associated with animating and rendering an avatar are disclosed herein. In embodiments, an apparatus may include a facial mesh tracker to receive a plurality of image frames, detect facial action movements of a face and head pose gestures of a head within the plurality of image frames, and output a plurality of facial motion parameters and head pose parameters that depict facial action movements and head pose gestures detected, all in real time, for animation and rendering of an avatar. The facial action movements and head pose gestures may be detected through inter-frame differences for a mouth and an eye, or the head, based on pixel sampling of the image frames. The facial action movements may include opening or closing of a mouth, and blinking of an eye. The head pose gestures may include head rotation such as pitch, yaw, roll, and head movement along horizontal and vertical direction, and the head comes closer or goes farther from the camera.