Self-Service Classroom Capture Generating Interactive Multivideo Objects

The capture of lectures for the generation of associated videos is mainstream in several locations. Alternative approaches include the capture of real lectures or studio-produced ones, the latter designed with the only purpose of generating the associated videos. The amount of control offered to instructors during the capture process varies from system to system. In cases in which the lectures are delivered in classrooms while regular classes take place, the capture may occur according to programmed schedules which are unaware of the presence of the instructor in the classroom, and may start before the instructor is in place and may end before the instructor concludes the lecture – the latter occurring when the instructor passes the scheduled time, a situation which is not uncommon in traditional courses. In cases in which the lectures are delivered in studios, the capture is usually directed by professionals that control start and ending times and orient the instructor to look at specific cameras, for instance. We built a prototype system that offers instructors facilities to control the starting and ending times of multiple segments so that the overall exposition is transformed into a corresponding interactive multivideo object, exploiting the multimodal and multi-device nature of the presentation. After a brief overview of our prototype, in this paper we present the document-based workflow which underlies the processes of capture, generation and presentation that offer instructors a self-service alternative to control the generation of a multimedia object composed of synchronized videos, audio, images and context information associated to the lecture. We illustrate the utility of the approach by summarizing data relative to the use of our prototype by a group of instructors.