Chapter 1

Introduction

Multimedia Systems
Instructor: Mr. Addisu M
 Contents

What is Multimedia?

History of Multimedia

Multimedia and Hypermedia

Multimedia and World Wide Web

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 What is Multimedia?
 Multi – many or multiple
 Medium – different type of data representation
 Multimedia – concerned with the computer
controlled integration of text, graphics,
drawings, moving images (Video), animation,
audio, and any other media where every type of
information can be represented, stored,
transmitted and processed digitally.
 Multimedia: a working definition
– Systems operating on multiple modalities: text,
audio, images, drawings, animation, video etc.
– one medium is a continuous medium while another
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InTcis
322discrete
– Multimedia Systems AMU - CSIT
 HyperText and HyperMedia

 Hypertext: a text which contains links to

other texts to be read non-linearly, by
following links that point to other parts of
the document, or to other documents
 By clicking on hot spots in the text, the reader
is immediately transported to related material
in the document

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 Cont’d

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 Cont’d
 HyperMedia: not constrained to be text-
based, can include other media, e.g., graphics,
images, and especially the continuous media –
sound and video and links them together.
 Examples of Hypermedia Applications
 World Wide Web (WWW) – the best example
 Powerpoint
 Adobe Flash
 Many Others?
 Multimedia – computer information can be
represented through audio, graphics, images,
video, and animation in addition to traditional
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media (i.e., text,
InTc 322 – Multimedia Systems graphics/AMU
drawings,
- CSIT images).
 Cont’d

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 Multimedia Applications
 Examples of multimedia applications include:
 Digital video editing and production systems.
 Electronic newspapers/magazines.
 World Wide Web
 Multimedia Authoring, e.g. Adobe/Macromedia Director
 On-line reference works: e.g. encyclopedias, games, etc.
 Home shopping
 Computer Games
 Virtual reality
 Multimedia Database systems
 Interactive TV
 Multimedia courseware
 Video conferencing
 Video-on-demand
 Interactive movies.
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 Multimedia Systems
 Multimedia System – system characterised
by the processing, storage, generation,
manipulation and rendition of multimedia data
and applications.
A system that involves:
– generation  production/authoring
– representation tools
– storage  compression and
– transmission formats
– search and retrieval  file system design
– delivery  networking issues
of multimedia  database management
information
InTc 322 – Multimedia Systems  server
AMU - CSITdesign,
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 Characteristics of a Multimedia
System
Multimedia system has four basic
characteristics:
 Multimedia systems must be computer
controlled.
 Multimedia systems are integrated.
 The information they handle must be
represented digitally.
 The interface to the final presentation of
media is usually interactive.

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 Cont’d

Computer controlled
 Producing the content of the information–e.g.
by using the authoring tools, image editor,
sound and video editor
 Storing the information – providing large and
shared capacity for multimedia information.
 Transmitting the information–through the
network.
 Presenting the information to the end user–
make direct use of computer peripheral such
as display device (monitor) or sound
generator(speaker).
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 Cont’d

Integrated
 All multimedia components (audio, video,
text, graphics) used in the system must be
some how integrated.
 Every device, such as microphone and
camera is connected to and controlled by a
single computer.
 A single type of digital storage is used for
all media type.
 Video sequences are shown on computer
screen instead of TV monitor.
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Interactivity
 Level1: Interactivity strictly on information
delivery. Users select the time at which the
presentation starts, the order, the speed
and the form of the presentation itself.
 Level2: Users can modify or enrich the
content of the information, and this
modification is recorded.
 Level3: Actual processing of users input
and the computer generate genuine result
based on the users input.
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 Cont’d

Digitally Represented
 Digitization: process involved in
transforming an analog signal to digital
signal

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 Challenges for Multimedia
Systems
Key issues MSs need to deal with here are:
 How to represent and store
temporal/progressive information.
 How to strictly maintain the temporal
relationships on play back/retrieval
 What process are involved in the above.
 Data has to represented digitally — Analog–
Digital
 Conversion, Sampling etc.
 Large Data Requirements — bandwidth,
storage,
Data compression is usually mandatory 15
InTc 322 – Multimedia Systems AMU - CSIT
 Desirables for a Multimedia
System
 Following feature a desirable for a MS:
 Very High Processing Power — needed to deal
with large data processing and real time delivery of
media. Special hardware commonplace.
 Multimedia Capable File System —needed to
deliver real-time media — e.g. Video/Audio Streaming.
 Special Hardware/Software needed – e.g. RAID
technology.
 Data Representations — File Formats that support
multimedia should be easy to handle yet allow for
compression/decompression in real-time.
 Software Tools — user friendly tools needed to
handle media, design and develop applications,
deliver media.
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 Cont’d
 Efficient and High I/O —input and output to the file
subsystem needs to be efficient and fast. Needs to allow
for real-time recording as well as playback of data. e.g.
Direct to Disk recording systems.
 Special Operating System —to allow access to file
system and process data efficiently and quickly. Needs
to support direct transfers to disk, real-time scheduling,
fast interrupt processing, I/O streaming etc.
 Storage and Memory — large storage units (of the
order of hundreds of Tb if not more) and large memory
(several Gbor more). Large Caches also required and
high speed buses for efficient management.
 Network Support — Client-server systems common as
distributed systems common.
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 Components of Multimedia
Systems
 Components (Hardware and Software) required for
a multimedia system:
 Capture devices — Video Camera, Video Recorder,
Audio Microphone, Keyboards, mice, graphics tablets, 3D
input devices, tactile sensors, VR devices. Digitising
Hardware
 Storage Devices — Hard disks, CD-ROMs, DVD-ROM,
etc
 Communication Networks — Local Networks,
Intranets, Internet, Multimedia or other special high
speed networks.
 Computer Systems — Multimedia Desktop machines,
Workstations, MPEG/VIDEO/DSP Hardware
 Display Devices — CD-quality speakers, HDTV,SVGA,
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Hi-Res monitors, Colour printers etc.
InTc 322 – Multimedia Systems AMU - CSIT
 Multimedia Data: Input and
Format
 Text and Static Data
 Source: keyboard, speech input, optical character
recognition, data stored on disk.
 Stored and input character by character:
- Storage of text is 1 byte per char / more bytes for Unicode.
- For other forms of data (e.g. Spreadsheet files). May store
format as text (with formatting) others may use binary
encoding.
 Format: Raw text or formatted text e.g HTML, Rich Text
Format (RTF), Word or a program language source (C,
Pascal, etc..
 Not temporal — BUT may have natural implied
sequence e.g. HTML format sequence, Sequence of C
program statements.
 Size Not significant w.r.t. other Multimedia data. 19
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 Cont’d
Graphics
 Format: constructed by the composition of primitive
objects such as lines, polygons, circles, curves and
arcs.
 Input: Graphics are usually generated by a graphics
editor program (e.g. Illustrator) or automatically by a
program (e.g. Postscript).
 Graphics are usually editable or revisable (unlike
Images)
 Graphics input devices: keyboard (for text and cursor
control), mouse, trackball or graphics tablet.
 graphics standards : OpenGL, PHIGS, GKS
 Graphics files usually store the primitive assembly
 Do not take up a very high storage overhead. 20
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 Cont’d
 Images
 Still pictures which (uncompressed) are represented as a
bitmap (a grid of pixels).
 Input:
 digitally scanned photographs/pictures or direct from digital
camera
 May also be generated by programs “similar” to graphics or
animation programs.
 Stored at 1 bit per pixel (Black and White), 8 Bits per pixel
(Grey Scale, Colour Map) or 24 Bits per pixel (True Colour)
 Size: 512x512 Grey scale image takes up 1/4 MB, a
512x512 24 bit image takes 3/4 MB with no compression.
 This overhead soon increases with image size — modern
high digital camera 10+ Megapixels ≈ 29MB
uncompressed!
 322 – Multimedia Systems
InTc Compression is commonly applied
AMU - CSIT
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 Cont’d
Audio
 Audio signals are continuous analog signals.
 Input: microphones and then digitised and stored
 CD Quality Audio requires 16-bit sampling at 44.1
KHz
 Even higher audiophile rates (e.g. 24-bit, 96 KHz)
 1 Minute of Mono CD quality (uncompressed)
audio requires 5 MB.
 1 Minute of Stereo CD quality (uncompressed)
audio requires 10 MB.
 Usually compressed (E.g. MP3, AAC, Flac, Ogg
Vorbis).
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 Cont’d
 Video
 Input: Analog Video is usually captured by a video camera
and then digitised.
 There are a variety of video (analog and digital) formats
 Raw video can be regarded as being a series of single images.
There are typically 25, 30 or 50 frames per second.
 E.g. A 512 x 512 size monochrome video images take 25 x
0:25 = 6.25MB for a second to store uncompressed.
 Typical PAL digital video (720 x 576 pixels per colour frame)
≈ 1:24 x 25 = 31MB for a second to store uncompressed.
 High Definition video on Blu-ray (up to 1920 x 1080 = 2
Megapixels per frame) ≈ 6.2 x 25 = 155MB for a second to
store uncompressed. (There are higher possible frame rates!)
 Digital video clearly needs to be compressed for most
times.
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 Brief History of Multimedia
Systems
Year Events
prior industrial Written Letters, Books, Poetry, Bulletin boards
Revolution
Late 1890s Radio was introduced
Early 1900s Movie was introduced
1940s Television was introduced
1960s Concept of hypertext systems was developed
Early 1980s Personal computer was introduced
1980-present Several digital audio, image, and video coding standards have been
developed.
1983 Internet is born, TCP/IP protocol was established. Audio CD was
introduced.
1990 Tim Berners-Lee proposed the WWW. HTML was developed.
1993-present Several Web browsers, hypertext languages were developed.
Mid 1990s High Definition Television standard was established.
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 Cont’d

World Wide Web Future

Digital Audio and 1990 32 bit

Video

CD-ROM, Local and Wide

Graphical Operating 1980 Area Networking
Systems 16 bit processors
Desktop Computer

1970-an 8 bit processor

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Multimedia Development

Input Output
Process
Capture Apply effect
from filters and Present
device transforms
Save to a
Read from Compress or file
a file decompress
Send
Receive Convert across the
over the between network
network formats
 Stages of Multimedia Application
Development
 developed in stages as all other software are
being developed
 Following are 4 basic stages of multimedia project
dev’t:
1. Planning and Costing: begins with an
idea or need and further refine it
 plan what writing skills, graphic art, music, video
and other multimedia expertise will be required
 estimate the time needed to prepare all elements
of multimedia and prepare a budget accordingly
 prototype or proof of concept can be developed.
2. Designing and Producing: execute each
of the planned tasks and
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 Cont’d

3. Testing:
 to ensure the product to be free from bugs and
multimedia application meets the objectives of
the project
 test whether the multimedia project works
properly on the intended deliver platforms and
they meet needs of the clients
4. Delivering: pack the project and deliver
the completed project to the end user
 This stage has several steps such as
implementation, maintenance, shipping and
marketing the product
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 Why Apply Multimedia
Technology
Ease of use
Intuitive Interface
Immersive Experience
Self-Paced Interaction and Better
Retention
Better Understanding of the Content
Cost Effectiveness
More Fun = Greater Efficiency
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 For
your