prof.irfanessa.com

In Spring 2012, I am teaching 2 classes.

Advanced Computational Photography (CS 8803 PHO) [with Grant Schindler]

This is an advanced topics class in Computational Photography, building on my intro class and explores technical aspects of pictures, and more precisely the capture and depiction of reality on a 2D medium. The scientific, perceptual, and artistic principles behind image-making will be emphasized. Topics include the relationship between pictorial techniques and the human visual system; intrinsic limitations of 2D representations and their possible compensations; and technical issues involving depiction. Technical aspects of image capture and rendering, and exploration of how such a medium can be used to its maximum potential, will be examined. Students are strongly encouraged (not required) to bring their digital cameras and a laptop to facilitate experiments. The class will explore recent and state of the art paper in Computational Photography from leading conferences and journals in the area and students will do projects in a variety of topics.

Computation + Journalism (CS 4464 / CS 6465)

This class is aimed at understanding the computational and technological advancements in the area of journalism. Primary focus is on the study of technologies for developing new tools for (a) sense-making from diverse news information sources, (b) the impact of more and cheaper networked sensors (c) collaborative human models for information aggregation and sense-making, (d) mashups and the use of programming in journalism, (e) the impact of mobile computing and data gathering, (f) computational approaches to information quality, (g) data mining for personalization and aggregation, and (h) citizen journalism. Complete schedule and other information will be on the t-square site available to only students taking the class.

Computational Journalism is defined as the application of computation to the activities of journalism such as information gathering, organization, communication, and dissemination of information, while upholding values of journalism such as accuracy and verifiability. Journalists are increasingly adopting and using the proliferation of open-source tools and embracing different styles of journalism. Explore how newsrooms are opening, what new tools are being created, and how to use those tools most effectively.

• Part of the Events associated with: FutureMedia Fest 2011 (Panel WebSite hosted by FutureMedia Fest 2011)
• Date and time: Tue, 11/15/2011 – 2:15 PM – 3:25 PM
• Location: Georgia Tech Hotel, Atlanta, GA 30308, USA.

Panelists:

• Irfan Essa, Professor, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Tech [Bio] [Website] [Projects: CnJ].
• David Clinch, Clinch Media [Bio] [Project: Storyful.com to curatehttp://youtube.com/news and http://youtube.com/politics]
• Eric Gilbert, Assistant Professor, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Tech [Bio] [Website] [Projects: comp.social].
• King-wa Fu, Research Assistant Professor, Journalism and Media Studies Centre University of Hong Kong. [Bio] [Project: Real-time Sina Weibo statistics
• John Perry, Database Specialist, Investigative Team, Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
• Leonard Witt, Robert D. Fowler Distinguished Chair in Communication at Kennesaw State University. [Bio] [Projects: JJIE.org, PJNet.org].

Topics of discussion will include (but will not be limited to):

• What is Computational Journalism?
• What impact has Computation / Information Technology / Networking Technology had on Journalism?
• What is the newsroom of the future? How has the newsroom changed?
• How has investigative journalism changed with new technologies?
• How is social networking changed how we gather, distribute, and share news (and information)?
• What are the economic / financial models that need to explored to support (and sustain) journalism?
• What is the role of an Editor in the new journalism model?
• What should we be teaching the next generation of journalists?

via CnJ Panel at Georgia Tech’s Future Media Fest 2011 | Computation + Journalism.

Just did a session at the Future Media Fest at GA Tech on Computational Journalism.

Journalism and related aspects information gathering, verification and distribution have significantly changed in recent times with the growth and pervasiveness of Computation, Information, and Networking Technologies. In this session, we will discuss how computation is now completely embedded into each and every aspect of news business from news gathering to newer distribution channels citizen journalism and oversight. Our goal is to bring together computationalists and journalists to study these current trends, and go further to impact future trends in the areas of both computation and journalism.

via FutureMedia Fest 2010: Birds of a Feather Session- Computationa….

Final Projects 2010 « Computation + Journalism Class at Georgia Tech.

Check out the list of final projects for this term’s (Spring 2010) class on Computational Journalism.  Final reports expected in last week of April.  Stay tuned.

Happy 2010! In Spring Term 2010, I am teaching the following two classes.

Computation + Journalism (CS 4464 / CS 6465)

This class is aimed at understanding the computational and technological advancements in the area of journalism. Primary focus is on the study of technologies for developing new tools for (a) sense-making from diverse news information sources, (b) the impact of more and cheaper networked sensors (c) collaborative human models for information aggregation and sense-making, (d) mashups and the use of programming in journalism, (e) the impact of mobile computing and data gathering, (f) computational approaches to information quality, (g) data mining for personalization and aggregation, and (h) citizen journalism.

Computing, Society and Professionalism (CS 4001)

Although Computing, Society and Professionalism is a required course for CS majors, it is not a typical computer science course. Rather than dealing with the technical content of computing, it addresses the effects of computing on individuals, organizations, and society, and on what yourresponsibilities are as a computing professional in light of those impacts. The topic is a very broad one and one that you will have to deal with almost every day of your professional life. The issues are sometimes as intellectually deep as some of the greatest philosophical writings in history – and sometimes as shallow as a report on the evening TV news. This course can do little more than introduce you to the topics, but, if successful, will change the way you view the technology with which you work.

Augmenting Aerial Earth Maps with Dynamic Information

• K. Kim, S. Oh, J. Lee, and I. Essa (2009), “Augmenting Aerial Earth Maps with Dynamic Information,” in Proceedings of IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR), 2009. [PDF] [WEBSITE] [VIDEO] [DOI] [BLOG] [BIBTEX]

  @inproceedings{2009-Kim-AAEMWDI,
    Author = {K. Kim and S. Oh and J. Lee and I. Essa},
    Blog = {http://prof.irfanessa.com/2009/10/20/augearth-ismar2009/},
    Booktitle = {Proceedings of IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR)},
    Date-Modified = {2012-04-09 23:23:56 +0000},
    Doi = {10.1109/ISMAR.2009.5336505},
    Month = {October},
    Pdf = {http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~irfan/p/2009-Kim-AAEMWDI.pdf},
    Title = {Augmenting Aerial Earth Maps with Dynamic Information},
    Url = {http://www.cc.gatech.edu/cpl/projects/augearth/},
    Video = {http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPk88soc2qw},
    Year = {2009},
    Bdsk-Url-1 = {http://www.cc.gatech.edu/cpl/projects/augearth/},
    Bdsk-Url-2 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/ISMAR.2009.5336505}}

Abstract

We introduce methods for augmenting aerial visualizations of Earth (from tools such as Google Earth or Microsoft Virtual Earth) with dynamic information obtained from videos. Our goal is to make Augmented Earth Maps that visualize the live broadcast of dynamic sceneries within a city. We propose different approaches to analyze videos of pedestrians and cars, under differing conditions and then augment Aerial Earth Maps (AEMs) with live and dynamic information. We also analyze natural phenomenon (clouds) and project information from these to the AEMs to add the visual reality.

For Journal Version of this paper, please see http://prof.irfanessa.com/2011/02/02/vr-2011/

Can Computer Nerds Save Journalism?, TIME Magazine, by MATT VILLANO, June 8, 2009

EXCERPT

“At the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, a three-year-old program in “computational journalism” helps computer-science majors study how journalists gather, organize and utilize information, then take these workflows and see how technology can make the processes easier.”

Full article here. Also see CnJ site.

From Computational Photography and Video to Computational Journalism

Irfan Essa
Georgia Institute of Technology
School of Interactive Computing, GVU and RIM Centers
April 21, 2009.

(see the video of this presentation)

Abstract

Our consumption of images (photography/video) continues to grow with the pervasiveness of computing (networking, mobile and media) technologies into our daily lives. Everyone now has a mobile camera, and digital image capture, processing, and sharing has become ubiquitous in our society. This has led to a significant impact on we want to (a) create novel scenes, (b) share our experiences with images, and (c) interact with  large amounts of images and videos from many sources. In this talk, I will start  with a brief overview of series of ongoing efforts in the analysis of images and videos for rendering novel scenes, interacting with images/videos and collaboratively authoring new content. I will describe some work on video-based rendering and synthesizing novel videos (and scenes) and highlight the technical contributions being made in areas of Computational Photography and Video.

Using these sets of efforts as a foundation I will showcase where things are headed in terms of user generated content, media sharing, annotation, and reuse with large scale networks. In essence, everybody is a content, producer, distributor, and consumer. I will describe some new efforts that move towards understanding mobile imaging and video, and also discuss issues of collaborative imaging, collective authoring, ad-hoc sensor networks, and peer production with images and videos.  Using these concepts I will discuss how all of these issues are impacting the field Journalism and Reporting and how we have started on a new interdisciplinary research and education effort, we call Computational Journalism.  The concept of Computational Journalism includes more than just imaging, and relates to media and information in general and is aimed at the study of how we remain informed in this connected world. I will outline this new field and relate it back to imaging, with examples from some of our recent work in this new area.

N. Diakopoulos, S. Goldenberg, I. Essa (2009). “Videolyzer: Quality Analysis of Online Informational Video for Bloggers and Journalists.” ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI). April, 2009. [PDF] [Project Site] [Video] (CHI 2009 – Digital Life New World – CHI 2009 Advance Program)

Abstract

Talk/Presentation at Duke University, Jan 27, 2009. Hosted by  James Hamilton, director of the DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy at Duke University

Computation & Journalism: The Impact of Technology on Journalism, Information Quality, and Civic Literacy

Irfan Essa
Georgia Institute of Technology
School of Interactive Computing, GVU and RIM Centers 

Fundamentally, journalism is the process of collecting news information and disseminating that information with a layer of contextualization and understanding provided by journalists in the form of a news story. Recent advances in computational technology are rapidly affecting how news is gathered, reported, and distributed, and how stories are authored and told. New technologies for aggregating, visualizing, summarizing, consuming, and collaborating on news are becoming increasingly popular. Theses advances are challenging the traditional practices of journalism and directly affecting the future of news production and consumption. Both computation and journalism share a deep interest in information and the value it provides to society, and they are deeply involved in the future of storytelling in various contexts, especially current events. This requires us to consider how both Computation and Journalism can help each other.

In this talk, I will present a vision for a new area of research and education that brings together the fields of computation and journalism together to enhance both these disciplines and supports a creation of a “Computationalist-Journalist.,” a new kind of participant in the public conversation. I will start by describing how imaging, video, and media production and consumption has changed with technology and then how similar technologies can be used for Journalism and related Civic Literacy issues. I will describe new technologies that have changed the landscape of both Computation and Journalism and use these developments to showcase, where we are headed to with both Computation and Journalism, and technologists and journalists together to create new computing tools that further the aims of journalism.

Bio