Multimedia Communications

Multimedia Communications is at the core of the advanced interactive services that make up today's Information Society. Videoconferencing, teleworking, teleshopping and video-on-demand will benefit from developments in broadband and mobile telecommunication systems, intelligent multimedia terminals and digital signal processing. The latest research findings from these fields are presented here in the proceedings of the 10th Tyrrhenian Workshop on Digital Communications, held in Ischia, Italy, September 19 98. Focus is placed on the following four areas: Signal Processing for Multimedia Communications. Modeling, Analysis and Simulation of Multimedia Traffic Sources. Access Techniques. Multimode Multimedia Terminals. In particular, multimedia services and applications are presented. This comprehensive collection of papers will enable the reader to keep pace with the rapid changes that are taking place in this field. Experts have co-operated with top research centers worldwide, on an academic and industrial level, to make this an up-to-date reference volume for all those who are concerned with technological advances in Multimedia Distributed Systems.

1 Signal Processing for Multimedia Communications.- Image Compression using Adaptive Wavelets and Trellis-Coded Quantization.- Synthesis Filter Bank Optimization in 1D and 2D Separable Subband Coding.- Multiple Descriptions Source-Channel Coding Methods for Communications.- A Robust Spatial Filtering Method for DOA Estimation of Coherent Sources in Impulsive Interference.- Signal Processing Considerations for Immersive Audio Rendering.- Real-Time Billboard Substitution in a Video Stream.- Signal Processing in Satellite Systems for Multimedia Services.- A Sketch-Based Approach for the Recovery of Transmission Errors in Coded Images.- An Algorithm for Fast Segmentation of Color Images.- Multi-Camera Strategies for High-Accuracy 3D Reconstruction.- 2 Multimedia Traffic: Modelling, Analysis, Measurements, and Performance Evaluation.- Providing Quality for Internet Video Services.- Video Traffic over Wireless Links: Issues and Performance.- Measurement-Based Admission Control with Aggregate Traffic Envelopes.- Coexistence of QoS and Best-Effort Flows.- Impact, Characterization and Modelling of Intermedia Relationships in a Multimedia System Performance Evaluation Framework.- Multimedia Network Management as Global Control.- Malleable Multimedia Presentations: Adaptive Streaming Tradeoffs for Best-Quality Fast-Response Systems.- Network Traffic Issues for Interactive Multipoint Multimedia Applications.- A Multi-Channel Approach to Voice Activity Detection in Noisy Environments Based on Time Delay Estimation.- Queuing Performance Evaluation by means of Traffic Sampling Methods.- Modelling DQDB Multimedia Sources at Cell/Segment Level.- A Novel Control Scheme for VBR Video Transmission over ATM Networks.- 3 Access Techniques.- Passive Optical Networks: Results from Project FSAN.- Resource Allocation Strategies for Multimedia Traffic in an ATM-Based PON.- DSL Technologies (HDSL2, ADSL, and VDSL), Improved Algorithms to Meet Wide Market Acceptance.- UMTS Access Network Architecture and Relevant Dimensioning Issues.- Wireless Multimedia Assessment with Traffic, Access and Transmission Protocols in Actual Environment at Millimeter Waves.- Error Propagation Stop Principle for CD3-OFDM: a Comparison with Perfect Coherent Demodulation.- Performance of a RS-Coded QPSK Cable Modem for TDMA Communication over the Return Channel of HFC Networks.- How Self-Similar Processes Persistence Determines the Queue Length Distribution Moments.- 4 Multimode Multimedia Terminals.- Multimode Multimedia Terminals: Issues and Trends.- Specification of Digital Interactive TV Systems.- MHEG-5 Common Application Interface for Broadcast and Interactive Services.- New Concepts for Multimode Multimedia Terminal Architectures.- Software Radio Technology: a Practical Example.- A Flexible Software Architecture for Multimedia Home Platforms.- PHS Mobile Communication System for Simultaneous Voice and Image Transmission.- Software Open Multimedia Interactive Terminal: an Open Terminal Architecture to Support Multimedia High-Quality Services.- Adaptive and Embedded Java-Codecs for Multimedia Terminals.- 5 Multimedia Services and Applications.- Multimedia Applications and Services.- Multimodal Human/Machine Communication.- Multimedia Processing for Advanced Communications Services.- Progressive Content-Based Retrieval of Image Databases through the Internet.- Content-Based Searching and Filtering of Visual Information.- Internet Video-Streaming.- Software Design and Simulation of a DS/CDMA Multimedia Transmission System for Remote Video-Surveillance Applications.- Rendering and Animation of a Proprietary Face Model into the MPEG-4 3D Player.- Authors’ Index.