Chapter One

Overview of Multimedia System

Multimedia?????

Overview of Multimedia System

In the world, media can be accessible as unitary
(traditional) or accessible as combination of various
media in one . To be sets of data are accessible
together and give an information, there should be a
mechanism or a science, which is multimedia system.
Multimedia is defined as follows:Multi Many and Media a way to transmit information/ set of
sources of resources. Hence, Multimedia is a collection of various
types of media such as text, audio, image, graphics and video to
form a single unit.
It refers to multiple sources of information sets in one. It
combines various of information sources such as voice, graphics,
animations, image, audio, and full motion video.

Multimedia:- is refers to the study of storage(magnetic tape, hard disk,

optical disk, DVDs, CD-ROMs, etc.), transmission/ Interchange,
presentation (Speakers, video windows) and perception(speech, music,
film) of different information types (data types) such as text, graphics,
voice, audio and video.

Multimedia means computer information that can be represented in

audio, video and animated format in addition to traditional format (text
and graphics).
Multimedia is the field concerned with the computer controlled
integration of text, graphics, drawings, still and moving images (video),
animation, and any other media where every type of information can be
represented, stored, transmitted, and processed digitally.

Multimedia System is a system capable of processing multimedia data

and applications.
Multimedia System is characterized by the processing, storage,
generation, manipulation and rendition of Multimedia information.

Multimedia falls into two main categories:one from stand alone multimedia work station which is
software systems and tools;
the second type is a distributed multimedia system
which encloses multimedia information system,
collaboration and conferencing information system, on
demand multimedia service, and distance learning.

Multimedia Application
Multimedia Application is an application which uses a collection of
multiple media sources e.g. text, graphics, images, sound/audio,
animation and/or video.
Multimedia finds its application in various areas with the help of
Web technologies
Education: hypermedia courseware, e-learning, audio/video conferencing
Business: e.g. multimedia authoring, video-on-demand
Digital and virtual libraries
Entertainment: e.g. games
Advertisements: e.g. interactive television
Scientific research: e.g. virtual worlds
Engineering: e.g. AutoCAD
Art, Medicine, Mathematics, etc.

Multimedia is a Multidisciplinary
subject
Operating
system,
Computer
networks

Multimedia
computing

Computer
graphics

Why we learn Multimedia?

It helps to simulate our day-to-day activities

Collaboration: video conferencing, tele-conferencing, social networking,

Virtual environments: e-commerce, e-education, e-governance

Webcasting: broadcasting via. the Internet to distribute a single content
source to many simultaneous listeners/viewers.

Existence of wide variety of application potential in different

areas; and, hence it gains Huge markets
Potential for improving our lives (e.g., learning, entertainment, and
work)

Convergence of computers, telecom, and TV industries

Caused by technology and competition

Dramatic changes in products, infrastructure, etc.
Digital Audio and Digital Video are revolutionizing music, film, and video
industries

Interesting technical and research issues

There are many challenges which needs further investigation

Why we need multimedia?

The key factor for the development of multimedia
technology is
The need of digitization:- need of conversion from
analog to digital
The need of fast growth of computer technologies:

Faster computers (fast processors)

Bigger RAMs
Bigger hard disks
Advanced technology in DVD and Flash memory

The internet:- Faster on demand delivery to anywhere

Multimedia can provide a value that each media can not
provide by itself. This is because we remember

20% of what we hear

30% of what we see
50% of what we see and hear and
80% of what we see, hear and do

Multimedia in advanced technologies used for

multimedia system technically and economically
feasible such as powerful work stations, high
capacity storage devices, high speed networks,
advances in audio and video processing, speech
processing, advanced data completions.

Hypertext vs Hypermedia
In contrast to traditional document, Hypertext and hypermedia have as
their major property , a non-linear information link .
Hypertext is a text, which contains links to other pure texts or some times
images, but not continuous medias such as audio, video etc . It is usually
non-linear i.e. traversals through pages of hypertext is usually non-linear (as
shown below)

Hypermedia is not constrained to be text-based. It can include other media

such as graphics, images, and continuous media( sound and video).
Hypermedia is the application of hypertext principles to a wider variety of
media, including audio, animations, video, and images. (hypertext)

Examples of Hypermedia Applications:

PowerPoint
The World Wide Web (WWW) is the best example of hypermedia applications.
Adobe Acrobat
Macromedia Director

In general,
Multimedia is necessary to know how to use
multimedia tools and techniques to weave each
multimedia elements come together
Multimedia tools such as soft ware tools are used to
manage individual multimedia elements and provide
interactions as well as facilitating for editing and
creating like image, text, sound, etc information
retention.
Multimedia requires large amount of memory to store,
and large amount of bandwidth to transfer data .
Multimedia could be applicable every where on which
it is appropriate of human interface connects to a
human user to electronic information of any kind.

Characteristics of a Multimedia System:- a

multimedia system has the following basic
characteristics:
It must be computer controlled
Integrated
The information they handle must be represented
digitally
The interface to the final presentation of media is usually
interactive

Challenges of Multimedia System

Distributed Networks: to support multimedia applications over a computer
network, distributed application will give aids. But, this is involved using
many special computing techniques, which needs professional persons and
the necessary technologies.
Temporal relationship between data:- multimedia systems may have to
render a variety of media at the same instant. Thus, there is a temporal
relationship between many forms of medias e.g. Video and Audio. These 2
are forms of problems here
Render/cause different data appeared continuously at same time
Sequencing within the media -- playing frames in correct order/time frame in video
is difficult
Synchronization -- inter-media scheduling . e.g. Video and Audio lip/edge. These all
may be caused by
Lack of knowledge to represent and store temporal information
Problem to maintain relationship between various data types

Digitalization data sets:- the translation from analog

source to digital representation needs digitize. To
make this type of data, there will involve scanning
(graphics, still images), sampling (audio/video)
although digital cameras now exist for direct scane
to digital capture of images and video.
Since data in multimedia system can be huge, there
is a need of large storage, transfer (bandwidth) and
processing capacity. This can be overcomed using
data compression techniques.

Desirable Features for a Multimedia System:- To effectively

and efficiently endure the multimedia system, the following features

should be fulfilled:
Very high processing speed processing power: Since multimedia systems deals with large data and to process data in real
time, the hardware should have high processing capacity.

It should support different file formats: Because multimedia deal with different data /media types

Efficient and High Input-output: this helps 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:
support direct transfers to disk, real-time scheduling, fast interrupt
processing, I/O streaming, etc.

Storage and Memory: large storage/memory are required.

Network Support: For a distributed multimedia systems, there should be a network supports

Software Tools: User-friendly tools needed to handle media, design and develop
applications, deliver medias

Components of a Multimedia System

Hardware and Software:
Capture devices :- Video Camera, Video Recorder, Audio
Microphone, Keyboards, mice, graphics tablets, 3D input
devices, tactile sensors, VR devices. Digitizing/Sampling
Hardware
Storage Devices:- Hard disks, CD-ROMs, Jaz/Zip drives, DVD,
etc
Communication Networks :- Ethernet, Token Ring, FDDI,
ATM, Intranets, Internets.
Computer Systems :- Multimedia Desktop machines,
Workstations, MPEG/VIDEO/DSP Hardware
Display Devices:- CD-quality speakers, HDTV,SVGA, Hi-Res
monitors, Color printers etc.
Software Tools:- user friendly tools needed to handle media,
design and develop applications, deliver media.

Media Types: Based on Human

Perception
How do human perceive information?
Auditory media:
A media that transmits what humans hear
It includes sound, music and voice.

Visual media:
A media that transmits what humans see, observe
and visualize
It includes text, still and moving pictures

Media Types: Based on Time

dimensions
Discrete (or Static) media: it refers to text, graphics, and
images as they are composed of time independent information
item.
Information in these media consist exclusively of a sequence of
individual elements without a time component. Indeed they may be
displayed according to a wide variety of timing or even sequencing and
still remain meaningful
Continuous (or Dynamic) media: refers to time-dependent media
like sound, and video, where the presentation requires a continuous play-out
as time passes.
Information is expressed as not only of its individual value, but also by
the time of its occurrence. In other word, time dependency between
information items is part of the information itself.
Thus if the timing of the items change, or the sequence is modified, the
meaning of the items is altered.

Multimedia Data: Input and format

Text and Static Data
Stored and input character by character in the form of
bit:
Storage of text is 1 byte per character (text or format
character).

Format: Raw text or formatted text e.g HTML, Rich Text

Format (RTF), Word or a program language source (C,
Pascal, etc..
Size Not signicant when it is compared with other
Multimedia data types e.g with Image/ Video

 Graphics
Format: constructed by the composition of primitive objects such
as lines, polygons, circles, curves and arcs.
Graphics are usually editable or revisable (unlike Images).
graphics standards : OpenGL, PHIGS, GKS
Graphics le usually store the primitive assembly
Do not take up a very high storage overhead

Images
pictures (uncompressed) are represented as a bitmap (a grid of
pixels).
Un editable
Input through digitally scanned photographs/pictures or direct
from a 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)
Compression is commonly applied because it take up a very high
storage overhead
It is compressed in the form of JPEG, BIT map. etc

 Audio
represented in the form of signals.
Input through microphones and then digitized and
stored
Usually compressed in the form of for example MP3,
AAC, Flac, Ogg Vorbis etc.

 Video
Input through analog Video is usually captured by a
video camera and then digitized.
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.
Digital video clearly needs to be compressed.

summary
Compare and contrast hyper text and hypermedia applications
What are application areas of multimedia systems?
What are the basic differences of audio and video?
What is the different between image and graphics?
what are the basic tools that can be used in multimedia
applications?
How multimedia and storage devices, networkings and speech
recognitions are related?
Where to use multimedia? Discussed by mentioning examples.
Discuses about standardization, types of standardization
applications of standardization, encoding, decoding
What are the basic data format? From where these variations
come from?
What are the characteristics, challenges and basic components of
multimedia system?