Significance

The Workshop will have great significance in providing an intense, focused, and broad-based discussion on the future course of facial models. Before the telecommunication thrusts of the '90s lead to incompatible and competing face animation systems, the principal developers should determine if common models can hasten widespread deployment and spur research in communication, medicine, education, virtual environments, and cognitive science.

Telecommunication

: Considering the developments expected in the next decade in telecommunications and audio-video teleconferencing, the problem of sending compressed images around the world is a current field of research. Sending a minimal number of parameters controlling a synthetic model appears to be a promising approach. Therefore, a standard coding system would be highly desirable.

Medicine

: Plastic, nerve, and muscle surgery, for example, aim for a precise simulation of skin behavior using a model integrating the various anatomical structures of the face. Facial reconstruction surgery is of great importance and would link the surface and muscle modeling community with the medical imaging profession.

Education and information assistance systems

: There is an increasing need for user-friendly computer software. Speech synthesis is now becoming an important ergonomic component of some systems. Simple expressive faces are even appearing. Efforts beyond canned video are going to be needed.

Virtual environments

: Recreation of particular (historical or popular) characters and personalities are coming to virtual reality! The entertainment and cinema industries are interested in synthetic actors for special effects and games.

Cognitive science

: A tool that could analyze the significance of particular facial movements would help in cognitive, psychology, and linguistic studies. Conversely, some experiments require the precise control of facial expression. Even trained actors can have difficulty forming specific, non-standard, exactly repeatable facial expressions: having a tool offering such control is therefore very useful for experiment design.