Efficient automatic analysis of camera work and microsegmentation of video using spatiotemporal images

Abstract The shot has been regarded as a fundamental unit for the application of digital manipulation to a video. Various techniques have been developed to detect automatically shot changes. But a sequence shot can be so long and complex that it has to be further decomposed into smaller units for more flexible and detailed manipulation. A sequence shot can be segmented into shot segments, each of which keeps a homogeneous camera motion. Camera work has important significance that reflect the intention of video producers. Camera work analysis and segmentation of a sequence shot into shot segments can help in choosing a representative image for a shot. Following concepts introduced by Tonomura et al. (1993), we propose an efficient method for the automatic detection of camera work changes using spatiotemporal images called X-ray images. We introduce various steps in the spatiotemporal image analysis process which significantly improves its robustness and decreases its computational complexity.