Navigating Through Video Stories Using Clustering Sets

The fast evolution of technology has led to a growing demand for video data, increasing the amount of research into efficient systems to manage those materials. Making efficient use of video information requires that data be accessed in a user-friendly way. Ideally, one would like to perform video search using an intuitive tool. Most of existing browsers for the interactive search of video sequences, however, have employed a too rigid layout to arrange the results, restricting users to explore the results using list- or grid-based layouts. This paper presents a novel approach for the interactive search that displays the result set in a flexible manner. The proposed method is based on a simple and fast algorithm to build video stories and on an effective visual structure to arrange the storyboards, called Clustering Set. It is able to group together videos with similar content and to organize the result set in a well-defined tree. Results from a rigorous empirical comparison with a subjective evaluation show that such a strategy makes the navigation more coherent and engaging to users.