Combining Web Audio Streaming, Motion Capture, and Binaural Audio in a Telepresence System

International audienceThis paper describes the use of spatialized binaural 3D audio in the Digiscape telepresence system. Digiscape is a custom-built system that enables groups of users of visualization platforms, including CAVEs and wall-sized displays, to collaborate at a distance while visualizing and manipulating large and complex data sets. Digiscape supports web-based audio and video streaming as well as data sharing among its constituent platforms. Using motion capture systems, the locations of collaborators in each physical spaces are sent to the remote platforms, which spatialize the collaborators' audio streams in their local audio space. The audio spaces can be configured in a variety of ways, from a single shared audio space to mapped, adjacent, contained, split, or distorted audio spaces, facilitating the exploration of the possibilities of spatialized voice communication in telepresence systems