Adaptive Interactive Movies (AIM)

We’ve seen an increase in the production of interactive films. It’s therefore surprising that the ‘interactive’ methods used to shape this type of media have not changed greatly since the 1960s. Traditional concepts of interactivity have been cited as incompatible with the inherent pleasures of movie watching. 

AIM project Lead, Richard Ramchurn’s work using Brain Controlled Interface (BCI) technology to produce adaptive interactive cinema produced promising results. However, the public uptake of BCI technology has proved a barrier to reaching the wider audience.   

AIM – a multi-disciplinary project partnering AlbinoMosquito and Kino Industries will address this issue and explore new forms of narrative interactions, affective computing, computer vision, machine learning, psychology and BCI, and in particular, privacy and security issues associated with these.  

Kino Industries, (formerly CtrlMovie) is the worldwide leader in interactive cinema and consumer content and empowers audiences to interact with movies in a game-like manner. AlbinoMosquito Productions Ltd (AMP) have been creating films using BCI technology designed for conscious and non-conscious audience interactions. 

We propose using the more ubiquitous technologies of front-facing cameras on laptops and personal devices to derive physiological affective data and a primary input to interact with cinematic narrative.  

This raises ethical, trust, network, and machine learning challenges which must first be uncovered, addressed and incorporated into the design of any adaptive system before it can be evaluated. 

Our work commences by engaging participants to take part in a survey which will help shape further activity involving marking up content for context with CV and experts in film, computer vision development, investigating edge computing opportunities and practical deployment.