Analyzing Interfaces and Workflows for Light Field Editing

• Published in: IEEE journal of selected topics in signal processing Vol. 11; no. 7; pp. 1162 - 1172
• Main Authors: Ortin, Marta, Jarabo, Adrian, Masia, Belen, Gutierrez, Diego
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.10.2017; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Cameras; Editing; Editing interfaces; editing workflow; Field cameras; Image contrast; Image manipulation; Light; Light field image processing; Light fields; Markov chains; Photography; Task complexity; User interfaces; user study
• ISSN: 1932-4553; 1941-0484
• DOI: 10.1109/JSTSP.2017.2746263

With the increasing number of available consumer light field cameras, such as Lytro, Raytrix, or Pelican Imaging, this new form of photography is progressively becoming more common. However, there are still very few tools for light field editing, and the interfaces to create those edits remain largely unexplored. Given the extended dimensionality of light field data, it is not clear what the most intuitive interfaces and optimal workflows are, in contrast with well-studied two-dimensional (2-D) image manipulation software. In this work, we provide a detailed description of subjects' performance and preferences for a number of simple editing tasks, which form the basis for more complex operations. We perform a detailed state sequence analysis and hidden Markov chain analysis based on the sequence of tools and interaction paradigms users employ while editing light fields. These insights can aid researchers and designers in creating new light field editing tools and interfaces, thus helping to close the gap between 4-D and 2-D image editing.