The augmented human - visual movement magnification

Abstract

Humans rely heavily on their vision, yet there are limitations to what the eye can perceive. While technologies like the Bionic Eye and Microsoft’s HoloLens 2 augment human vision, detecting subtle movements such as micro-expressions, breathing, or pulse remains challenging to this current day. Two advanced motion magnification techniques are presented through a web application to allow users to amplify subtle motions in video footages or live streaming: FlowMagnification and Axial-Motion Magnification. Subtle motions focused include pulses, breathing and facial expressions. Adopting a Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) approach, this project showcases the development of development, design and evaluation of a web application that allows users to upload videos or connect via live streams to apply these magnification techniques. With React as frontend and Django as backend, the application offers a user-friendly user interface to interact and manipulate visual content. To ensure application’s goals are met, low and hide-fidelity prototypes are created, showcasing the progress via drafts. Feedback is gathered through online surveys among selected group of target audience. The goal is to provide an accessible application that allows an optimal experience in exploration of basic motion magnification or for health purposes, contributing to fields such as healthcare monitoring or surveillance.