Reality (AR) in electronic financial trading. This added From Virtual to Augmented value is gained from augmented realism and less constrained interaction. The paper discusses the Reality in Financial Trading: A challenges and rewards of emerging digital media CYBERII Application technologies in meeting the needs of electronic commerce applications, in particular electronic financial trading, in terms of the realism of rendering, portability, and Soha Maad, Samir Grabaya, and Saida widespread usability. It motivates further ergonomic studies involving the evaluation of utility and usability of Bouakaz augmented reality technologies, including the CYBERII technology, in the field of electronic commerce. The authors Soha Maad is a Post-doc at INRIA (Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique) Rhône- INTRODUCTION Alpes doing research at LIRIS Lab (Laboratoire d'InfoRmatique en Images et Systèmes d'information) in With the growing importance of digital media Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 in France. technology, there is a rising need for developing new Samir Garbaya is a researcher at the Robotics applications that harness the use of this technology Laboratory of Versailles, France. while meeting various industries' needs. With this Saida Bouakaz is a Profossor in Computer Sciences at Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 in France. motivating aim in mind, this paper considers an application that targets the financial industry and Keywords implements novel media technologies developed Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Mixed within the scope of the CYBERII project. The Reality, Digital Image Processing, CYBERII, Virtual proposed application grew from two earlier financial Financial Worlds. applications considered by the author. The first application is a virtual reality simulation depicting Abstract the role of a monopoly dealer in influencing the true Digital media technology is becoming an integral part of price of a security by setting his/her bid/ask prices to our daily activities, with widespread penetration in attract buyers and sellers (Maad et al., 2001). The various application domains including arts, medicine, second application, MARILYN (Multimodal Avatar education, and commerce. In this paper, we discuss the ResponsIve LIve News Caster), consists of a 3D horizon of emerging digital media technologies in virtual human avatar presenting interactively a electronic financial trading with reference to a novel multilingual live financial news television program application drawing expertise from two important fields (Maad, 2003a; Maad, 2003b; Maad, 2003c). of study, namely: digital media (video and image) While the first application simulated reality, and the processing and augmented reality. The application implements technology developed within the scope of the second application substituted reality (the interactive CYBERII project1. It features the user insertion in a television program is presented by a virtual human virtual world of financial indicators for exploration and instead of a real human), the application proposed in apprehension. This insertion aims at augmenting the user's this paper is rather innovative and aims at perception of the financial market activity and at augmenting reality by adopting basic concepts, equipping him/her with concrete information for analysis techniques, and tools developed within the scope of and dissemination. The insertion of a human in a virtual the CYBERII project. world of financial indicators serves in reflecting realism This paper is divided into five sections. The first through a closer correspondence with real experience, and section overviews the fields of digital image in extending the power of computer-based technology to processing and augmented reality and tracks their better reflect abstract experience. The paper presents an ergonomic study that considers the widespread penetration in various application potential utility and usability of Augmented Reality (AR) domains. Section two overviews the CYBERII in finance. In order to justify the outcome of this project, its objective, techniques, and target ergonomic study, the paper has to clearly describe the industries and applications. Section three describes technology under study (CYBERII) and its the novel proposed application that implements implementation in finance. This ergonomic study is based CYBERII technology. This application features on a comparative analysis of the use of Augmented humans insertion and full body interaction with a Reality (AR) technology with a counterpart Virtual virtual world of financial indicators. Section four Reality (VR) technology for the same application. This addresses major challenges for the penetration of comparative analysis highlights an added value in the emerging digital media technologies, such as the shift from the use of Virtual Reality (VR) to Augmented CYBERII technology, in the field of electronic commerce, in particular electronic financial trading. 1http://artis.imag.fr/Projects/Cyber-II/ The paper concludes with a summary and an outlook of the potential and future prospects of the CYBERII involving the use of mouse, remote control, power technology. gloves, or human sensor equipments. The CYBERII project adopts a five steps technique DIGITAL IMAGE PROCESSING AND to insert one or several humans in a virtual AUGMENTED REALITY interaction space. It uses the notion of "Active Regions" to initiate the interaction with the virtual This section overviews the fields of digital image world. Actions are triggered upon body interaction processing and augmented reality. This quick with "Active Regions". This interaction may take the overview presents a synthesis of the major focus of form of touching the "Active Region" and may be interest of these two fields of study and their technically sensed using image analysis techniques penetration in various application domains. that identify a body presence in the "Active Region". As described in (Hazenfratz et al., 2004; Hazenfratz Image Processing (Gur, 2001) deals with images et al., 2003), the CYBERII technology involves the which are two-dimensional entities captured following five steps : electronically through a scanner or camera system 1) Multi-camera image acquisition, from different that digitizes the spatially continuous coordinates to view points, of real moving bodies (see Figure 1 a sequence of 0's and 1's. (a) ). Digital image processing applications found 2) Reconstruction, modelling, and motion tracking widespread applications in document and medical of the acquired bodies and the surrounding imaging, computer vision and industrial environment (see Figure 1 (b) ). applications, remote sensing and space applications, 3) Rendering of the reconstructed bodies and their etc.. surrounding. 4) The creation of patterns of interaction in the An augmented reality system, is a combination of a rendered world using "Active Regions" as shown real scene viewed by the user and a virtual scene in Figure 2. Examples of "Active Regions" in a generated by the computer that augments the scene virtual interaction space include: the On/Off with additional information. The augmentation can Button "Active Region" (see Figure 2 (a) ) and take on a number of different forms and its ultimate the moving slider (see Figure 2 (b) ). goal is to enhance the user's performance in and 5) Data management and distributed parallel perception of the world (Vallino, 2002). computing to meet the real time and realistic While Virtual Reality (VR) applications place you rendering constraints. inside a digitized environment that closely resembles the real world, Augmented reality (AR) applications The CYBERII technology targets various industries combine virtual reality with depictions of real-world including: (1) the TV industry (e.g. Virtual Sets and objects. online presentations) ; (2) the game industry (e.g. Augmented Reality applications may include among inserting real persons in the game world); and others: medical; entertainment; engineering design; education and entertainment (e.g. allowing visits and robotics and telerobotics; manufacturing, presentation of remote places). maintenance and repair; and consumer design Novel applications that may emerge out of the (fashion and beauty), etc.. CYBERII project may include for instance: an augmented reality environment offering new ways to play music through full body interaction with ABOUT THE CYBERII PROJECT musical notes; and augmented virtual environments for internal design involving the creation of virtual This section overviews the CYBERII project: its apartments where the user can change the location objectives, techniques, and target industries and and color of furnitures. applications. The proposed novel paradigm of interaction developed within the scope of the CYBERII project, The CYBERII project aims at simulating, in real- namely full body interaction with active regions, time, the presence of a person (e.g. a TV presenter or promises universal accessibility to media content. a teacher) in a virtual environment. Novel paradigms For instance, physically impaired users may find a of interaction are proposed within the context of this greater convenience in full body interaction with a project. These paradigms involve full body virtual scene instead of interaction with a mouse, a interaction with the virtual world in real time. This keyboard, or a remote control. goes beyond traditional modes of interaction Figure 1 (a) Image capturing FROM VIRTUAL TO AUGMENTED