A Multi-media Database for Meetings Research

At ATR, we are collecting and analysing ‘meetings’ data using a table-top sensor device consisting of a small 360degree camera surrounded by an array of high-quality directional microphones. This equipment provides a stream of information about the audio and visual events of the meeting which is then processed to form a representation of the verbal and non-verbal interpersonal activity, or discourse flow, during the meeting. This paper describes the resulting corpus of speech and video data which is being collected for the above research. It currently includes data from 12 monthly sessions, comprising 71 video and 33 audio modules. Collection is continuing monthly and is scheduled to include another ten sessions.