The Digital Album: a personal file-tainment system

Abstract

Describes the Digital Album, a personal 'file-tainment' (entertainment file) system that allows users to enjoy multimedia data as well as filing and retrieving them. This system incorporates an album metaphor which imitates a photo album and features pseudo-3D page-turning animation. Stories described in this album metaphor entertain the users. We also adopt a multiview classification scheme in which each data item is registered to any node in multiple classification hierarchies. The system is suitable for filing and retrieving multimedia data visually and bibliographically. Moreover, users can enjoy creating their own albums, based on the classification, easily and dynamically. The album metaphor is used as a PhotoCD user interface in Hitachi's multimedia products.