A word from the editor
Authors: Lee Newton 
Published: August 2005

Welcome to the fourth issue of the ACM Computers in Entertainment magazine!

In this exciting new issue, we publish six interesting papers on entertainment technologies from authors around the world including Greece, Malaysia, Portugal, UK, and USA. Two papers were selected for revision from four best winning papers at the ACM SIGCHI 2004 International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology. We will present the other two winning papers in the next issue. Three of the papers in this issue have accompanying videos for lively demonstrations.

To get started, the Interviews column features video interviews with our distinguished advisory board members Cynthia Breazeal and Karlheinz Brandenburg. Prof. Dr. Breazeal, Director of the Robotic Life Group at the MIT Media Lab, talks about her sociable robot Kismet, her role in Steven Spielberg's movie "Artificial Intelligence: AI," and the future of robotics. Prof. Dr. Brandenburg, inventor of the MP3 music format, shares with us the history of MP3, the new spatial audio technology called Wave Field Synthesis, and other fascinating research at the Fraunhofer Institute.

In the Sociable Robot section, Andrew G. Brooks et al. from the MIT Media Lab's Robotic Life Group describe socially interactive game playing with personal robots for human entertainment, a step towards lifelike, expressive, and autonomous humanoid robot. Be sure to watch the fascinating human-robot interaction in their 5-minute demonstration video.

In the Wireless Game and Game Story section, Josephine Reid et al. from the HP Labs in UK document on paper and a 2-minute video about a week long public field trial of a spontaneous, wireless networked musical game in a cafe setting. Luis Romero et al. from New University of Lisbon and Viana do Castelo Polytechnic Institute in Portugal describe gaming and storytelling activities in a mixed environment that integrates the real and virtual worlds.

In the 3D Animation and iTV section, Belinda Teoh Soo Phing et al. from Multimedia University in Malaysia discuss the potential of adapting moveable pop-up technique as a continuity element for the entire flow in 3D animation, and present a 3-minute video demonstration. Konstantinos Chorianopoulos et al. from Athens University of Economics and Business in Greece explore the use of an animated character and dynamic insertion of advertising for an interactive music television channel.

In the Synopsis - Book column, David Freeman talks about the art and craft of Emotioneering - and presents 32 categories of creating emotion in games.

Before diving into the exciting content, I would like to take a moment to congratulate two of our distinguished editorial board advisors:

(1) Bob Lambert has been named in July 2004 the senior vice president for worldwide media technology and development at the Walt Disney Company. Mr. Lambert also serves on the boards of USC and the American Film Institute, and has served as an advisor to the National Academy of Science, the USC Entertainment Technology Center, and the US FIRST program.

(2) Masa Inakage, a member of the ACM SIGGRAPH Executive Committee, along with other committee members, conference chair Dena Slothower, and ACM volunteers, had done an outstanding job in bringing 27,825 professionals from nearly 90 countries to the annual conference and exhibition of SIGGRAPH 2004 in August. It exceeded all expectations with an overall 14 percent increase in attendance over last year.

Finally, ACM Computers in Entertainment is a proud co-sponsor of the University Project at Digital Hollywood Fall 2004 in September. Our distinguished editorial board advisors Adrian Cheok, Charles Swartz, Glenda Revelle, and Richard Weinberg will join Athomas Goldberg, Celia Pearce, and Dana Plautz on the panel "Research, Development and Investment in Entertainment Technologies and Media Studies Innovation: From the University to Industry Application." We will bring you the details in the next issue of ACM Computers in Entertainment.

Please enjoy reading this online magazine and spread the words that we are planning for a special issue on Digital Cinema. Thank you very much for your continuing support!