Using Cinematic Techniques in a Multimedia Museum Guide

In this paper we introduce the idea of enhancing the audio presentation of a multimedia museum guide by using the PDA screen to travel throughout a fresco and identify the various details in it. During the presentation, a sequence of pictures is synchronized with the audio commentary, and the transitions among the pictures are planned according to cinematic techniques. The theoretical background is presented, discussing the language of cinematography and the Rhetorical Structure Theory to analyze dependency relationships inside a text. In building the video clips, a set of strategies similar to those used in documentaries was employed. Two broad classes of strategies have been identified. The first class encompasses constraints imposed by the grammar of cinematography, while the second deals with conventions normally used in guiding camera movements in the production of documentaries. The results of a preliminary evaluation are also presented and discussed.