Title: Towards AI-Assisted Sustainable Adaptive Video Streaming Systems: Tutorial and Survey Authors: Reza Farahani, Zoha Azimi, Christian Timmerer, Radu Prodan Journal: ACM Computing Surveys Abstract: Improvements in networking technologies and the steadily increasing number of users, as well as the shift from traditional broadcasting to streaming content over the Internet, have made video applications (Video-on-Demand (VoD) and live […]
Title: Who Gets to Make Games? Rethinking Tools for Community-Based Game Jams Conference: International Conference on Game Jams, Hackathons and Game Creation Events 2026 Author: Kseniia Harshina Abstract: Game accessibility is often discussed in relation to players, but access to game-making is also unevenly distributed. This short paper examines how authoring tools shape participation in community-based […]
Title: You have a long way to go”: Migrant and Displaced People as Authors in a Storytelling Game Jam Conference: CHI Play 2026 Authors: Kseniia Harshina, Ameneh Safari, Tom Tucek Abstract: Games about migration and displacement are often framed through empathy: they invite players to understand experiences of border crossing, bureaucracy, loss, or uncertainty from a […]
From Pixels to Semantics: Where Streaming Trends Meet the Container Christian Timmerer (AAU/Bitmovin, Austria) Abstract: The next inflection in streaming isn’t a codec — it’s three pressures (efficiency, low-latency live, and AI-native media) converging on the systems layer, with concrete implications for the MPEG Systems and ITU-T SG21 roadmap drawn from Bitmovin and the ATHENA […]
On 25.06.2026, Hadi Amirpourazarian defended his habilitation thesis, “The Predictive Video Encoding Using Visual Complexity Analysis” Congratulations! Committee members: Prof. Wolfgang Faber (Chairperson), Prof. Eckehard Steinbach (External Member), Prof. Wilfried Elmenreich, Prof. Barbara Kaltenbacher, Katharina Stengg, Yuliia Lomonosova, Christoph Rauter
Dr Felix Schniz participated in the podcast “Rock my Worlds of English” to promote the Master’s Programme in Game Studies and Engineering. The full podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4f4wSWb8SD48yFIsTDnG1I?si=Ha53h2m8Txe1LZuiTjJ-EA
Title: GNS-GAN: A novel GAN model based on gradient noise suppression Authors: Hongyou Chen, Lingfeng Qu, Baodan Tian, Yutong He, Yong Fan, Hadi Amirpour, Christian Timmerer and Yao Xin Journal: Applied Soft Computing Abstract: Generative adversarial networks (GANs) are widely applicable generative models. However, ensuring stability in adversarial learning remains a significant challenge in current GAN training. Gradient noise, […]
On 10 June 2026, Dr Felix Schniz hosted a session on the video game Bloodborne for AAU’s Media Club. Following this semester’s Media Club leitmotif of ‘the fantastic,’ Felix delved into the game’s depiction of arcane architecture, dream spaces, and the sublime in virtual realms. With 15 attendees and even guests from Salzburg on campus […]
Last week, Francesco Marchetto and Klaus Schoeffmann presented their work on synthetic data generation for surgical image synthesis at IEEE CBMS 2026 (Computer-Based Medical Systems) conference in Limassol, Cyprus. Their paper, entitled “Hybrid Semantic Augmentation for Cataract Surgery Image Synthesis with GANs and Diffusion-based Models”, investigated how augmenting semantics in conditional generative models can be […]
Title: Can Swarms Be Trusted? Showcasing Swarm Intelligence and Privacy Preservation Through AR Conference: SIMULTECH 2026, Porto, Portugal, 18.-20.07.2026 Authors: Melanie Schranz, M. Gojkovic, Horia Vulcu, Kseniia Harshina, Abstract: Swarm intelligence provides a robust approach for decentralized coordination in nowadays systems, yet its algorithmic principles, like local decision-making, role differentiation, and emergent global behavior are often difficult to convey to individuals […]