The length of a film will no longer necessarily be the same as the time it takes to watch it from beginning to end. This will be only one of the possibilities available. Ephyx Technologies of Herzlia has developed technology which will enable the viewer to freeze a picture or text within the film, and to obtain a variety of additional information, according to his level of interest.
Last week, Ephyx Technologies announced its V-Active technology, which will allow interactive linking from within a video film. Business Development vice-president Eli Efrat: "Video is a very popular medium but until today you could do nothing with it except watch it. We got excited about hypertext - the hot spots in a text or a still picture - on which you click in order to find another Internet site or additional information. The combination of video and hyperlinking seemed to us the right way to go."
V-Active technology provides an editing tool which introduces a new concept to the lexicon of multimedia producers and Internet site builders: hypervideo (full motion digital video with embedded hyperlinks to related content). The new technology positions Ephyx as the world’s leading company in the area of interactive video software development.
Just like a hypertext environment, a film processed using V-Active technology enables the editor or the content creator to assign an unlimited number of hotspots on the film in advance. Clicking a mouse on these spots while watching the film links the viewer to various kinds of information: pictures, sounds, other video clips, different software, or URL addresses.
The hotspots have a distinctive colour, or they may be detected as they are traversed by the cursor. When you go over to the other information, the original film can continue undisturbed. The hotspots can be easily assigned without any prior programming knowledge.
The story of the establishment of Ephyx is the story of comradeship in arms of algorithm warriors. Eli Efrat, president Avner Peleg, and general manager Yossi Hermush were all in the electronics unit in the IDF’s intelligence corps. All three were project managers, who set up Ephyx Technologies on being demobbed. All of the company’s fifteen employees were also in the same unit. In answer to the question what turned the ex-members of that unit in particular into the inventors of the new dimension in video, Efrat says: "It’s connected with the fact that we had a great deal to do with probability algorithms."
Until now, multimedia developers and video editors who wanted to create hotspots had to assign them frame by frame, dozens of frames per second, an almost impossible task because of the time and manpower required.
80% of the equity in the company is divided between the three founders. The remaining 20% is held by private investors who went into the company over six months ago. Ephyx Technologies seeks to raise capital and is negotiating with Israeli and foreign investors. Efrat: "We learned very quickly that it is necessary to co-operate with big companies. Our product enables this. We don’t interfere with anyone, and we can work with everyone.
"Globes": Have you no competitors?
Efrat: "We know of two companies which are working on video hotspots. One is the French company Arts Video, and the other is Digital Renaissance of Canada. But neither of them has our automatic tracking technology, and they are a long way behind us."
Who will use the product ?
"Mainly multimedia developers and video editors in companies, multimedia service bureaux, games and CD makers, and builders of Internet sites."
What about future directions?
"Editing products for DVD, and Internet video servers."
Where is the big market?
"We are aiming at the business market, not the domestic market. That’s where the money is, and that’s what interests us. For example, Macromedia alone sells 80,000 video editing products a year. That’s $80 million, and we will certainly take a small percentage of that."
And the domestic market?
"There will be a product for the domestic market too. V-Active Home. It will be possible, for example, to take a picture with a digital camera, and to combine the people with a view of Paris. We’ll film a wedding, click on our aunt, and find out everything about her."
Four years in high-tech is like the next era. Where will you be then?
"I believe that we will dictate the international standard for interactive video. It will be possible to make a video simulation and combine it with interactive television. We will watch a film, see Tom Cruise in a jacket, click on the jacket, and get full details of it and its price."