Multi-video browsing and summarization

We propose a method for browsing multiple videos with a common theme, such as the result of a search query on a video sharing website, or videos of an event covered by multiple cameras. Given the collection of videos we first align each video with all others. This pairwise video alignment forms the basis of a novel browsing interface, termed the Browsing Companion. It is used to play a primary video and, in addition as thumbnails, other video clips that are temporally synchronized with it. The user can, at any time, click on one of the thumbnails to make it the primary. We also show that video alignment can be used for other applications such as automatic highlight detection and multi-video summarization.