Intelligent Video-The Key to the Best Hybrid Workspaces

As more and more offices and universities permanently adopt hybrid models — a blend of in-person and remote working and learning — several terms have gained traction recently, among them: “equal pixel real estate,” “intelligent video,” and “meeting equity.” 

That last term is especially impactful. There’s a fairly big difference between equality and equity: Equality has to do with giving everyone the exact same resources, while equity involves distributing resources based on the needs of the recipients.

So, how does one meet everyone’s specific needs in a hybrid meeting space?  

The AI Video Answer 

Defining the problems inherent in a standard videoconferencing setup is step one. When a remote worker is presented with what’s best described as a “view down a bowling alley” with a single camera perched at one end of a conference table, disengagement is bound to occur. For remote attendees, it can be difficult to see everyone at that table, to read body language, to see those non-verbal cues that are so important — those very things that help remote collaborators understand when it’s the right time to offer an interjection.

Another challenge? The natural movement of attendees when they’re speaking to one another. If an in-person attendee has a camera on their right, the moment they speak to the person on their left, the remote viewer sees the back of their head. Audio quality is likely diminished, and the speaker’s facial expressions are completely hidden from sight for the virtual attendee.  

To overcome these issues, a multi-camera, automated switching system — an AI program that follows who’s speaking at a given moment and “cuts” to that individual — can have a profound impact.

Following the Speaker as They Talk

This technology tracks a speaker’s voice and automatically frames that individual on a screen, giving the remote worker a look that’s not dissimilar from the layout one finds when every attendee is virtual. It’s quite literally a close-up of the speakers, revealing all those critical nonverbal clues and providing the best available audio in that hybrid situation.

  Add Crestron’s control and automation solutions, and you’ll find collaborative solutions that are as intuitive and easy to use as they are effective. 

The other half of the equation, however, is the in-person attendees' viewpoint when interacting with remote workers or learners. If remote workers are not in their peripheral vision, in-person attendees tend to overlook them. The answer: A room with multiple displays synced to keep everyone engaged. It’s another piece of the ecosystem that ultimately drives equity for all.

Mimicking Human Behavior

There’s another advantage of the AI at work here: “intercutting” between speakers — as opposed to a single camera panning back and forth — is part of a visual language we all understand. When two characters in a film are having a dialog, or two anchors at a news desk are taking turns delivering stories, a cut from talking head to talking head appears completely natural to the human eye. 

The familiarity of that automatic edit, that cut from speaker to speaker, isn’t just a result of years of exposure to film and television — it’s actually an editing technique that mimics our physiology. If we glance from one side of a room to another — looking back and forth between two individuals contributing to a meeting — our brains omit the information our eyes are taking in between the two endpoints. We often blink as our heads are moving, too.

The Components

The result of all the aforementioned aspects, these factors that create the most natural-seeming environment for those in a hybrid meeting, is increased engagement and decreased “screen fatigue.” The goal is to minimize the extra emotional and physical toll it takes on an individual to overcompensate for the unnaturalness of the environment.

When it comes to outfitting a room for hybrid meetings, the largest spaces in an organization are the most challenging — there’s simply a lot of real estate to cover. But since these larger rooms are often the venues for the most high-impact meetings in a business, they demand best-in-class solutions. Two critical elements in those high-impact spaces are multi-camera arrays and the software that can unlock the cameras’ true potential.

Cameras and the Software That Drives Them

The Crestron line of 1 Beyond cameras have a range of 60 feet — and most importantly, they rely on optical as opposed to digital zoom to bring the remote viewer a close-up of a contributor. Optical zoom occurs within the physical lens of a camera, while digital zoom “blows up” and crops an image in close-up. That process reduces the pixel density of an image, rendering it less clear — an issue that’s magnified as the distance between subject and camera increases. As the clarity of an image diminishes, gestures, expressions, and all the other nonverbal clues critical to maintaining engagement become compromised.

When those cameras are coupled with software such as the most recent version of the Crestron Automate VX multi-camera speaker tracking solution, the results are impressive. Visual AI automatically frames the speaker even if they move from a position where a microphone has been sending location data. This extends the power of the Automate VS solution’s speaker tracking, freeing collaborators to move naturally about the room as they speak without participants having to concern themselves with “staying in the frame.”

The Total Package

The “reframing” function that’s part of this update is one of the keys to its success: As people move around a space, they’ll be centered in the shot. The AI solution is able to discern between slight movements — where no reframing is necessary — and larger moves. There’s no constant reframing if a speaker shifts slightly in their seat, for example, and this prevents unnecessary camera movements that could trigger motion sickness for some viewers.

The combination of cameras and software (coupled with multiple displays) is at the heart of the Crestron Sightline Experience — it’s a complete, integrated ecosystem. Add Crestron’s control and automation solutions, and you’ll find collaborative solutions that are as intuitive and easy to use as they are effective. Technology that allows your team the ability to see and be seen, hear and be heard, all with the ease of control and connectivity Crestron is known for, is the key to meeting equity — and maximum productivity.

Sam Kennedy, Sr. Director, Product Marketing

Sam Kennedy is Crestron's Senior Director of Product Marketing, leading the company's Commercial Product Marketing, Technical Marketing, Campaign Strategy, and Experience Center teams. Collectively under Sam's direction, these teams are responsible for bringing the Crestron story to customers and partners around the world. Sam has over 25 years of experience in Unified Communications across various Sales, Marketing, and Product Development roles. He often shares his perspectives in presentations and thought leadership sessions across the industry.

Prior to his current role, Sam most notably served as the Chief Product Evangelist for Poly and Polycom, as well as other roles in Product Management and Sales Engineering.  His resume also includes roles at Wire One, VCON, and Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield.

Sam has a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Central Connecticut State University.