Eye tracking news: iMotions tool (SMI)

from Free-Press-Release.com June 24, 2009

iMotions, a world leader in emotion metrics software and SensoMotoric Instruments GmbH (SMI), a world leader in eye tracking solutions have, after extensive integration and field-testing, integrated their flagship products, iMotions - Emotion Tool® and SMI’s iView X™ RED. The combined solution is now available from iMotions for the FMCG and Market Research Industries. Emotion Tool clients currently include many world-leading opinion leaders within the FMCG industry.

SMI’s award winning iView X™ RED remote eye tracker is an non-intrusive and accurate eye tracking system that allows iMotions - Emotion Tool® users to assess the impact of advertising, brand label designs, package designs and other relevant marketing material on flexible multiple-size screens ranging from 19’’ monitors to large-scale projections with high accuracy and easy-to-use setups. The iView X™ RED remote eye tracker has been continuously developed on the basis of SMI’s 18-year experience creating high-performance research and medical measurement solutions.

“The SMI iView X™ RED further broadens the scope of our solutions and expands the market opportunity. We focus on delivering our high profile clients the best solutions in the market. The outstanding quality of SMI’s technologies fits perfectly with our customer driven approach, where the client should have plug and play possibilities without any hassle. We are excited to now support the eye trackers from SMI and Tobii, the two world leading manufacturers, ”explains Peter Hartzbech, CEO of iMotions.“Our eye tracker provides a strong technological fundament for Emotion Tool® and a reliable and versatile solution for iMotions’ customers. We are proud to add iMotions, the widely respected pioneer in objective emotion measurement, to the range of high profile OEM partners of SMI and thereby expand our market coverage for the FMCG and Market Research Industries” says Eberhard Schmidt, Managing Director of SMI.About iMotions (www.imotionsglobal.com)iMotions – Emotion Technology A/S is the developer of Emotion Tool®, the world’s first objective, non-intrusive, reliable software to measure human emotional response to visual stimuli such as packaging and print ads. The software, which also measures visual attention (eye tracking), uses data from world leading eye tracking monitors. iMotions was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark and have additional offices in Hyderabad, India and Boston, USA.About SMI (www.smivision.com/egts)SensoMotoric Instruments GmbH (SMI) is a world leader in dedicated computer vision applications, developing and marketing eye & gaze tracking systems and OEM solutions for a wide range of applications such as market and consumer research, usability and ergonomics, HCI, psychology, neurology and ophthalmology. SMI serves customers around the globe from offices in Teltow, Germany and Boston, USA, backed by a network of trusted local partners in many countries.

Eye tracking history by Wikipedia

Eye tracking history by Wikipedia

In the 1800s, studies of eye movements were made using direct observations.

In 1879 in Paris, Louis Émile Javal observed that reading does not involve a smooth sweeping of the eyes along the text, as previously assumed, but a series of short stops (called fixations) and quick saccades.[1] This observation raised important questions about reading, which were explored during the 1900s: On which words do the eyes stop? For how long? When does it regress back to already seen words?

An example of fixations and saccades over text. This is the typical pattern of eye movements during reading. The eyes never move smoothly over still text.

Edmund Huey[2] built an early eye tracker, using a sort of contact lens with a hole for the pupil. The lens was connected to an aluminum pointer that moved in response to the movements of the eye. Huey studied and quantified regressions (only a small proportion of saccades are regressions), and show that some words in a sentence are not fixated.

The first non-intrusive eye trackers were built by Guy Thomas Buswell in Chicago, using beams of light that were reflected on the eye and then recording them on film. Buswell made systematic studies into reading[3] and picture viewing[4].

In the 1950s, Alfred L. Yarbus[5] did important eye tracking research and his 1967 book is one of the most quoted eye tracking publications ever. For example he showed the task given to a subject has a very large influence on the subject's eye movements. He also wrote about the relation between fixations and interest:
"All the records (…) show conclusively that the character of the eye movements is either completely independent of or only very slightly dependent on the material of the picture and how it was made, provided that it is flat or nearly flat." [6] The cyclical pattern in the examination of pictures "is dependent not only on what is shown on the picture, but also on the problem facing the observer and the information that he hopes to gain from the picture." [7]

This study by Yarbus (1967) is often referred to as evidence on how the task given to a person influences his or her eye movements.
"Records of eye movements show that the observer's attention is usually held only by certain elements of the picture. (…) Eye movements reflect the human thought processes; so the observer's thought may be followed to some extent from records of eye movements (the thought accompanying the examination of the particular object). It is easy to determine from these records which elements attract the observer's eye (and, consequently, his thought), in what order, and how often." [8]

"The observer's attention is frequently drawn to elements which do not give important information but which, in his opinion, may do so. Often an observer will focus his attention on elements that are unusual in the particular circumstances, unfamiliar, incomprehensible, and so on." [9]

"(…) when changing its points of fixation, the observer's eye repeatedly returns to the same elements of the picture. Additional time spent on perception is not used to examine the secondary elements, but to reexamine the most important elements." [10]

This study by Hunziker (1970)[11]on eye tracking in problem solving used simple 8 mm film to track eye movements by filming the subject through a glass plate on which the visual problem was displayed. To view a slow motion movie of the eye tracking in problem solving click: http://www.learning-systems.ch/multimedia/eye%20movements%20problem%20solving.swf for details of the study: http://www.learning-systems.ch/multimedia/forsch1e.htm

In the 1970s, eye tracking research expanded rapidly, particularly reading research. A good overview of the research in this period is given by Rayner.[12].

In 1980, Just and Carpenter [13] formulated the influential Strong eye-mind Hypothesis, the hypothesis that "there is no appreciable lag between what is fixated and what is processed". If this hypothesis is correct, then when a subject looks at a word or object, he or she also thinks about (process cognitively), and for exactly as long as the recorded fixation. The hypothesis is too often today taken for granted by beginning eye tracker researchers.

During the 1980s, the eye-mind hypothesis was often questioned in light of covert attention,[14] [15] the attention to something that one is not looking at, which people often do. If covert attention is common during eye tracking recordings, the resulting scan path and fixation patterns would often show not where our attention has been, but only where the eye has been looking, and so eye tracking would not indicate cognitive processing.
According to Hoffman, [16] current consensus is that visual attention is always slightly (100 to 250 ms) ahead of the eye. But as soon as attention moves to a new position, the eyes will want to follow.[17]

We still cannot infer specific cognitive processes directly from a fixation on a particular object in a scene.[18] For instance, a fixation on a face in a picture may indicate recognition, liking, dislike, puzzlement etc. Therefore eye tracking is often coupled with other methodologies, such as introspective verbal protocols.

Eye tracking conference at EyetrackUX 2009 - Realeyes

Eye tracking conference at EyetrackUX 2009
Realeyes

Eye tracking studies - presentations - Tobii

Eye Tracking For Market Research Seminar

View more OpenOffice presentations from Tobii Eyetracking.

Tobii eyetracking and Eprime Training Course EyeTracKids

View more PDF documents from Tobii Eyetracking.

Tobii Studio eye tracking software training course

View more PDF documents from Tobii Eyetracking.

Eye tracking - Tobii XL60 Eye tracker

Bigger Screen, Better Testing

Providing your customers with increasingly diverse testing is becoming more important than ever. In your research you need the most unobtrusive tools with the highest level of precision. The new Tobii T60XL Eye Tracker is the first ever 24” HD widescreen Eye Tracker and the best way to maximize efficiency and precision in many of your eye tracking studies.

The Tobii T60XL is the only eye tracker that allows you to easily, accurately and unobtrusively measure gaze through widescreen stimuli. It is easy to transport and set up onsite and for the first time you can conduct widescreen eye tracking using large stimuli.

The benefits of widescreen eye tracking are easily seen in research and studies related to:

• Print ads and magazine spreads
• Store shelves and packaging design
• Interactive TV
• Virtual environments
• Preferential looking in developmental psychology and linguistics research
• Peripheral vision research
  

The Tobii T60 XL will be demonstrated to the public for the first time at SRCD in Denver, April 2-4, CHI in Boston, April 4-9, Esomar Asia Pacific in Beijing, April 5-7, and MRA in Chicago, June 3-5. Welcome to our stand and be one of the first in the world to test widescreen eye tracking! Learn more about how the T60XL Eye Tracker can strengthen your research or business. Click on the link to the right to download a product leaflet or get in touch with us and we’ll give you all the details.

Realeyes (eye tracking review) video about new Tobii XL60 Eye tracker - Part 1

Realeyes (eye tracking review) video about new Tobii XL60 Eye tracker - Part 2

Realeyes (eye tracking review) video about new Tobii XL60 Eye tracker - Part 3

More videos about eyetracking here.