Successfully Navigate the Evolving World of Mobile and Social Game Design and Monetization Completely updated, Mobile and Social Game Design: Monetization Methods and Mechanics, Second Edition explains how to use the interconnectedness of social networks to make "stickier," more compelling games on all types of devices. Through the book's many design and marketing techniques, strategies, and examples, you will acquire a better understanding of the design and monetization mechanics of mobile and social games as well as working knowledge of industry practices and terminology. Learn How to Attract and Retain Gamers and Make Money The book explores how the gaming sector has changed, including the evolution of free-to-play games on mobile and tablet devices, sophisticated subscription model-based products, and games for social media websites, such as Facebook. It also demystifies the alphabet soup of industry terms that have sprouted up around mobile and social game design and monetization. A major focus of the book is on popular mechanisms for acquiring users and methods of monetizing users. The author explains how to put the right kinds of hooks in your games, gather the appropriate metrics, and evaluate that information to increase the game's overall stickiness and revenue per user. He also discusses the sale of virtual goods and the types of currency used in games, including single and dual currency models. Each chapter includes an interview with industry leaders who share their insight on designing and producing games, analyzing metrics, and much more.

Composing Music for Games is a guidebook for launching and maintaining a successful career as a video game composer. It offers a pragmatic approach to learning, intensified through challenging project assignments and simulations. Author Chance Thomas begins with the foundation of scoring principles applicable to all media, and then progresses serially through core methodologies specific to video game music. This book offers a powerful blend of aesthetic, technique, technology and business, which are all necessary components for a successful career as a video game composer.

As one of the most promising biometric technologies, vein pattern recognition (VPR) is quickly taking root around the world and may soon dominate applications where people focus is key. Among the reasons for VPR's growing acceptance and use: it is more accurate than many other biometric methods, it offers greater resistance to spoofing, it focuses on people and their privacy, and has few negative cultural connotations. Vein Pattern Recognition: A Privacy-Enhancing Biometric provides a comprehensive and practical look at biometrics in general and at vein pattern recognition specifically. It discusses the emergence of this reliable but underutilized technology and evaluates its capabilities and benefits. The author, Chuck Wilson, an industry veteran with more than 25 years of experience in the biometric and electronic security fields, examines current and emerging VPR technology along with the myriad applications of this dynamic technology. Wilson explains the use of VPR and provides an objective comparison of the different biometric methods in use today-including fingerprint, eye, face, voice recognition, and dynamic signature verification. Highlighting current VPR implementations, including its widespread acceptance and use for identity verification in the Japanese banking industry, the text provides a complete examination of how VPR can be used to protect sensitive information and secure critical facilities. Complete with best-practice techniques, the book supplies invaluable guidance on selecting the right combination of biometric technologies for specific applications and on properly implementing VPR as part of an overall security system.

First published in 2011. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor and Francis, an informa company.

Design and create functional applications that interact with remote data sources. You get a thorough introduction to the latest Flash Builder tools learning how you can use the built-in wizards, MXML or pure ActionScript 3 to build information-rich applications for the browser or AIR applications. Hand's on tutorials guide you through each iteration including building user interaction, charting, incorporating audio and video, customizing the UI; and a code repository provides re-usable code that you can modify and deploy in your own applications.

When making games for kids, it s tempting to simply wing-it on the design. We were all children once, right? The reality is that adults are far removed from the cognitive changes and the motor skill challenges that are the hallmark of the developing child. Designing Games for Children, helps you understand these developmental needs of children and how to effectively apply them to games. Whether you re a seasoned game designer, a children's media professional, or an instructor teaching the next generation of game designers, Designing Games for Children is the first book dedicated to service the specific needs of children's game designers. This is a hands-on manual of child psychology as it relates to game design and the common challenges designers face. Designing Games for Children is the definitive, comprehensive guide to making great games for kids, featuring: Guidelines and recommendations divided by the most common target audiences babies and toddlers (0-2), preschoolers (3-5), early elementary students (6-8), and tweens (9-12). Approachable and actionable breakdown of child developmental psychology, including cognitive, physical, social, and emotional development, as it applies to game design Game design insights and guidelines for all aspects of game production, from ideation to marketing

Vintage Game Consoles tells the story of the most influential videogame platforms of all time, including the Apple II, Commodore 64, Nintendo Entertainment System, Game Boy, Sega Genesis, Sony PlayStation, and many more. It uncovers the details behind the consoles, computers, handhelds, and arcade machines that made videogames possible. Drawing on extensive research and the authors own lifelong experience with videogames, Vintage Game Consoles explores each system s development, history, fan community, its most important games, and information for collectors and emulation enthusiasts. It also features hundreds of exclusive full-color screenshots and images that help bring each system s unique story to life. Vintage Game Consoles is the ideal book for gamers, students, and professionals who want to know the story behind their favorite computers, handhelds, and consoles, without forgetting about why they play in the first place the fun! Bill Loguidice is a critically acclaimed technology author who has worked on over a dozen books, including CoCo: The Colorful History of Tandy s Underdog Computer, written with Boisy G. Pitre. He s also the co-founder and Managing Director for the popular Website, Armchair Arcade. A noted videogame and computer historian and subject matter expert, Bill personally owns and maintains well over 400 different systems from the 1970s to the present day, including a large volume of associated materials. Matt Barton is an associate professor of English at Saint Cloud State University in Saint Cloud, Minnesota, where he lives with his wife Elizabeth. He s the producer of the "Matt Chat," a weekly YouTube series featuring in-depth interviews with notable game developers. In addition to the original Vintage Games, which he co-authored with Bill, he s author of Dungeons and Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games and Honoring the Code: Conversations with Great

This book takes you step-by-step through the process of creating a playable 3D character using 3DS Max. Offering a complete overview of the 3D real-time character asset creation pipeline. Yancey Clinton will take you through the five major subjects used in the asset pipeline: 1. 3D modeling, including techniques specifically for both the body and head. 2. Unwrapping a model, which is one of the most misunderstood processes. 3. An overview of creating textures for your Unwrapped chararacter using Photoshop. 4. Rigging or Skinning a Character, using the industry standard Character Studio 4. 5. 'How to make your character move' with an overview of game animation and deeper into Character Studio. But it doesn't end there! Yancey also shows you the final step; how to actually put the model into the Unreal editor and compile it for play in Unreal Tournament.

Corona SDK is one of the most powerful tools used to create games and apps for mobile devices. The market requires speed; new developers need to operate quickly and efficiently. Create 2D Mobile Games with Corona SDK gives you the tools needed to master Corona - even within the framework of professional constraints. A must-read guide, this book gives you fast, accurate tips to learn the programming language necessary to create games. Read it sequentially or as an FAQ and you will have the tools you need to create any base game before moving on to advanced topics. The tutorial-based format: Contains step-by-step directions complete with coding and screenshots Is filled with tutorials, tips, and links to useful online resources Includes a comprehensive companion website featuring online exercise files to practice coding, full build samples from the text, additional book details, and more!

This book is written by a professional instructor and founder of CartoonSmart.com, a company specializing in new media tutorials for nearly a decade. The book is a start-to-finish guide for anyone looking to begin iOS development using Cocos2d and Xcode and submit their finished app to Apple. Even if you haven't read code before, you can begin with this book. This book is a handy reference guide, with easy to look-up sections of code snippets, pictures and links to video examples. Features: Code Video examples 5 hours of tutorial videos on Box2d, which can take the reader even further beyond what they learned in the book

The Essential Guide to Game Audio: The Theory and Practice of Sound for Games is a first of its kind textbook and must-have reference guide for everything you ever wanted to know about sound for games. This book provides a basic overview of game audio, how it has developed over time, and how you can make a career in this industry. Each chapter gives you the background and context you will need to understand the unique workflow associated with interactive media. The practical, easy to understand interactive examples provide hands-on experience applying the concepts in real world situations.

Holistic Mobile Game Development with Unity: An All-In-One Guide to Implementing Mechanics, Art Design and Programming for iOS and Android Games Master mobile game design and development in this all-in-one guide to creating iOS and Android games in the cutting-edge game engine, Unity. By using Penny de Byl s holistic method, you will learn about the principles of art, design, and code and gain multidisciplinary skills needed to succeed in the independent mobile games industry. In addition, hands-on exercises will help you throughout the process from design to publication in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Over 70 practical step-by-step exercises recreating the game mechanics of contemporary mobile games, including Angry Birds, Temple Run, Year Walk, Minecraft, Curiosity Cube, Fruit Ninja, and more. Design principles, art, and programming in unison the one-stop shop for indie developers requiring interdisciplinary skills in their small teams. An introduction to essential two- and three-dimensional mathematics, geometry and physics concepts. A portfolio of royalty free reusable game mechanics and assets. Accompanying website, www.holistic3d.com, features project source code, instructional videos, art assets, author blog, and teaching resources. Challenge questions and lesson plans are available online for an enhanced learning experience.

Get ahead of the game with Unity 4. The Unity engine is the tool of choice for many indie and AAA game developers. Unity 4 Fundamentals gives readers a head start on the road to game development by offering beginners a comprehensive, step by step introduction to the latest Unity 4 engine. The author takes a theory-to-practice approach to demonstrate what Unity 4 has to offer which includes: Asset management tools Real-time lighting and lightmapping Particle systems Navigation and pathfinding

Photoshop is the cornerstone of the graphics industry and understanding its 3D capabilities is becoming a requirement for graphic designers, photographers, and creatives alike. Starting with the fundamental tools and ending with advanced resources, Adobe Community Professional Stephen Burns guides you with a clear voice and creative exercises that encourage you to work as you read. Accompanied by a free app that includes video tutorials, interactive models to compare your activity work from the book against, and on-going updates about the latest Photoshopreleases, this book will elevate your art off the page and into a new world of possibilities. (The app is available for the iPad and iPhone in the iTunes App Store, and Android users can find it through Google Play. Just search for 3D Photoshop on either of these platforms and download it to your device.)

Artificial Vision is a rapidly growing discipline, aiming to build computational models of the visual functionalities in humans, as well as machines that emulate them. Visual communication in itself involves a numberof challenging topics with a dramatic impact on contemporary culture where human-computer interaction and human dialogue play a more and more significant role.
This state-of-the-art book brings together carefully selected review articles from world renowned researchers at the forefront of this exciting area. The contributions cover topics including image processing, computational geometry, optics, pattern recognition, and computer science. The book is divided into three sections. Part I covers active vision; Part II deals with the integration of visual with cognitive capabilities; and Part III concerns visual communication.
Artificial Vision will be essential reading for students and researchers in image processing, vision, and computer science who want to grasp the current concepts and future directions of this challenging field.
Key Features
* This state-of-the-art book brings together selected review articles and accounts of current projects from world-renowned researchers at the forefront of this exciting area; The contributions cover topics such as:
* psychology of perception
* image processing
* computational geometry
* visual knowledge representation and languages
* It is this truly multi-disciplinary approach that has produced successful theories and applications for the subject.

This book reviews the state of the art in algorithmic approaches addressing the practical challenges that arise with hyperspectral image analysis tasks, with a focus on emerging trends in machine learning and image processing/understanding. It presents advances in deep learning, multiple instance learning, sparse representation based learning, low-dimensional manifold models, anomalous change detection, target recognition, sensor fusion and super-resolution for robust multispectral and hyperspectral image understanding. It presents research from leading international experts who have made foundational contributions in these areas. The book covers a diverse array of applications of multispectral/hyperspectral imagery in the context of these algorithms, including remote sensing, face recognition and biomedicine. This book would be particularly beneficial to graduate students and researchers who are taking advanced courses in (or are working in) the areas of image analysis, machine learning and remote sensing with multi-channel optical imagery. Researchers and professionals in academia and industry working in areas such as electrical engineering, civil and environmental engineering, geosciences and biomedical image processing, who work with multi-channel optical data will find this book useful.

As multimedia applications have become part of contemporary daily life, numerous paradigm-shifting technologies in multimedia processing have emerged over the last decade. Substantially updated with 21 new chapters, Multimedia Image and Video Processing, Second Edition explores the most recent advances in multimedia research and applications. This edition presents a comprehensive treatment of multimedia information mining, security, systems, coding, search, hardware, and communications as well as multimodal information fusion and interaction. Clearly divided into seven parts, the book begins with a section on standards, fundamental methods, design issues, and typical architectures. It then focuses on the coding of video and multimedia content before covering multimedia search, retrieval, and management. After examining multimedia security, the book describes multimedia communications and networking and explains the architecture design and implementation for multimedia image and video processing. It concludes with a section on multimedia systems and applications. Written by some of the most prominent experts in the field, this updated edition provides readers with the latest research in multimedia processing and equips them with advanced techniques for the design of multimedia systems.

Bring your artwork to life with the power of the FORCE! Watch, listen, and follow along as Mike Mattesi demonstrates the fundamental FORCE line and explains dynamic figure drawing techniques through 30 videos that are launched through the book's companion App. Packed with superb, powerfully drawn examples, the updated third edition of FORCE features an all-new section on the "FORCE blob," and dozens of fresh illustrations. Mike Mattesi's 10th anniversary edition of FORCE will teach readers how to put thought and imagination to paper. Whether you are an illustrator, animator, comic book artist, or student, you'll learn to use rhythm, shape, and line to bring out the life in any subject. The 10th Anniversary Edition contains numerous improvements. Around 30 videos are embedded within the book and accessible through the FORCE Drawing App. In the App, click on the image of the camera, point your mobile device's camera at the page with the symbol, and then finally tap the video card image floating above the drawing to launch the video. Then sit back and watch the video that shows me creating that drawing and discussing my process. Many new drawings can be found within this edition and the addition of color now further clarifies the theory of FORCE. Key Features The unique, dynamic learning system that has helped thousands of artists enhance their figure drawing abilities Dozens of updated illustrations and all-new content, exclusive to the 3rd edition Select pages can be scanned by your smartphone or other device to pull up bonus video content, enhancing the learning process Companion App: Nearly 50 videos are available on the free FORCE Drawing companion app that can be downloaded through Google Play or the Apple App Store

The book has two intentions. First, it assembles the latest research in the field of medical imaging technology in one place. Detailed descriptions of current state-of-the-art medical imaging systems (comprised of x-ray CT, MRI, ultrasound, and nuclear medicine) and data processing techniques are discussed. Information is provided that will give interested engineers and scientists a solid foundation from which to build with additional resources. Secondly, it exposes the reader to myriad applications that medical imaging technology has enabled.

Broad in scope, Semantic Multimedia Analysis and Processing provides a complete reference of techniques, algorithms, and solutions for the design and the implementation of contemporary multimedia systems. Offering a balanced, global look at the latest advances in semantic indexing, retrieval, analysis, and processing of multimedia, the book features the contributions of renowned researchers from around the world. Its contents are based on four fundamental thematic pillars: 1) information and content retrieval, 2) semantic knowledge exploitation paradigms, 3) multimedia personalization, and 4) human-computer affective multimedia interaction. Its 15 chapters cover key topics such as content creation, annotation and modeling for the semantic web, multimedia content understanding, and efficiency and scalability. Fostering a deeper understanding of a popular area of research, the text: Describes state-of-the-art schemes and applications Supplies authoritative guidance on research and deployment issues Presents novel methods and applications in an informative and reproducible way Contains numerous examples, illustrations, and tables summarizing results from quantitative studies Considers ongoing trends and designates future challenges and research perspectives Includes bibliographic links for further exploration Uses both SI and US units Ideal for engineers and scientists specializing in the design of multimedia systems, software applications, and image/video analysis and processing technologies, Semantic Multimedia Analysis and Processing aids researchers, practitioners, and developers in finding innovative solutions to existing problems, opening up new avenues of research in uncharted waters.

Visual perception is a complex process requiring interaction between the receptors in the eye that sense the stimulus and the neural system and the brain that are responsible for communicating and interpreting the sensed visual information. This process involves several physical, neural, and cognitive phenomena whose understanding is essential to design effective and computationally efficient imaging solutions. Building on advances in computer vision, image and video processing, neuroscience, and information engineering, perceptual digital imaging greatly enhances the capabilities of traditional imaging methods. Filling a gap in the literature, Perceptual Digital Imaging: Methods and Applications comprehensively covers the system design, implementation, and application aspects of this emerging specialized area. It gives readers a strong, fundamental understanding of theory and methods, providing a foundation on which solutions for many of the most interesting and challenging imaging problems can be built. The book features contributions by renowned experts who present the state of the art and recent trends in image acquisition, processing, storage, display, and visual quality evaluation. They detail advances in the field and explore human visual system-driven approaches across a broad spectrum of applications, including: Image quality and aesthetics assessment Digital camera imaging White balancing and color enhancement Thumbnail generation Image restoration Super-resolution imaging Digital halftoning and dithering Color feature extraction Semantic multimedia analysis and processing Video shot characterization Image and video encryption Display quality enhancement This is a valuable resource for readers who want to design and implement more effective solutions for cutting-edge digital imaging, computer vision, and multimedia applications. Suitable as a graduate-level textbook or stand-alone reference for researchers and practitioners, it provides a unique overview of an important and rapidly developing research field.

This edition presents the most prominent topics and applications of digital image processing, analysis, and computer graphics in the field of cultural heritage preservation. The text assumes prior knowledge of digital image processing and computer graphics fundamentals. Each chapter contains a table of contents, illustrations, and figures that elucidate the presented concepts in detail, as well as a chapter summary and a bibliography for further reading. Well-known experts cover a wide range of topics and related applications, including spectral imaging, automated restoration, computational reconstruction, digital reproduction, and 3D models.

Image Restoration: Fundamentals and Advances responds to the need to update most existing references on the subject, many of which were published decades ago. Providing a broad overview of image restoration, this book explores breakthroughs in related algorithm development and their role in supporting real-world applications associated with various scientific and engineering fields. These include astronomical imaging, photo editing, and medical imaging, to name just a few. The book examines how such advances can also lead to novel insights into the fundamental properties of image sources. Addressing the many advances in imaging, computing, and communications technologies, this reference strikes just the right balance of coverage between core fundamental principles and the latest developments in this area. Its content was designed based on the idea that the reproducibility of published works on algorithms makes it easier for researchers to build on each other's work, which often benefits the vitality of the technical community as a whole. For that reason, this book is as experimentally reproducible as possible. Topics covered include: Image denoising and deblurring Different image restoration methods and recent advances such as nonlocality and sparsity Blind restoration under space-varying blur Super-resolution restoration Learning-based methods Multi-spectral and color image restoration New possibilities using hybrid imaging systems Many existing references are scattered throughout the literature, and there is a significant gap between the cutting edge in image restoration and what we can learn from standard image processing textbooks. To fill that need but avoid a rehash of the many fine existing books on this subject, this reference focuses on algorithms rather than theories or applications. Giving readers access to a large amount of downloadable source code, the book illustrates fundamental techniques, key ideas developed over the years, and the state of the art in image restoration. It is a valuable resource for readers at all levels of understanding.

In this book, veteran game developers, academics, journalists, and others provide their processes and experiences with level design. Each provides a unique perspective representing multiple steps of the process for interacting with and creating game levels - experiencing levels, designing levels, constructing levels, and testing levels. These diverse perspectives offer readers a window into the thought processes that result in memorable open game worlds, chilling horror environments, computer-generated levels, evocative soundscapes, and many other types of gamespaces. This collection invites readers into the minds of professional designers as they work and provides evergreen topics on level design and game criticism to inspire both new and veteran designers. Key Features: Learn about the processes of experienced developers and level designers in their own words Discover best-practices for creating levels for persuasive play and designing collaboratively Offers analysis methods for better understanding game worlds and how they function in response to gameplay Find your own preferred method of level design by learning the processes of multiple industry veterans

Covering the theoretical aspects of image processing and analysis through the use of graphs in the representation and analysis of objects, Image Processing and Analysis with Graphs: Theory and Practice also demonstrates how these concepts are indispensible for the design of cutting-edge solutions for real-world applications. Explores new applications in computational photography, image and video processing, computer graphics, recognition, medical and biomedical imaging With the explosive growth in image production, in everything from digital photographs to medical scans, there has been a drastic increase in the number of applications based on digital images. This book explores how graphs-which are suitable to represent any discrete data by modeling neighborhood relationships-have emerged as the perfect unified tool to represent, process, and analyze images. It also explains why graphs are ideal for defining graph-theoretical algorithms that enable the processing of functions, making it possible to draw on the rich literature of combinatorial optimization to produce highly efficient solutions. Some key subjects covered in the book include: Definition of graph-theoretical algorithms that enable denoising and image enhancement Energy minimization and modeling of pixel-labeling problems with graph cuts and Markov Random Fields Image processing with graphs: targeted segmentation, partial differential equations, mathematical morphology, and wavelets Analysis of the similarity between objects with graph matching Adaptation and use of graph-theoretical algorithms for specific imaging applications in computational photography, computer vision, and medical and biomedical imaging Use of graphs has become very influential in computer science and has led to many applications in denoising, enhancement, restoration, and object extraction. Accounting for the wide variety of problems being solved with graphs in image processing and computer vision, this book is a contributed volume of chapters written by renowned experts who address specific techniques or applications. This state-of-the-art overview provides application examples that illustrate practical application of theoretical algorithms. Useful as a support for graduate courses in image processing and computer vision, it is also perfect as a reference for practicing engineers working on development and implementation of image processing and analysis algorithms.