Often times, conferences are being held as video conferences. The conference participants can participate in the conference from anywhere in the world. As an example, some of the dialog partners are sitting together in a room and others are sitting alone at work or in their home office. In a real conference where all participants are sitting together in a room, each participant is able to individually turn to individual participants and draw more precise conclusions, for example, from their facial expressions and reactions, behavior, and emotions and to adjust their own behavior accordingly. In a video conference, all participants have the same view which is an aggregate view of all participants and is created by the conference server. Settings of individual participants (for example, camera orientation, zoom) influence the representation for all participants. It is not possible to individually observe individual participants.
It is known that the representation of a video conference can be manipulated such that a camera from a far side of the conference can be controlled on a case-by-case basis. However, this has implications for all conference participants and also does not create an individual view, but influences the aggregate view only. In addition, constantly readjusting the camera(s) can create a certain anxiety during the conference that is not desirable.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds