Multimedia Signal Processing Systems

The summer dissertation projects provide an opportunity for you to apply material learnt during the previous two semesters and to develop a detailed knowledge of a particular area.

The dissertation projects have strong industrial relevance by drawing on EU- or industry-funded research and development carried out in the Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP).

They will cover various applications areas, including 3D broadcast production, biometrics, video archive restoration, security and surveillance systems, image and video database retrieval, speech recognition, machine audio perception, biomedical image processing and robotics.

The projects may be based at the University or in industry. There are also opportunities for carrying out the project work at collaborating academic institutions in the EU under the Socrates programme.

Recent projects include:

• Facial expression recognition
• Fusion of multimodal biometrics
• Illumination invariant face recognition
• Single-channel speech source separation
• Interactive user interface to a large-scale image collection
• Face recognition via non-negative sparse coding
• Auditory morphing of speech signals
• Hazard detection and obstacle avoidance for autonomous mobile rovers
• Automatic counting of people in images of crowds
• Reading writing for robots
• Scene recognition
• Real-time 3D capture and visualisation
• Tamper-proof audio watermarking
• Omnidirectional vision

Our taught programme structure provides a judicious mix of theoretical and applied topics delivered over two semesters through lectures, assignments and laboratory exercises. The assessment of these taught modules is through formal examinations at the end of Semesters 1 and 2.

The pass mark is set at 50 per cent for each module, representing a combination of the formal examination and any associated coursework or lab marks. An overall average, aggregated over all of the assessed modules, in excess of 70 per cent achieves a Pass with Distinction.

Projects are selected during the first semester from a broad list and are primarily undertaken between June and September. Following the spring examinations, usually staggered over May and June, you will concentrate on your MSc project.

You will usually meet with your project supervisor either weekly or fortnightly to discuss your project. There is a mid-term assessment based at the University where you will orally present your projects to an assessment panel. This provides you with feedback on your progress and suggestions for ongoing development.

You will produce a formal MSc dissertation and will also be assessed at a viva voce examination in late August or early September.

To support your learning, we hold regular MSc group meetings where any aspect of the programme, technical or non-technical, can be discussed in an informal atmosphere. This allows you to raise any problems that you would like to have addressed and encourages peer-based learning and general group discussion.

We provide computing support with any specialised software required during the programme, for example, Matlab. The Department’s student common room is also covered by the University’s open-access wireless network, which makes it a very popular location for individual and group work using laptops and mobile devices.

Specialist experimental and research facilities, for computationally demanding projects or those requiring specialist equipment, are provided by the Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP).

The programme is accredited by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) and as such can be used in partial fulfilment of the requirements for gaining Chartered Engineer (CEng) status.

As an Institution of Engineering and Technology-accredited institution, our programmes are countable under the continuing professional development (CPD) scheme.

Students graduating from these MSc pathways can expect to find employment in a diverse range of media-related and advanced technology industries. The demand for such graduate engineers reflects the UK’s status as a world leader in the media production business, with music and film post-production and games development recognised internationally and second only in size to the USA.

Our location is perfectly placed to benefit from the high concentration in London and the South East of companies involved in media production, broadcast, post-production, games, defence systems, biometric and surveillance systems, and computer vision, and major international consumer electronics companies.