An Innovative Adaptive Web-Based Solution for Improved Remote Co-Creation and Delivery of Artistic Performances

Abstract

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most arts and cultural activities have moved online. This has contributed to the surge in development of artistic tools that enable professional artists to produce engaging and immersive shows remotely. This article introduces TRACTION Co-Creation Stage (TCS), a novel Web-based solution, designed and developed in the context of the EU Horizon 2020 TRACTION project, which allows for remote creation and delivery of artistic shows. TCS supports multiple artists performing simultaneously, either live or pre-recorded, on multiple stages at different geographical locations. It employs a client-server approach. The client has two major components: Control and Display. The former is used by the production teams to create shows by specifying layouts, scenes, and media sources to be included. The latter is used by viewers to watch the various shows. To ensure viewers’ good quality of experience (QoE) levels, TCS employs adaptive streaming based on a novel Prioritised Adaptation solution based on the DASH standard for pre-recorded content delivery (PADA), which is introduced in this paper. User tests and experiments are carried out to evaluate the performance of TCS’ Control and Display applications and that of PADA algorithm when creating and distributing opera shows.