--The focus of this session will be on novel color mappings, models, computational methods, and data structures to produce ergonomic color representations of multimodal imagery and information from multiple sources, intended for human visual presentation, analysis or exploitation. Color is a powerful tool for multi-modal information representation and exploration. Suitable color representations should ideally provide invariant representations of the relevant semantic information independent of the registration conditions (color invariance).

--Alexander Toet received his PhD in physics from the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands in 1987, where he worked on visual spatial localization (hyperacuity) and image processing. His is currently a senior researcher at TNO Defense, Safety and Security in Soesterberg where he investigates multimodal image fusion, image quality, computational models of human visual search and detection, and the quantification of visual target distinctness. Recently he started investigating crossmodal perceptual interactions between the visual, auditory and tactile senses, with the aim to deploy these interactions to enhance the perceived quality ?of serious gaming programs for training and simulation of search and rescue operations. He has published over 50 papers in refereed journals, 60 papers in refereed conference proceedings, was co-editor of a book on the mathematical description of shape in images, and a was Guest Editor of Special Issue of Optical Engineering on “Advances in Target Acquisition Modeling II”. He organized and directed 3 international workshops on Search and Target Acquisition, Combinatorial algorithms for Military Applications, and on the mathematical description of shape in images.

--Stavri Nikolov is a Research Fellow in Image Processing at the University of Bristol. His research there is focused on image processing, image fusion, new methods for data visualisation and navigation, and more recently the use of gaze-tracking and VR in 2-D and 3-D image analysis and understanding, and the development of gaze-contingent and interactive information displays. Dr Nikolov received his PhD, in microscopic image analysis, from Vienna University of Technology, Austria in 1996. In the last 15 years he has taken part in many international and national research projects in Austria, Portugal and the UK, in microscopic image processing, analytical data processing, construction of 3-D maps of the seafloor, analysis of volumetric sonar images, medical imaging, image fusion, spatio-temporal volume processing and visualisation, and gaze-contingent data visualisation and analysis. He has published more than 50 papers and three invited book chapters in these areas. He has also given many invited lectures around the world on image processing, image fusion and information visualisation. He is the creator and co-ordinator of The Online Resource for Research in Image Fusion (www.ImageFusion.org) and The Online Archive of Scanpath Data (www.Scanpaths.org), together with Dr Pelz of Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. Dr Nikolov was Guest Editor (together with Prof Goshtasby of Wright State University, USA) of a recent special issue of the Information Fusion Journal on “Image Fusion: Advances in the State-of-the-Art” and Co-Chair of a Special Session on “Fused Image Assessment” (together with Dr Toet of TNO, The Netherlands) at the Fusion 2006 Conference in Florence, Italy.

--Maarten A. Hogervorst received his PhD in physics from the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands in 1996 for his work on visual perception. From 1996 to 1999 he continued his work in this area as a post-doc at Oxford University. In 1999 he joined TNO Human Factors as a research scientist. He has worked on perception of depth, tracking, human sensor integration, object detection and recognition, workload assessment. His current research interests include visual information processing, electro- optical system performance, search and target acquisition, image quality assessment, image enhancement, image fusion and camera surveillance.