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The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

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21–30 of 108 posts

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#21

Why — though in the early days of interlace's internetted teleputers that operated off largely the same fiber-digital grid as the phone companies, the advent of video-telephoning (a.k.a. 'videophony') enjoyed an interval of huge consumer popularity — callers thrilled at the idea of phone-interfacing both aurally and facially (the little first-generation phone-video cameras being too crude and narrow-apertured for any…

Came here to post this and glad I was beaten to it. While the prediction of video conferencing isn’t that wild (in the same way that Kubrick predicting tablets in 2001 isn’t that wild), the user anxiety that led to the mask/face filter industry was really genius.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#22
post #20

Anecdotal, and I don't want it to sound like my example is intended to disprove this research or anyone else's experience, but I personally find it extremely fatiguing if people _don't_ turn on their video. More specifically, when I'm talking in a meeting or giving a presentation, I find it very helpful to see other people, see their reactions, see whether they laugh at jokes or look confused when I'm bad at explaini…

I've worked from home for a decade now, and I've found the people who want cameras on in meetings are the folks who don't normally work remote. They're not used to not seeing reactions, so it throws them when nobody has a camera on. The people who have worked remote for a while - at least since before covid - don't ever use their camera.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#23

I think it's because, in real life, you can tell who's looking at you and when. There's key components of body language that are based in who is paying attention to who. In a videoconference, this is all missing. You can't tell who's looking at you or not, so that mean anyone could be looking at you, so you act like everyone is looking at you all the time, you feel the need to control your presentation more, that cau…

This is why I almost always minimize my own video on my screen. Just seeing myself makes me really self conscious.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#24

I think it's because, in real life, you can tell who's looking at you and when. There's key components of body language that are based in who is paying attention to who. In a videoconference, this is all missing. You can't tell who's looking at you or not, so that mean anyone could be looking at you, so you act like everyone is looking at you all the time, you feel the need to control your presentation more, that cau…

I don't do video calls, but my partner does them often for work. The other day she mentioned that you're able to see who is looking at your video feed because their eyes looks directly at you (akin to them looking into the webcam). I'm not sure if she was mistaken, or if there's some kind of eye tracking/image processing stuff going on to do this. FYI it was Microsoft Teams.

Not at all true. For that to work, there would have to be, yes, eye tracking and a lot of image processing to change where your gaze appeared to be, but also knowledge of the physical size of the screen, the location of that particular person's feed on the screen, and where the screen is in relation to the camera. Now, it's possible that a lot of that could be inferred if it's assumed the screen is not moved in relation to the camera, and a lot of work went into tracking window locations even as you move things around, but that's a LOT of effort to expend for such a minor feature (let alone the uncanny valley effect if you don't get the image processing perfect, including the transitional "eye moved from the document you were looking at, to looking at them" - the software would have to somehow note that rather than just looking over an inch, you actually looked up 7 inches, and render that realistically).

Easiest way to confirm this is not true, though (rather than just describe the challenge involved) - have a Zoom/Teams/whatever call 1-on-1. As you're talking to the person, and they're talking back to you, note where their eyes are. 95% of the time they're going to be below where your eyes would "meet", i.e., the camera is at the top of their monitor/laptop, and they're looking at you on screen. In fact, I've had some people -never- 'meet' my gaze, because they never become self-aware enough to "oh, I should look at my camera when I am talking".

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#25

I think it's because, in real life, you can tell who's looking at you and when. There's key components of body language that are based in who is paying attention to who. In a videoconference, this is all missing. You can't tell who's looking at you or not, so that mean anyone could be looking at you, so you act like everyone is looking at you all the time, you feel the need to control your presentation more, that cau…

I don't do video calls, but my partner does them often for work. The other day she mentioned that you're able to see who is looking at your video feed because their eyes looks directly at you (akin to them looking into the webcam). I'm not sure if she was mistaken, or if there's some kind of eye tracking/image processing stuff going on to do this. FYI it was Microsoft Teams.

I know this is something Apple FaceTime does. I recently noticed that when I looked at myself during a video call it looked like I was making direct eye contact, whereas when I looked at the camera it looked like I was looking away. I thought maybe I was imagining things but I found this article to back it up: https://www.fastcompany.com/90372724/welcome-to-post-reality...

There’s also a video where someone shows how your eyes get distorted to cause the effect, but I can’t find it right now.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#26
post #20

Anecdotal, and I don't want it to sound like my example is intended to disprove this research or anyone else's experience, but I personally find it extremely fatiguing if people _don't_ turn on their video. More specifically, when I'm talking in a meeting or giving a presentation, I find it very helpful to see other people, see their reactions, see whether they laugh at jokes or look confused when I'm bad at explaini…

I've worked from home for a decade now, and I've found the people who want cameras on in meetings are the folks who don't normally work remote. They're not used to not seeing reactions, so it throws them when nobody has a camera on. The people who have worked remote for a while - at least since before covid - don't ever use their camera.

Having worked remotely before and since Covid, I prefer to at least keep my camera on. I think it makes me more approachable... as approachable as can be expected anyway.

I've also been in large meetings where everyone has the camera off - it doesn't bother me, but given a choice between not seeing people and seeing people, I would choose seeing people.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#27
I have anxiety about being on camera, it’s like a public speaking skill set. There’s also environmental concerns (can they see the underwear on the floor?) that can creep in to distract away from what is important (not my face!). Video of my face is exhausting. I’m not a paid actor, and I’m not a YouTube star with a studio. Over time, I have found ways to feel better about being on camera, and that’s bern the acquisition of streamer-grade equipment where I can control to zoom and focus and contrast etc and punch the colors and film grain up to distracting levels. I want my video to distract you! Not me, so yeah I will tune it up so I’ve turned my face into purple chunky vasoline and now it’s your problem to think through, and not so much mine. Hope that helps! (Leave me alone with the camera FFS)

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#28
post #20

Anecdotal, and I don't want it to sound like my example is intended to disprove this research or anyone else's experience, but I personally find it extremely fatiguing if people _don't_ turn on their video. More specifically, when I'm talking in a meeting or giving a presentation, I find it very helpful to see other people, see their reactions, see whether they laugh at jokes or look confused when I'm bad at explaini…

We've had a couple people prove at work that you can prerecord your presentation, force-mute everyone using the mod tools, and then play it back and they'll never realize it was a recording unless you're showing your background on it.

(I'm not very dependent on human social anything, so I don't really know how to speak to the rest of it, sorry.)

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#29
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't do video calls, but my partner does them often for work. The other day she mentioned that you're able to see who is looking at your video feed because their eyes looks directly at you (akin to them looking into the webcam). I'm not sure if she was mistaken, or if there's some kind of eye tracking/image processing stuff going on to do this. FYI it was Microsoft Teams.

That only works if they are on a laptop. I work off a desktop with two 28" monitors and my camera sits above them in the center, and the meeting has to be on the left monitor or the right monitor, not straddling the middle, so you will never get that feeling of me looking directly at you. I am, however, thinking of making something that deepfakes the perspective change correctly.

Well, don't deepfake it. Strap a big long selfie stick to your head and hang the camera in front of your face :-)

I have two different setups, one with a laptop that has an external monitor; one that is my tower with two monitors. On both, the camera is basically over the monitor I use for video conferencing. I don't care if somebody notices me staring at the other monitor - it's no worse than staring at the desk during a face-to-face meeting while somebody else is talking.

Re: The Fatiguing Effects of Camera Use in Virtual Meetings [pdf]

#30

Several people on our team do not turn-on video during meetings. I also do not like to turn-on video for our stand-up calls - those are fact oriented and whatever I'm saying is sufficient to convey the details (one-on-one meetings would be a different scenario). Citrix on Linux seems to have issues exposing external webcams and this has worked to my advantage because once I found out about this issue, I simply presen…

> treatment of Linux as a second class citizen worked out to be in my favour. I don't know if being able to "get away with" not turning on your video is really in your favor. I am probably rare in this, but probably every month I end up seeing that someone is visibly stressed/exhausted on a Zoom, ask them about it and we usually end up talking about it and solving it. Like "holly shit noisy_boy, you look really tired…

I hope you save comments like that for 1:1, clearly it is overstepping for a standup...
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