Zoom launches Intelligent Director to bring colleagues closer in the office and remotely
Zoom Video Communications is launching the Intelligent Director for Zoom Rooms. This AI-driven solution takes over the image direction of hybrid meetings and brings participants in large meeting rooms into separate view. This makes the meeting experience more equal for all participants regardless of their location.
"With more people returning to the office, it is no longer enough to focus only on a good remote meeting experience. The focus is on an optimal hybrid experience," says Smita Hashim, Chief Product Officer at Zoom. "Because despite the partial return to the office, meetings will structurally have remote participants. Intelligent Director provides a solution to engage participants equally regardless of their location."
The new technology is an evolution of Zooms Smart Gallery, an AI-powered solution for small meeting rooms with a single camera. For larger meeting rooms, a single camera is often not enough to capture everyone equally. This is why Intelligent Director works with multiple cameras, so that participants in the room are also properly captured when they turn their heads or walk around.
Intelligent Director is specially designed for medium-sized and large meeting rooms to prevent the 'bowling alley effect'. This is caused by the large distance between camera and participants in the office - making the staff in the office appear to the remote participants like skittles at the end of a long, narrow track.
The development of Intelligent Director was made possible in part by Zoom's hardware partner network. Vendors such as Apple, AVer, Dell, HP | Poly, Intel, Logitech and Yealink supported Zoom with the necessary computing, controller and camera solutions needed for this technological innovation.
