Video Analysis Initiative

What is the Video Analysis Initiative?

Since we began OpenBehavior in 2016, there has been invigorated interest and effort directed towards creating, improving, and disseminating open-source tools for acquisition and analysis of behavioral videos. Rigorous video analyses are uniquely able to track and reveal features of behavior, so the expansion of these open source tools has opened up avenues for new questions and approaches to better understand fundamental neural and behavioral features of animal behavior.  

While the OpenBehavior Project has always been interested in video analysis tools and included them in our tool repository and twitter promotions, the Video Analysis Initiative was launched in 2021 as a focused outshoot of ongoing efforts. The Initiative aims to encourage community engagement and advancement of open source video analysis software through four distinct activities. First, hosting a repository of videos from across the field of behavioral neuroscience. Second, housing discussions of emerging ideas for development, use, and evaluation of video analysis software. Third, linking to educational and training resources related to learning and using video analysis software in the lab and/or classroom. Fourth, launching a data analysis competition to advance methods and explore the impact of parameter choices on algorithm performance. Click the boxes below to learn more about each activity.

The Video Repository is currently live, but we plan to roll out the other three activities over the coming year. If you would like to join us and work with the OpenBehavior Team on this Initiative, you can either reach out to us via email at openbehavior@gmail.com or Twitter at @OpenBehavior. 

 

Educational & Training Resources

Video Analysis Discussions

Data Analysis Competition