Dr. Thomas Kübler

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University of Tübingen
Dpt. of Computer Science
Human-Computer Interaction
Sand 14
72076 Tübingen
Germany

Telephone
+49 - (0) 70 71 - 29 - 78996
Telefax
+49 - (0) 70 71 - 29 - 50 62
E-Mail
thomas.kuebler@uni-tuebingen.de
Office
Sand 14, C205a
Office hours
on appointment

Profile on ResearchGate

Profile on Linkedin

My research concerns all aspects of eye-tracking, from the design of a physical recording device, the necessary image processing steps via classical computer vision as well as DNNs, to the high-level interpretation of recorded gaze sequences through machine learning. I work on assessing data quality, visualization and gaze analysis tools in various applications in the medical, educational, automotive and art historian fields.

With my Spin-Off Look! we develop eye-tracking solutions for automotive applications as well as in-vehicle head-mounted devices for driving schools and instructor teaching.

Our algorithms for the registration and analysis of gaze data are well suited to infer cognitive processes such as attention and vigilance solely from the movement of the eyes - and are therefore an excellent complementary factor to traditional measures such as perclos, head movements or gaze-on-road. This adds to robustness and sensitivity of driver monitoring systems by enabling the vehicle to sense the current attentional state of the driver.

Driving instructors are enabled by our head-mounted eye-tracking devices to see the streets through the eyes of their students. That way they can provide efficient feedback and speed up the learning process by making students aware of the importance of correct visual exploration of their surroundings.

Research Interests

  • Gaze-based driver assistance and monitoring systems
  • Computational models of human gaze behavior
  • Algorithms for the comparison of exploratory gaze sequences
  • Eye-tracking data quality in real-world applications
  • Algorithms and tools for the analysis and visualization of eye-tracking data
  • Head-mounted eye-tracking hardware

Publications

2021

FakeNewsPerception: An eye movement dataset on the perceived believability of news stories

Ömer Sümer, Efe Bozkir, Thomas Kübler, Sven Grüner, Sonja Utz, and Enkelejda Kasneci. Data in Brief 35, 2021.

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55 Rides: Attention annotated Head and Gaze data during Naturalistic Driving

Thomas Kübler, Wolfgang Fuhl, Elena Wagner, and Enkelejda Kasneci. Eye-Tracking Research and Applications. ACM, 2021.

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2020

Low Power Scanned Laser Eye Tracking for Retinal Projection AR Glasses

Johannes Meyer, Thomas Schlebusch, Thomas C Kübler, and Enkelejda Kasneci. Eye Tracking Research and Applications. ACM, 2020.

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The Perception Engineer’s Toolkit for Eye-Tracking data analysis

Thomas C Kübler. Eye Tracking Research and Applications. ACM, 2020.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Deep semantic gaze embedding and scanpath comparison for expertise classification during OPT viewing

Nora Castner, Thomas C Kübler, Juliane Richter, Therese Eder, Fabian Huettig, Constanze Keutel, and Enkelejda Kasneci. Eye Tracking Research and Applications. ACM, 2020.

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2019

Improving Real-Time CNN-Based Pupil Detection Through Domain-Specific Data Augmentation

S. Eivazi, T. Santini, A. Keshavarzi, T. C. Kübler, and A. Mazzei. Proceedings of the 2019 ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA) – To Appear, 2019.

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Ferns for area of interest free scanpath classification

W. Fuhl, N. Castner, T. C. Kübler, A. Lotz, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. Proceedings of the 2019 ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA) , 2019.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

2018

Eye-Hand Behavior in Human-Robot Shared Manipulation

R. M., T. Santini, T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, S. Srinivasa, and H. Admoni. Proceedings of the 13th Annual ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human Robot Interaction, 2018.

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An Inconspicuous and Modular Head-Mounted Eye Tracker

S. Eivazi, T. Kübler, T. Santini, and E. Kasneci. Proceedings of the 2018 ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA) , 2018.

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Automatic generation of saliency-based areas of interest

W. Fuhl, T. Kübler, T. Santini, and E. Kasneci. Symposium on Vision, Modeling and Visualization (VMV), 2018.

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Region of interest generation algorithms for eye tracking data

W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, H. Brinkmann, R. Rosenberg, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. Third Workshop on Eye Tracking and Visualization (ETVIS), in conjunction with ACM ETRA, 2018.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Scanpath comparison in medical image reading skills of dental students

N. Castner, E. Kasneci, T. C. Kübler, K. Scheiter, and J. Richter. Proceedings of the 2018 ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA), 2018.

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Eye movement simulation and detector creation to reduce laborious parameter adjustments

W. Fuhl, T. Santini, T. Kuebler, N. Castner, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. arXiv preprint arXiv:1804.00970, 2018.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

2017

EyeLad: Remote Eye Tracking Image Labeling Tool

W. Fuhl, T. Santini, D. Geisler, T. C. Kübler, and E. Kasneci. 12th Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications (VISIGRAPP 2017), 2017.

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Algorithms for the comparison of visual scan patterns

T. C. Kübler. PhD thesis. University of Tübingen, 2017.

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Aggregating physiological and eye tracking signals to predict perception in the absence of ground truth

E. Kasneci, T. C. Kübler, K. Broelemann, and G. Kasneci. Computers in Human Behavior, Elsevier 68: 450-455, 2017.

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Ways of improving the precision of eye tracking data: Controlling the influence of dirt and dust on pupil detection

W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, D. Hospach, O. Bringmann, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. Journal of Eye Movement Research 10(3), 2017.

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Automatic Mapping of Remote Crowd Gaze to Stimuli in the Classroom

T. Santini, T. C. Kübler, L. Draghetti, P. Gerjets, W. Wagner, U. Trautwein, and E. Kasneci. Eye Tracking Enhanced Learning (ETEL2017), 2017.

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Monitoring Response Quality During Campimetry Via Eye-Tracking

G. Dambros, J. Ungewiss, T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, and M. Spüler. Proceedings of the 22st International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces, IUI 2017, ACM, 2017.

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2016

EyeRec: An Open-source Data Acquisition Software for Head-mounted Eye-tracking

T. Santini, W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, and E. Kasneci. Proceedings of the 11th Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications (VISIGRAPP) 3: VISAPP: 386–391, 2016.

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Rendering refraction and reflection of eyeglasses for synthetic eye tracker images

T. C. Kübler, T. Rittig, J. Ungewiss, C. Krauss, and E. Kasneci. ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research and Applications, ETRA 2016, 2016.

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ElSe: Ellipse Selection for Robust Pupil Detection in Real-World Environments

W. Fuhl, T. Santini, T. C. Kübler, and E. Kasneci. Proceedings of the Ninth Biennial ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA), pages 123–130, 2016.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Bayesian Identification of Fixations, Saccades, and Smooth Pursuits

T. Santini, W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, and E. Kasneci. Proceedings of the Ninth Biennial ACM Symposium on Eye Tracking Research & Applications (ETRA), pages 163–170, 2016.

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SubsMatch 2.0: Scanpath comparison and classification based on subsequence frequencies

T. C. Kübler, C. Rothe, U. Schiefer, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. Behavior Research Methods online first: 1-17, 2016.

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Eyes Wide Open? Eyelid Location and Eye Aperture Estimation for Pervasive Eye Tracking in Real-World Scenarios

W. Fuhl, T. Santini, D. Geisler, T. C. Kübler, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. ACM International Joint Conference on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing: Adjunct publication – PETMEI 2016, 2016.

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Novel methods for analysis and visualization of saccade trajectories

T. C. Kübler, W. Fuhl, R. Rosenberg, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. 3. ECCV Workshop VISART 2016, 2016.

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2015

Towards Automated Scan Pattern Analysis for Dynamic Scenes

J. Ungewiss, T. C. Kübler, D.R. Bukenberger, E. Kasneci, and U. Schiefer. The Eye, The Brain And The Auto 2015, 2015.

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Online Recognition of Fixations, Saccades, and Smooth Pursuits for Automated Analysis of Traffic Hazard Perception

E. Kasneci, G. Kasneci, T. C. Kübler, and W. Rosenstiel. 4: 411-434. Artificial Neural Networks - Springer Series in Bio-/Neuroinformatics (Ed. Petia Koprinkova-Hristova, Valeri Mladenov, Nikola K. Kasabov), Springer International Publishing, 2015.

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Analysis of eye movements with Eyetrace

T. C. Kübler, K. Sippel, W. Fuhl, G. Schievelbein, J. Aufreiter, R. Rosenberg, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. 574: 458-471. Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies. Communications in Computer and Information Science (CCIS). Springer International Publishing, 2015.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Eyetrace2014: Eyetracking Data Analysis Tool

K. Sippel, T. C. Kübler, W. Fuhl, G. Schievelbein, R. Rosenberg, and W. Rosenstiel. 8th International Conference on Health Informatics, Healthinf 2015, 2015.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Exploiting the potential of eye movements analysis in the driving context

E. Kasneci, T. C. Kübler, C. Braunagel, W. Fuhl, W. Stolzmann, and W. Rosenstiel. 15. Internationales Stuttgarter Symposium Automobil- und Motorentechnik. Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden, 2015.

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ExCuSe: Robust Pupil Detection in Real-World Scenarios

W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, K. Sippel, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. 16th International Conference on Computer Analysis of Images and Patterns (CAIP 2015), 2015.

PDF BIB Supplementary Material

Automated Comparison of Scanpaths in Dynamic Scenes

T. C. Kübler and E. Kasneci. Pfeiffer, Thies ; Essig, Kai (Hrsg.): Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Solutions for Automatic Gaze Data Analysis 2015 (SAGA 2015), 2015.

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Automated Visual Scanpath Analysis Reveals the Expertise Level of Micro-neurosurgeons

T. C. Kübler, S. Eivazi, and E. Kasneci. MICCAI 15 Workshop on Interventional Microscopy, 2015.

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Driving with Glaucoma: Task Performance and Gaze Movements

T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, K. Aehling, M. Heister, W. Rosenstiel, U. Schiefer, and E. Papageorgiou. Optometry and Vision Science 92(11): 1037-1046, 2015.

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Driving with Homonymous Visual Field Defects: Driving Performance and Compensatory Gaze Movements

T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, W. Rosenstiel, K. Aehling, M. Heister, K. Nagel, U. Schiefer, and E. Papageorgiou. Journal of Eye Movement Research 8(5): 1-11, 2015.

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Arbitrarily shaped areas of interest based on gaze density gradient

W. Fuhl, T. C. Kübler, K. Sippel, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. European Conference on Eye Movements, ECEM 2015, 2015.

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2014

The Applicability of Probabilistic Methods to the Online Recognition of Fixations and Saccades in Dynamic Scenes

E. Kasneci, G. Kasneci, T. C. Kübler, and W. Rosenstiel. Proceedings of the 8th Symposium on Eye Tracking Research and Applications, ETRA 2014, pages 323-326, 2014.

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SubsMatch: Scanpath Similarity in Dynamic Scenes based on Subsequence Frequencies

T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, and W. Rosenstiel. Proceedings of the 8th Symposium on Eye Tracking Research and Applications, ETRA 2014, pages 319-322, 2014.

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Rule-based classification of visual field defects

E. Kasneci, G. Kasneci, U. Schiefer, and W. Rosenstiel. 7th International Conference on Health Informatics (HEALTHINF 2014), 2014.

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Stress-indicators and exploratory gaze for the analysis of hazard perception in patients with visual field loss

T. C. Kübler, E. Kasneci, W. Rosenstiel, U. Schiefer, K. Nagel, and E. Papageorgiou. Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour 24: 231 - 243, 2014.

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Towards automated comparison of eye-tracking recordings in dynamic scenes

T. C. Kübler, D. R., J. Ungewiss, A. Wörner, C. Rothe, U. Schiefer, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Kasneci. EUVIP 2014, 2014.

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2013

Online Classification of Eye Tracking Data for Automated Analysis of Traffic Hazard Perception

E. Tafaj, T. C. Kübler, G. Kasneci, W. Rosenstiel, and M. Bogdan. Artificial Neural Networks and Machine Learning (ICANN 2013), 2013.

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Auswirkungen des visuellen Explorationsverhaltens von Patienten mit binokularen Gesichtsfelddefekten auf alltagsrelevante Tätigkeiten - Ergebnisse der TUTOR-Studie

U. Schiefer, T. C. Kübler, M. Heister, K. Aehling, K. Sippel, E. Papageorgiou, W. Rosenstiel, and E. Tafaj. 111. DOG-Kongress, 2013.

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2011

Vishnoo - An Open-Source Software for Vision Research

E. Tafaj, T. C. Kübler, J. Peter, U. Schiefer, and M. Bogdan. 24th IEEE International Symposium on Computer-Based Medical Systems (CBMS 2011), Bristol, UK, 2011.

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Teaching

Course Term
Eye-based Human-Computer Interaction
Eye-based Human-Computer Interaction
Grundlagen der Multimediatechnik
Proseminar: Introductory Topics in Human-Computer Interaction
Advanced Topics in Perception Engineering
Advanced Topics in Perception Engineering
Computational Models of Visual Attention
Technische Anwendungen der Informatik: Hard- und Software aktueller Eye-Tracking-Systeme
Technische Anwendungen der Informatik: Hard- und Software aktueller Eye-Tracking-Systeme
Technische Anwendungen der Informatik: Hard- und Software aktueller Eye-Tracking-Systeme
Eye Tracking in Mobile Computing and Virtual Reality

Open Thesis Topics

10.07.2019

Saccade Bundles

This project is about applying (and probably adjusting) a linear time clustering algorithm for brain fiber activity to work with saccadic trajectories. The result will be a clustering of saccades (= saccade bundle).

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10.07.2019

Gaze Counter

Während in der Online-Werbebranche die Erfolgskontrolle für eine bestimmte Werbeanzeige z.B. durch die Anzahl der Klicks oder eine Klick/Kauf-Rate relativ einfach durchgeführt werden kann, ist dies für Offline-Medien nicht immer ganz so einfach: Wie oft wird beispielsweise ein bestimmtes Plakat pro Tag betrachtet? Erregt ein Design mehr Aufmerksamkeit, als ein anderes? Ist ein höherer Preis für einen bestimmten Plakatstandort gerechtfertigt? Das Blickverhalten ist in der Werbebranche ein gängiger Indikator. Eye-Tracking Studien sind aber teuer und aufwändig auszuwerten.

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10.07.2019

Crowd attention tracking

We want to be able to track eye and head movements of a crowd of people, such as a whole classroom. Thereby we can infer measures about current attentional focus, e.g. whether students pay attention to the lecture material and when attention decreases. Therefore we will record high resolution videos of multiple persons in a naturalistic setting, including a variety of head poses and eye positions.

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10.07.2019

Automatisierter Scanpath Vergleich

Menschen können ihre Aufmerksamkeit gezielt lenken. Eine Methode diese Aufmerksamkeitszuweisung aufzuzeichnen sind Eye-Tracking Aufnahmen: Objekte, die momentan interessant sind, werden mit den Augen fixiert. Oftmals ist es nicht nur interessant, wohin einzelne Individuen ihre Aufmerksamkeit lenken, sondern auch ein Vergleich zwischen Individuen oder verschiedenen Zeitpunkten. Hierzu werden diese auf einfache Elemente reduziert: Fixationen und Sakkaden (schnelle Augenbewegungen). Die zeitliche Abfolge und räumliche Position von Fixationen und Sakkaden nennt man Scanpath. Aktuelle Vergleichsmetoden basieren auf zwei verschiedenen Ansätzen:

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Assigned Thesis Topics

Finished Thesis Topics

10.07.2019

Vein extraction and eye rotation determination

The first step is setting up a recording environment with fixed subject position. This environment is used for data acquisition with predefined head rotations of the subjects. Based on this data, an algorithm has to be developed measuring the eyeball rotation of the subject. The resulting angle is then compared and validated based on the head rotation.

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10.07.2019

EyeTrace CUDA extension

EyeTrace is a software for gaze data visualization and analysis. Due to the increasing amount of data, these visualizations need more computation time. In this thesis, existing visualizations should be implemented using CUDA for GPU computations. Additionally, this includes a data storage model making it possible to shift the data between the GPU and the host computer. Due to the fact that nowadays not all computers have a CUDA capable card, the module should also allow CPU computations. This should be determined automatically by the module.

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10.07.2019

Ein Dashboard für Eyetrace

Die Eyetrace Software bietet eine Vielzahl an Visualisierungsmöglchkeiten für Eye-Tracking Daten. In diesem Projekt soll eine grafisch ansprechende Übersicht über die momentan ins Programm geladenen Daten erzeugt werden.

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10.07.2019

3D Eyeball generation based on vein motion

The first step is robust feature extraction. This can be done using SURF, SIFT, BRISK or MSER features if sufficient. Those features have to be mapped on features found in consecutive images. Based on the displacement a 3D model has to be computed. This model is used afterwards for gaze position estimation.

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