AUTHOR GUIDELINES

Author Guidelines ISMAR Conference Papers

We welcome conference paper submissions from 4-8 pages excluding references. Paper quality versus length will be assessed according to a contribution-per-page judgment. Note that references should not exceed 2 pages in length and that the minimum length is 4 full pages of text. All submissions will be accepted or rejected as conference papers or poster papers*.

- All accepted papers will be orally presented at the ISMAR conference.
- All accepted papers will have the opportunity to be presented as a demo/poster.
- All accepted papers will be archived in the IEEE Xplore digital library.

* Note that the poster submission track will run in parallel to the paper submission track and there will not be a poster submission deadline after the conference paper notifications. The conference paper track cooperates with the poster track and may accept conference paper submissions as posters based on their level of contribution; see details below.

Conference papers are also eligible for one of a number of best paper awards. ISMAR has an established reputation of awarding prizes to papers with future high impact (http://arnetminer.org/bestpaper).

Before Submission

Previously published or submitted work. Conference paper submissions must not have been previously published. A manuscript is considered to have been previously published if it has appeared in a peer-reviewed or non-reviewed periodical or proceedings that is permanently available in print or electronic form to non-attendees, regardless of the language of that publication. A paper identical or substantially similar in content (in its entirety or in part) to one submitted to ISMAR should not be simultaneously under consideration for another conference or journal during any part of the ISMAR review process, from the submission deadline until notifications of decisions are emailed to authors. In some situations a submission may build upon prior work. In order to fully explain the relationship between the submitted paper and prior work, authors are asked to provide the related papers as well as a non-anonymous letter of explanation that highlights the significant changes or advances; these materials will only be seen by the Primary reviewer.

Completeness. The submission must include all information necessary to evaluate the paper and must not ask reviewers to go to web sites or other external information sources, since that might circumvent page and media format limits, and may jeopardize the anonymity of the reviewers. Such external sites will not be accessed during the review process.

Videos. Authors are encouraged to submit videos to aid the Program Committee in reviewing their submissions. Videos must be submitted according to the instructions at the submission website. When submitted as supporting material, videos must be free of any identifying information prior to reviewing as per the double-blind submission policy. Authors submitting a video should also include a text file describing the codec used to encode the video. Videos should be playable with standard software on PCs, Macs, and Linux machines. If the reviewers cannot play the video, it may reduce the chances of the submission being accepted.

Review Duties for Authors. Due to the increasing numbers of submissions to ISMAR, we rely on a large number of reviewers who are willing to provide expert opinions. To expand the reviewer pool and promote community integrity, the senior author/principal investigator will be required to register to review up to three papers through PCS at the time of submission. Additionally, senior authors are encouraged to ask experienced junior authors to register in PCS to review papers and mentor them in the review process.

Ethics and Responsibility. All submissions describing research experiments with human participants must follow the appropriate ethical guidelines as imposed by your affiliation, and authors are required to secure and report their approval by the relevant ethics commission, if applicable. An approval by any ethical review board needs to be indicated via the submission system.

Double-Blind Process and Anonymity Policy

ISMAR uses a DOUBLE-BLIND review process. This means that both the authors and the reviewers must remain anonymous to each other. Submissions (including citations and optional videos) must not contain information that identifies the authors, their institutions, funding sources, or their places of work. Relevant previous work by the authors must be cited in the third person to preserve anonymity. Authors that have questions/issues around the double-blind submission policy should contact the conference Program Chairs.

Given the reviewers may recognize the submission authors based on information available online, the following are considered violations of the review process if they occur during the review process, i.e., from 30 days before the submission deadline till the submission is officially accepted (final version approved), or the authors are notified that the submission is rejected:

1. Listing ISMAR submissions or prepublications (ArXiv, institutional tech reports, …) of these submissions on authors’ individual or institutional webpages.
2. Generating any publicity for the submitted works via university or company PR teams or channels.
3. Publicizing the submitted work in external talks (unless it is a job talk).
4. Generating any publicity for the submitted works via authors’ individual or institutional social media channels or other forms of media. This includes publishing any types of interviews with editors/journalists/writers/interviewers of newspapers, radio, television, or magazines, as well as public relations and media arms of companies, universities, and other research institutions.
5. Publicly replying or acknowledging authorship in response to any social media posts by others regarding the submitted work.
6. Creating public code or data repositories corresponding to the submission that allow determining the author’s identity (e.g., by listing the author name, or through the username).

Based on the above principles, the following are NOT considered a violation of the review process rules, as long as the respective conditions are satisfied:

1. Archiving the submission (as a way to get a timestamp) as an institutional tech report, or a preprint on ArXiv or a similar service, before or after the submission deadline is allowed. However, the submission webpage or manuscript should not state anywhere that the submission is under review for ISMAR. In particular, it should not include the submission ID or use the IEEE VGTC conference format (this refers to conference name, copyright, etc., not to the choice of fonts, margins, or column layout).
2. Unlisted YouTube videos linked to an ArXiv submission are allowed. Such videos should not include submission IDs or author information.
3. Anonymous code or data repositories, i.e., ones where the author’s identity cannot be determined through username or other means, either stand-alone or linked to an ArXiv submission, are allowed.
4. Authors can privately reply to submission-related queries submitted via social media. The replies should not be publicly visible.

If a potential violation of any of these guidelines is discovered, the case will be discussed by the Primary and Secondary review coordinators and Program Chairs, who will determine if a violation has occurred and if, consequently, the paper in question should be desk rejected.

Submission Process

All materials will be submitted electronically through the Precision Conference website at: PCS

If you already have an account with that system, please use that account to submit your materials. Otherwise, create a new account.

Note that a paper abstract must be uploaded prior to the actual paper submission deadline and by the Abstract deadline of June 5th, 2023 (23:59 AoE). This is alongside supporting requests for reviewer continuity if your paper has previously been submitted to the journal track. For more information please see the submission guidelines.

After Submission

After your submission, the ISMAR Program Committee will process the new submission and resubmitted papers from the journal track. Also, the ISMAR conference paper track works closely with the poster track and may decide to accept papers submitted to the conference track as posters depending on the merit of their contribution. Thus, the following sections explain these three tracks independently.

Review Process for new submissions to the conference paper track:

The following items outline the review process for contributions submitted to the conference paper track:

- - Initially, the ISMAR Program Chairs will scan each submission to verify compliance with ISMAR policies and formatting requirements. In case of violation of these policies or formatting requirements, Program Chairs will decide on desk rejection of the paper.
  - Each submission will be assigned to one Primary review coordinator (referred to as the Primary), who manages the review process and communicates with the authors.
  - The Primary will review the paper initially and may suggest to desk-reject a paper that is exceptionally uncompetitive or in violation of ISMAR policies; the ISMAR Program Chairs will make the final decision on desk rejection of the paper.
  - ISMAR employs a two-tier reviewing process. Each submission will be reviewed by one member of the Program Committee (the Secondary, not the Primary) and two external reviewers. Each reviewer will be asked to submit a written assessment along with an initial recommendation to accept or reject the paper.
  - The initial reviews will be released to the paper authors. After receiving the reviews, authors may submit a rebuttal to address the reviewers’ comments. The author rebuttal is meant to provide an opportunity to rebut factual errors or to supply additional information requested by the reviewers. It is not intended to add new contributions (theorems, algorithms, experiments) that were not included in the original submission.
  - The Primary will check the rebuttal and review quality and initiate the discussion with the Secondary and the external reviewers. They will read the rebuttal, the reviews, and anonymously discuss the paper.
  - Initial recommendation: The Primary will ask the reviewers to agree on one recommendation (accept, conditional accept as a paper, or reject). If there is no consensual decision between Primary, Secondary, and external reviewers, the Primary and Secondary will discuss a recommendation and if inconclusive, an additional review can be requested from another ISMAR Program Committee member.
  - After the discussion phase, the Primary will write a meta-review that states the initial recommendation. The final decision of the ISMAR Program Committee will rely on this meta-review.
  - The ISMAR Program Chairs will decide, based on the recommendation, if a paper is accepted, conditionally accepted, or rejected.
  - In the case the paper is accepted or conditionally accepted, a shepherd will be assigned to the paper (usually the Primary) who assists the authors in preparing the final paper and who verifies that the authors comply with all conditions (if applicable).
  - In the case the paper will be rejected, continue to read the poster review details.

Handling of rejected papers and recommendations as posters:

In the case a conference paper submission will be rejected, the ISMAR Program Chairs will coordinate with the poster track and its committee to conditionally accept a paper as a poster. The submissions will be handled as follows:

- - The Primary will be asked to recommend the paper for the poster track or to reject it (from both conference paper and poster tracks). The Program Chairs will consider this recommendation and make the final decision.
  - If the paper has a recommendation for the poster track, the Poster Chairs and committee will receive all the reviews and the meta-review generated during the conference paper review process. The Poster Chairs may also decide to discuss questions with the Primary.
  - Based on this information, the poster track committee will either conditionally accept the paper as a poster, or reject the contribution.
  - In the case the contribution is accepted as a poster, a shepherd will be assigned to the paper, who assists the authors in preparing a poster contribution.

Review Process for resubmitted journal track papers:

The authors of rejected submissions from the ISMAR journal paper track who wish to resubmit their work to the ISMAR conference paper track may choose one of the following two processes at the Abstract deadline of June 5th, 2023 (23:59 AoE) via the submission form in PCS:

1. 1. Review Continuity Process: If the authors select this process (the journal track submission ID must be provided in the submission form by the abstract deadline, additionally a cover letter indicating the changes applied to the paper and the original journal track reviews should also be provided by the full submission date). The Program Chairs will allocate a Primary and Secondary to manage the paper, which may include the original Primary and Secondary review coordinators from the ISMAR journal track. They will be tasked to read the new conference paper, a cover letter (if provided by the authors), and check whether the main issues that were highlighted in the ISMAR journal review process were addressed in this resubmission in a satisfactory manner. If required additional reviews may then be allocated for the paper. The review continuity process is in particular suitable for papers that received a positive recommendation for the conference paper track as part of their journal reviews, e.g., if the Primary and Secondary of the journal track felt that the contributions are more in line with an ISMAR conference paper than a journal paper.
  2. Regular Process: Authors can select the regular process if they wish to have their resubmission from the journal track treated like a regular conference paper submission at the Abstract deadline. In this case, the process detailed in the section above (“Review process for new submissions to the conference paper track”) is applied. We would like to highlight that this may be a good option if the authors feel that the Primary and Secondary from the journal track misunderstood their paper or may be otherwise biased or simply wish to have the paper reviewed as an entirely new submission. However, note that we cannot rule out that by chance the same reviewers as in the journal track may end up reviewing this conference paper. Choosing the regular process is not a guarantee to have different reviewers assigned.

Plagiarism Check:

Please note that all submissions will be checked for plagiarism using IEEE Crosscheck. Detection of significant plagiarism will lead to rejection. For more information about definitions of plagiarism and IEEE policies in this area, please see IEEE Publication Services and Products Board Operations Manual.

Camera-ready and Preparing for the Conference

Camera-ready paper. Upload the final version to: https://new.precisionconference.com/ismar

Use the “Final Submission Form” to provide your final version and any supplementary material, such as video files. In the preparation of the final submission, follow the camera-ready instructions. Ensure that you are using the correct formatting and submit the IEEE copyright form. Otherwise, your contribution might not be included in the proceedings.

Registration. At least one author must register for the conference and present the work. If no author is fully registered by the camera-ready submission deadline, the accepted work will be withdrawn from publication.

Conference presentation. All accepted papers must be orally presented at the conference.

Best paper awards: The Program Chairs Will create a list of the best paper candidates based on their review score and the recommendation of the Primary reviewer. There is no set size limit for this list; all submitted papers are potentially qualified to compete for a Best Paper Award. The Program Chairs then forward this list to an awards committee, which assesses papers (along with accompanying meta-review, external reviews and discussion) separately from the Program Committee.

Writing a Good ISMAR Paper:

A good ISMAR submission will result in both a respectable document for the proceedings and a good conference talk. As an author, you should ask yourself the following questions while writing your paper. Submissions that do not provide good answers to these questions are unlikely to be accepted.

What problem are you addressing?

The most common motivation for publishing a paper is to present a solution to a problem. When doing so, try to state all your constraints and assumptions. This is an area where it can be invaluable to have someone who is not intimately familiar with your work read the paper. Include a crisp description of the problem in the abstract and try to suggest it in the title. Note that the Program Chairs depend almost completely on the abstract and title when they determine which Program Committee member to assign to the paper.

ISMAR papers often focus on a certain aspect of Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, or Virtual Reality systems. The following list includes some example topics, but does not represent an exhaustive list of all topics. We welcome any new idea beyond the usual range of areas.

- - Interaction Methods: Does the paper propose a novel interaction method? Does it present different use cases and applications for it? Can it demonstrate that the method performs better than other known ones?
  - User Interface & Human Factors: Does the paper describe how Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, or Virtual Reality is improving a user interface design, human task performance or perception?
  - Tracking and Pose Estimation: Does the paper describe a novel method that is more robust in difficult conditions (lighting, outdoor, fast motion)? Is it a new, clever combination of different sensors? Does it provide more information for use in interaction and rendering?
  - Rendering and Visualization: Does the paper describe a novel, improved method for realistic integration of virtual graphics into a mixed scene? Is it faster or more accurate than known methods? Does it present a novel way of presenting information about the real world?
  - Displays and Input Devices: Does the paper describe a novel display (e.g., visual or aural)? Does it describe a novel input device that provides different input modalities, is easier to use and deploy or more precise?
  - Applications: Is the paper proposing a new application of Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, or Virtual Reality in a specific domain? Are you providing a new understanding of usage patterns and social behavior of a deployed application? Mind that an application has a use case in a target domain; it is not just an implementation of software.

What were the previous approaches?

What are the relevant published works in your problem area? What deficiencies in their approaches are you trying to overcome? How does the new approach differ from previously published results? Do not expect the reviewers to know this information without telling them in the paper, as they are unlikely to remember the precise details of all the relevant literature. Make specific comparisons between your work and that described in the references; do not just compile a list of vaguely related papers. What are the limitations of your work and is the future work still to be addressed?

How well did you address your stated problem?

Based on your problem statement, what did you accomplish? You are responsible for arguing that the problem is sufficiently addressed. Include pictures, statistics, or whatever is required to make your case. If you find this part of the paper difficult to write, perhaps the work is not yet finished and the paper should be deferred until next year. (And, perhaps, submitted as a poster this year).

The following describes some typical evaluation methods for different kinds of papers. This list is not exhaustive, but provides some hints as to what can help to present your contribution.

- - Interaction Methods: Did you measure how usable the method or system is? What is the performance of users (e.g. completion time, error rate, learning curve) compared to a previous interface developed for a similar task?
  - User Interface & Human Factors: Is the improvement or effect described well supported through evaluations? Was the experimental design appropriate to your solution? Were sample size, statistical evaluation, and presentation and conclusions appropriate? Were sample sizes diverse and representative of all intended users?
  - Tracking and Pose Estimation: What opportunity does the method contribute to the Augmented/Mixed/Virtual Reality domain? How does it compare to known state-of-the-art systems? Can your system maintain competitive robustness/reliability? Can it deal with difficult input including light conditions, fast motion, occlusions? How fast is it and on which hardware? It is also a good idea to use a standard data set to make the results comparable to other publications, or make your test data sets available for other authors.
  - Rendering and Visualization: Is the output quality of your system superior to previous methods? Is it faster or capable of operating at real-time rates? What hardware and sensors does it require? For visualization, what use cases does it cover? What amount or complexity of data can it deal with?
  - Displays and Input Devices: What are the performance specifications of the display? For example, for a visual display does it work in indoor/outdoor, strong light conditions, what is the field of view, and is it multi-user capable? What is the hardware/software required to recreate it? What are the specifications of the input device? Can it be used in a mobile setting?
  - Applications: How did you design the application, what constraints from the application domain are essential? Was the system tested by end users that are representative of the intended population in the application domain? Did it affect a relevant factor, i.e. performance, safety? Did it create opportunities to improve the work methods?

What does this work contribute to the field?

What are your new ideas or results? If you do not have at least one new idea, you do not have a publishable paper. Can your results be applied anywhere outside of your project? If not, the paper is probably too special-purpose for ISMAR. On the other hand, beware of trying to write a paper with too large a scope.

Is the paper complete?

The question that generates a large amount of discussion within the Program Committee is to determine whether a paper is complete. If the paper presents an algorithm or technique, an experienced practitioner in the field should be able to implement it using the paper and its references. If the paper claims to present a faster or more efficient way of implementing an established technique, it must contain enough detail to replicate the experiment on competing implementations. When you quote numbers, be sure that they are not misleading—state clearly whether they were measured, simulated, or derived, and how you did the measurements, simulations, or derivations. For example, CPU time measurements are meaningless unless the reader is told the machine and configuration on which they were obtained.

Does the paper present too much information?

Can this paper be presented well?

While ISMAR papers are judged primarily as technical papers, some consideration is given to how suitable the topic is for a conference presentation. Think of how you would present your ideas, and how big the audience is likely to be. Papers that have a small number of concisely stated new ideas and that are visually interesting tend to appeal to a large audience and be easy to present. As recent conferences clearly show, these criteria do not eliminate papers that have taxonomies or strong theoretical content, or appeal to a specialized audience, if they contain significant new ideas.

Should a video also be included?

A video can be very helpful for communicating technical results, especially when the paper discusses an interaction technique. However, do not try to save space in the paper by putting essential information into the video. The paper must stand on its own.

Is the paper accessible?

All information, including information in figures, charts, tables, etc., should be available to readers who consume it in different ways. For example: some of us cannot see color, some read papers as a monochrome printout, some use low-contrast displays, and some listen to the content instead of seeing it. CHI 2021 has useful information on making a paper accessible.

Is the paper using gender neutral language?

Use “he” when referring to men or boys. Use “she” when referring to women or girls. Avoid phrases such as “he/she” or “he or she” when a gender is not clearly known. Instead use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun. When referencing a profession, use the gender neutral form. For example use fire fighter, police officer, or worker instead of fireman, policeman, or workman. See this excerpt of the Chicago Style for more information about gender-neutral pronouns.

Further Examples:

You can also find the full list of papers previously published at ISMAR in the IEEE Digital Library (IEEE Xplore). Furthermore, the ismar.net website lists past best paper awards, which are good examples of great ISMAR papers. Note that the ISMAR proceedings from previous years include TVCG journal publications and conference proceedings. Since the separation of the conference track and journal track, we advise focusing on previous conference track proceedings when searching for example ISMAR conference papers.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs):

Is ISMAR a visual tracking-only conference?

No. ISMAR has and continues to help bring to the world key works on real time 3D tracking, scene mapping, pose estimation and registration. However, ISMAR welcomes submissions of all types related to Augmented, Mixed, and Virtual Reality. At ISMAR we are highlighting the interest in work that goes beyond tracking. Issues on usefulness of AR, learning, training, therapy, rehabilitation, virtual analytics, entertainment, context, behavior and object recognition together with other wearable sensors using computer vision, sensor networks and new types of onboard and external sensing technologies become very relevant to augment our world. Note that this is list is not exclusive by any means, so if you have questions please contact the Program Chairs via email: conference_paper_chairs@ismar2023.org

Does the IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR) only accept submissions focusing on Mixed and Augmented Reality?

No. The ISMAR conference accepts submissions from all areas of Extended Reality, including Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, and others. See a list with example topics in the Call for Papers.

Is it acceptable to publish my paper on ArXiv?

Please read the full “Double-Blind Process and Anonymity Policy” above. In a nutshell: Yes, you are allowed to archive your submission (as a way to get a timestamp) on ArXiv or a similar service. However, the manuscript should not state anywhere that the submission is under review for ISMAR. You should further not list this prepublication on your individual or institutional webpages or generate any publicity for it through other forms of media as this would constitute a violation of the double-blind review process.

Can I submit both a poster and a conference paper to ISMAR on the same work?

Note that the poster and conference paper review processes run in parallel. Thus, the deadlines do not afford authors the option to re-submit a rejected conference submission to the poster track. A conference paper submission can be redirected and conditionally accepted as a poster depending on the scientific/engineering level of the contribution. Thus, double-submission to both tracks (conference paper and poster track) is unnecessary and may pose a violation of the ISMAR double-submission policy.

Do not hesitate to contact us for any further information.

ISMAR 2023 Science & Technology Conference Papers Chairs: conference_paper_chairs@ismar23.org

ISMAR 2023 PC Chairs,

Jens Grubert, Coburg University, Germany
Andrew Cunningham, University of South Australia, Australia
Evan Y. Peng, University of Hong Kong, China
Gerd Bruder, University of Central Florida, USA
Anne-Hélène Olivier, University of Rennes 2 – Inria, France
Ian Williams, Birmingham City University, UK

Document History:

This document was updated and extended by the ISMAR 2023 Conference Paper Chairs: Jens Grubert, Andrew Cunningham, Evan Y. Peng, Gerd Bruder, Anne-Hélène Olivier, and Ian Williams. This document was adapted by the 2021 Journal Paper Chairs: Daisuke Iwai, Denis Kalkofen, Guillaume Moreau, and Tabitha Peck as well as the 2021 Conference Paper Chairs: Maud Marchal, Anne-Hélène Olivier, Rafael Radkowski, Jonathan Ventura, and Lily Wang. The document was obtained from Shimin Hu and Stefanie Zollmann, Wolfgang Broll, Holger Regenbrecht, and J. Edward Swan II, who inherited it from Wolfgang Broll, Hideo Saito, and J. Edward Swan II, based on Walterio Mayol, Christian Sandor, and Rob Lindeman, based on significant materials created by Ron Azuma on how to write a successful ISMAR paper and how to be a successful Program Chair, also based on the 2011 UIST Author Guidelines edited by Maneesh Agrawala and Scott Klemmer (using material provided by Saul Greenberg), who inherited it from François Guimbretière, who inherited it from Michel Beaudouin Lafon, who inherited it from Ravin Balakrishnan and Chia Shen, who inherited it from Ken Hinckley and Pierre Wellner, who inherited it from Dan Olsen, who inherited it from Steve Feiner, who inherited it from Joe Konstan, who inherited it from Michel Beaudouin Lafon, who inherited it from Ari Rapkin, who inherited it from Beth Mynatt, who inherited it from George Robertson, who inherited it from Marc H. Brown, who inherited it from George Robertson, who got lots of help on it from Steve Feiner, Brad Myers, Jock Mackinlay, Mark Green, Randy Pausch, Pierre Wellner, and Beth Mynatt. We also acknowledge the anonymity guidelines presented at SIGGRAPH and have shaped our policies to include these for 2023 (https://s2023.siggraph.org/anonymity-policy/).