Method and apparatus for photograph finding

• US 20060018542A1
• Filed: 02/10/2005
• Published: 01/26/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 02/12/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Intellectual Ventures I LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: IdeaFlood, Inc.
• Inventors: Shuster, Gary Stephen
• Granted Patent: US 7,460,737 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/181
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/38 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/50 of still image data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/58 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/583 using metadata automatically derived from the content
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/5838 using colour
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/5854 using shape and object relationship
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/587 using geographical or spatial information, e.g. location
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/22 Matching criteria, e.g. proximity measures
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/75 Organisation of the matching processes, e.g. simultaneous or sequential comparisons of image or video features; Coarse-fine approaches, e.g. multi-scale approaches; using context analysis; Selection of dictionaries
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99936 Pattern matching access

Abstract

Digital image data including discrete photographic images of a variety of different subjects, times, and so forth, are collected and analyzed to identify specific features in the photographs. In an embodiment of the invention, distinctive markers are distributed to aid in the identification of particular subject matter. Facial recognition may also be employed. The digital image data is maintained in a database and quarried in response to search requests. The search requests include criteria specifying any feature category or other identifying information, such as date, time, and location that each photograph was taken, associated with each photograph. Candidate images are provided for review by requesters, who may select desired images for purchase or downloading.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for distributing image data, comprising:

collecting digital image data comprising a plurality of discrete photographic images in digital form;

collecting source information for each of the plurality of discrete photographic images;

automatically analyzing the digital image data to identify specific feature information present in each of the plurality of discrete photographic images;

providing the digital image data for storage in a database in association with source information and specific feature information identified in the automatically analyzing step;

receiving requests to access the digital image data over a wide area network, wherein the requests comprise search criteria corresponding to categories of the specific feature information;

serving responses to the requests, the responses comprising a list of identifiers for discrete photographic images in the database at least partially matching the search criteria.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the source information comprises a time and a location that each of the discrete photographic images was first generated.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising querying the database to identify discrete photographic images at least partially matching the search criteria.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the analyzing step further comprises identifying facial characteristics of persons imaged in the digital image data.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising distributing a plurality of distinctive markers to contributors of the digital image data.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the analyzing step further comprises identifying the distinctive markers when present in the plurality of discrete photographic images.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the receiving requests step further comprises receiving search criteria specifying selected ones of the distinctive markers.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving requests step further comprises receiving search criteria specifying a specific public event occurring at a specified date and location.