ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT AND METHOD FOR DISPLAYING IMAGES

• US 20090172545A1
• Filed: 08/21/2008
• Published: 07/02/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/27/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Toshiba Client Solutions CO., Ltd. (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba (Toshiba Corporation)
• Inventors: Yokoi, Hidetoshi
• Granted Patent: US 7,757,172 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/721
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/51 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00453 arranged in a two dimensional array

Abstract

An electronic equipment includes: a storage unit that stores a plurality of facial images extracted from video data and time stamp information indicating time points when the plurality of facial images appear in the video data; and a processor that operates, based on the time stamp information, to: arrange a plurality of facial image display areas in a two-dimensional display area in a grid layout having a given number of rows and a plurality of columns, each of the columns being assigned with respective time zones divided from a total time length of the video data; and display the facial images, which belong to each of the time zones assigned to the columns, in the facial image display areas included in the respective columns.

Claims

1. An electronic equipment comprising:

a storage unit that stores a plurality of facial images extracted from video data and time stamp information indicating time points when the plurality of facial images appear in the video data; and

a processor that operates, based on the time stamp information, to;

arrange a plurality of facial image display areas in a two-dimensional display area in a grid layout having a given number of rows and a plurality of columns, each of the columns being assigned with respective time zones divided from a total time length of the video data; and

display the facial images, which belong to each of the time zones assigned to the columns, in the facial image display areas included in the respective columns.

2. The equipment according to claim 1, wherein the processor further operates to:

split the video data into a plurality of scenes;

extract thumbnail images from the video data at time points near a border of each of the scenes; and

display the thumbnail images together with the facial images in the respective columns corresponding to time zones containing the border between the scenes.

3. The equipment according to claim 1, wherein the processor further operates to:

split the time zones corresponding to the columns, on which the thumbnail images and the facial images are displayed, at a given interval of time based on the number of the facial images; and

display the thumbnail images, which are extracted at time points near the points where the time zones are split, on the respective columns.

4. The equipment according to claim 1, wherein the processor further operates to:

determine whether a command is input for start playing the video data while any one of the facial images and the thumbnail images is being selected; and

start playing the video data, when determined that the command is input, from a time point that is previous to or corresponding to a time point where the selected facial or thumbnail image appears, based on the time stamp information.

5. A method for displaying images for an electronic equipment having a storage unit that stores a plurality of facial images extracted from video data and time stamp information indicating time points when the plurality of facial images appear in the video data, the method comprising:

arranging, based on the time stamp information, a plurality of facial image display areas in a two-dimensional display area in a grid layout having a given number of rows and a plurality of columns, each of the columns being assigned with respective time zones divided from a total time length of the video data; and

displaying, based on the time stamp information, the facial images, which belong to each of the time zones assigned to the columns, in the facial image display areas included in the respective columns.

6. The method according to claim 5 further comprising:

splitting the video data into a plurality of scenes;

extracting thumbnail images from the video data at time points near a border of each of the scenes; and

displaying the thumbnail images together with the facial images in the respective columns corresponding to time zones containing the border between the scenes.

7. The method according to claim 5 further comprising:

splitting the time zones corresponding to the columns, on which the thumbnail images and the facial images are displayed, at a given interval of time based on the number of the facial images; and

displaying the thumbnail images, which are extracted at time points near the points where the time zones are split, on the respective columns.