COMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE INCLUDING SIMULTANEOUS VIDEO PATHWAYS FOR MULTI-VIEWER SUPPORT

• US 20110157264A1
• Filed: 12/30/2010
• Published: 06/30/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/31/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Avago Technologies International Sales Pte Limited (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Broadcom Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Seshadri, Nambirajan, Bennett, James D., Karaoguz, Jeyhan
• Granted Patent: US 9,066,092 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/698
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 6/00 Light guides; Structural details of arrangements comprising light guides and other optical elements, e.g. couplings
• CPC Class Codes: G03B 35/24 using apertured or refractive resolving means on screens or between screen and eye
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0346 with detection of the device orientation or free movement in a 3D space, e.g. 3D mice, 6-DOF [six degrees of freedom] pointers using gyroscopes, accelerometers or tilt-sensors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/14 Digital output to display device ; Cooperation and interconnection of the display device with other functional units
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2300/023 Display panel composed of stacked panels
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/028 by changing the viewing angle properties, e.g. widening the viewing angle, adapting the viewing angle to the view direction
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2370/04 Exchange of auxiliary data, i.e. other than image data, between monitor and graphics controller
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 3/003 to produce spatial visual effects
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 3/20 for presentation of an assembly of a number of characters, e.g. a page, by composing the assembly by combination of individual elements arranged in a matrix no fixed position being assigned to or needed to be assigned to the individual characters or partial characters
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/003 Details of a display terminal, the details relating to the control arrangement of the display terminal and to the interfaces thereto specific for a CRT G09G1/165; for a flat panel G09G3/2092
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 5/14 Display of multiple viewports
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/00 Stereoscopic video systems; Multi-view video systems; Details thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/139 Format conversion, e.g. of frame-rate or size
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/161 Encoding, multiplexing or demultiplexing different image signal components for multi-view video sequence encoding H04N19/597
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/189 Recording image signals; Reproducing recorded image signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/194 Transmission of image signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/305 using lenticular lenses, e.g. arrangements of cylindrical lenses
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/31 using parallax barriers
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/312 the parallax barriers being placed behind the display panel, e.g. between backlight and spatial light modulator [SLM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/315 the parallax barriers being time-variant
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/332 : Displays for viewing with the aid of special glasses or head-mounted displays [HMD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/351 : for displaying simultaneously
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/359 : Switching between monoscopic and stereoscopic modes
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/361 : Reproducing mixed stereoscopic images; Reproducing mixed monoscopic and stereoscopic images, e.g. a stereoscopic image overlay window on a monoscopic image background
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/366 : using viewer tracking
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/383 : for tracking with gaze detection, i.e. detecting the lines of sight of the viewer's eyes
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 13/398 : Synchronisation thereof; Control thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2013/403 : the images being monoscopic
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2013/405 : the images being stereoscopic or three dimensional
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/235 : Processing of additional data, e.g. scrambling of additional data or processing content descriptors
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4122 : additional display device, e.g. video projector digital output for controlling a plurality of local displays G06F3/1423
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/435 : Processing of additional data, e.g. decrypting of additional data, reconstructing software from modules extracted from the transport stream
• CPC Class Codes: H04S 7/303 : Tracking of listener position or orientation

Abstract

A communication system is described that allows co-located viewers to simultaneously consume different media content, such as different video content, via the same display screen, wherein video content delivered to at least one co-located viewer is not visible to the other co-located viewer(s). The communication system comprises an infrastructure that includes multiple pathways for delivering media content from one or more media sources to the eyes of each of the co-located viewers, wherein each pathway passes through the pixels of a pixel array included in the shared display screen. The pathways also include distributed or non-distributed processing circuitry that manages certain resources that are shared among the multiple pathways, wherein such shared resources may include shared display resources (e.g., pixels of the pixel array and light generated thereby) and shared data communication resources (e.g., bandwidth on data communication links and processing resources of nodes located on such links).

Claims

1. A communication infrastructure used to support visual presentations based on media content to both a first viewer and a second viewer, the communication infrastructure comprising:

one or more media sources that store the media content;

processing circuitry;

a shared display screen having a pixel array;

a first pathway from the one or more media sources and through both the processing circuitry and the shared display screen to the first viewer, the first pathway supporting delivery of a first visual experience to the first viewer, the first visual experience being based on at least a first part of the media content, and at least a portion of the first visual experience being observable by the first viewer but not by the second viewer;

a second pathway from the one or more media sources and through both the processing circuitry and the shared display screen to the first viewer, the second pathway supporting delivery of a second visual experience to the second viewer, the second visual experience being based on at least a second part of the media content, the first pathway and the second pathway operating to simultaneously deliver via the shared display screen both the first visual experience and the second visual experience; and

the processing circuitry at least assists in managing at least one pathway resource that is shared between the first pathway and the second pathway.

2. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry at least assists in the managing the at least one pathway resource prior to beginning the simultaneous delivery of the first visual experience and the second visual experience.

3. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry changes the allocation of the at least one pathway resource during the simultaneous delivery of the first visual experience and the second visual experience.

4. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the at least one pathway resource comprises a data communication resource.

5. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the at least one pathway resource comprises a display resource.

6. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry at least assists in managing the at least one pathway resource by at least assisting in gathering a pathway characteristic.

7. The communication infrastructure of claim 1, wherein the first pathway and the second pathway are both adaptive pathways and wherein the processing circuitry adapts the first pathway and the second pathway based on at least one pathway performance characteristic.

8. A method for operating a communication system, comprising:

utilizing a first pathway from one or more media sources and through both processing circuitry and a shared display screen to a first viewer to deliver a first visual experience to the first viewer, the first visual experience being based on at least a first part of media content obtained from the media source(s) and at least a portion of the first visual experience being observable by the first viewer but not a second viewer;

utilizing a second pathway from the media source(s) and through both the processing circuitry and the shared display screen to the second viewer to deliver a second visual experience to the second viewer simultaneously with the delivery of the first visual experience to the first viewer, the second visual experience being based on at least a second part of the media content obtained from the media source(s); and

at least assisting in managing at least one pathway resource that is shared between the first pathway and the second pathway.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least assisting in the managing of the at least one pathway resource comprises:

at least assisting in managing the at least one pathway resource prior to beginning the simultaneous delivery of the first visual experience and the second visual experience.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least assisting in the managing of the at least one pathway resource comprises:

changing an allocation of the at least one pathway resource during the simultaneous delivery of the first visual experience and the second visual experience.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least one pathway resource comprises a data communication resource.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least one pathway resource comprises a display resource.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein the at least assisting in the managing of the at least one pathway resource comprises:

at least assisting in gathering a pathway characteristic.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein the first pathway and the second pathway are both adaptive pathways and wherein at least assisting in the managing of the at least one pathway comprises:

adapting the first pathway and the second pathway based on at least one pathway performance characteristic.

15. A communication infrastructure, comprising:

a first pathway that delivers first video content via a screen assembly to a first viewer but not a second viewer, the screen assembly comprising a pixel array;

a second pathway that simultaneously delivers second video content via the screen assembly to the second viewer but not the first viewer, the first pathway and the second pathway sharing one or more display-related resources including at least pixels of the pixel array and light transmitted therefrom; and

control circuitry connected to the screen assembly that allocates at least one of the shared display-related resources between the first pathway and the second pathway responsive to ascertaining at least one characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway.

16. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the screen assembly further comprises an adaptable light manipulator and wherein the control circuitry allocates the shared display-related resources between the first pathway and the second pathway by modifying the configuration of the adaptable light manipulator to spatially filter the light transmitted from the pixels of the pixel array such that a first portion of the spatially-filtered light is observable by the first viewer and a second portion of the spatially-filtered light is observable by the second viewer.

17. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the control circuitry allocates the shared display-related resources between the first pathway and the second pathway by modifying a frequency at which at least one of frames of the first video content and frames of the second video content are displayed via the pixels of the pixel array.

18. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the control circuitry allocates the shared display-related resources between the first pathway and the second pathway by modifying a number of pixels of the pixel array that are allocated to at least one of delivering the first video content to the first viewer and delivering the second video content to the second viewer.

19. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway comprises one or more of:

a location of the first viewer or the second viewer with respect to the screen assembly;

a head orientation of the first viewer or the second viewer; and

a point of gaze of the first viewer or the second viewer.

20. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway is determined based on feedback received from a device carried or worn by the first viewer or the second viewer.

21. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway is determined based on user input received from the first viewer or the second viewer.

22. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway comprises a number of camera views or resolution associated with the first video content or the second video content.

23. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway comprises a quality of service associated with at least one of the first pathway and the second pathway.

24. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the at least one ascertained characteristic of the first pathway or the second pathway comprises payment terms associated with at least one of the first pathway and the second pathway.

25. The communication infrastructure of claim 15, wherein the first pathway further includes at least one node that operates to modify the first video content prior to delivery to the screen assembly.

26. The communication infrastructure of claim 25, wherein the at least one node modifies the first video content by changing a number of camera views included in the first video content.

27. The communication infrastructure of claim 25, wherein the at least one node modifies the first video content by changing a resolution level associated with the first video content.

28. The communication infrastructure of claim 25, wherein the at least one node operates to modify the first video content based on at least one of:

a delay associated with at least one link along the portion of the first pathway that extends between a source of the first media content and the screen assembly; and

a processing constraint associated with at least one node located along the portion of the first pathway that extends between the source of the first media content and the screen assembly.