Control apparatus for electronic equipment

• US 5,566,271 A
• Filed: 04/18/1994
• Issued: 10/15/1996
• Est. Priority Date: 01/12/1991
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Tomitsuka, Hidemi, Chigusa, Yasuhiro, Tamura, Asako, Omori, Shiro
• Primary Examiner(s): MacDonald, Allen R.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Dorvil, Richemond
• Application Number:
  US08/228,923
• Time in Patent Office: 911 Days
• Field of Search: 395/2, 395/12, 395/2.79, 395/2.84, 395/2.55, 395/2.67, 395/152, 381/48, 364/419.2, 345/122
• US Class Current: 704/275
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04895 Guidance during keyboard input operation, e.g. prompting
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 21/001 Teaching or communicating with blind persons G09B21/02 - G09B21/06 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 5/065 Combinations of audio and video presentations, e.g. videotapes, videodiscs, television systems
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 7/04 characterised by modifying the teaching programme in response to a wrong answer, e.g. repeating the question, supplying a further explanation
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 15/02 Control of operating function, e.g. switching from recording to reproducing
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 15/087 by sensing recorded signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/7826 involving helical scanning of the magnetic tape

Abstract

An instruction for operation mode control of a VTR 40 and information on the video recording reservation is voice inputted. The voice input is recognized by a voice recognition circuit 13 and is fed to a control circuit 15. The control circuit 15 controls the VTR 40 in response to the instruction or information of the voice input and causes an animation character generating circuit 16 to generate a video image of an animation character AC for displaying it on the screen of a CRT display 30. A message from the animation character AC is voice synthesized in a voice synthesizing circuit 19 and the synthesized voice is outputted from a speaker 20.

The electronic equipment can be operated as if the user were talking with the animation character, so that a natural man-machine interface can be realized.

Claims

1. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment and for designating and controlling an operation mode thereof, comprising:

an acoustic-electric transducer for receiving spoken instructions from a user designating the operation mode and for outputting an electric speech signal in response thereto;

speech recognition means receiving the electric speech signal output from the acoustic-electric transducer for recognizing words in the electric speech signal and outputting a signal corresponding to the recognized words;

animation character generating means for producing a video signal of an animation character who is a message speaker that interacts with the user;

video image display means for displaying the video signal from the animation character generating means;

speech synthesizing means for synthesizing a speech signal of a message spoken by the animation character;

speech outputting means for transmitting the speech signal from the speech synthesizing means in audible human sounds; and

a microprocessor responsive to the output signal from the speech recognition means for producing an operation mode designation and control signal for designating the operation mode of the electronic equipment and controlling the electronic equipment to operate in the designated mode, an action control signal fed to the animation character generating means for controlling the action of the animation character, and a message signal fed to the speech synthesizing means instructing a message signal to be synthesized in the speech synthesizing means, wherein the microprocessor performs natural language or dialogue inference processing of the output signal from the speech recognition means.

2. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 1, wherein the electronic equipment is a video tape recorder and the operation mode is a video recording reservation mode, and wherein the microprocessor detects if a normal reserved video recording is impossible due to a conflict in a reservation date or a reservation channel and a detected conflict causes the microprocessor to control the animation character to request a reinput from the user of the control apparatus and to bring the video tape recorder into an input stand-by state until the user provides the reinput.

3. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 1, wherein the microprocessor detects if a new input has a content different from a content of a currently requested input in response to the new input.

4. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 1, wherein the microprocessor selects and outputs one control instruction appropriate for a current operation mode of the electronic equipment from among a plurality of control instructions in response to an instruction supplementing the operation mode recognized by the speech recognition means, such that a selection made by the microprocessor corresponds to a user selection following a request from the animation character to the user for an instruction supplementing the operation mode.

5. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 4, wherein the electronic equipment is a video tape recorder and when the instruction supplementing the operation mode recognized by the speech recognition means is a word meaning "Fast" and a current operation mode of the video tape recorder is a "stop" or "playback" mode, the microprocessor brings the video tape recorder into a "fast feeding" mode or "fast playback" mode, respectively.

6. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 4, wherein the electronic equipment is a video tape recorder and when the instruction supplementing the operation mode recognized by the speech recognition means is a word meaning "Return" and a current operation mode of the video tape recorder is a "stop" or "playback" mode, the microprocessor brings the video tape recorder into a "rewind" mode or "reverse playback" mode, respectively.

7. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 1, wherein the video display means displays an animation character and a balloon on a screen thereof for displaying a message being spoken by the animation character.

8. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 7, wherein the video display means further includes a superimposer for superimposing the animation character upon a reproduced or broadcast video image.

9. A control apparatus for controlling electronic equipment as defined in claim 1, wherein the acoustic-electric transducer includes a switch for designating a speech input state and in which the speech input is divided by turning the switch on and off.

10. An apparatus for designating and controlling an operation mode of electronic equipment, comprising:

speech transducer means for receiving spoken instructions from a user designating the operation mode and for outputting an electric speech signal in response thereto;

speech recognition means receiving the electric speech signal output from the speech transducer means for recognizing words in the electric speech signal and outputting a signal corresponding to the recognized words,

the speech recognition means including an analog interface for setting the electric speech signal to a particular level in response to control data supplied from a system controller and an operational processor for receiving the leveled electric speech signal from the analog interface for forming a voice pattern by frequency analyzing the leveled electric speech signal, and for correcting, by time axis normalization, a time distortion of the voice pattern due to changes in speaking speed of spoken instructions, and for comparing the time axis normalized voice pattern with a plurality of patterns stored in a pattern storing memory;

animation character generating means for producing a video signal of an animation character who is a message speaker that interacts with the user;

video image display means for displaying the video signal from the animation character generating means;

speech synthesizing means for synthesizing a speech signal of a message spoken by the animation character;

speech outputting means for transmitting the speech signal from the speech synthesizing means in audible human sounds; and

a microprocessor responsive to the output signal from the speech recognition means for producing an operation mode designation and control signal for designating the operation mode of the electronic equipment and controlling the electronic equipment to operate in the designated mode, an action control signal fed to the animation character generating means for controlling the action of the animation character, and a message signal fed to the speech synthesizing means instructing a message signal to be synthesized in the speech synthesizing means, wherein the microprocessor performs natural language or dialogue inference processing of the output signal from the speech recognition means.