Security system for homes and small offices

• US 6,313,872 B1
• Filed: 06/18/1993
• Issued: 11/06/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 06/18/1993
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Robert E. Malm
• Original Assignee: Isabelle R. Borg
• Inventors: Borg, Arthur N.
• Primary Examiner(s): BRITTON, HOWARD W
• Application Number:
  US08/080,471
• Time in Patent Office: 3,063 Days
• Field of Search: 348/152, 348/154, 348/155, 348/156, 348/469, 348/151, 348/14, 348/153, 348/143, 348/584, 348/588, 348/589, 348/466, 340/541, 340/825.32, 340/825.3, 340/825.36, 382/159
• US Class Current: 348/155
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19634 Electrical details of the system, e.g. component blocks for carrying out specific functions
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/1966 Wireless systems, other than telephone systems, used to communicate with a camera
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19673 Addition of time stamp, i.e. time metadata, to video stream
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19695 Arrangements wherein non-video detectors start video recording or forwarding but do not generate an alarm themselves
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/188 Capturing isolated or intermittent images triggered by the occurrence of a predetermined event, e.g. an object reaching a predetermined position signal generation from motion picture films H04N5/253

Abstract

The security system for homes and small offices provides snapshots of potential trespassers for viewing on conventional television receivers. The system consists of at least one scene capture unit, a scene recovery unit, and communication links between the scene capture units and the scene recovery unit. A scene capture unit consists of a motion detector, a conventional television camera, and circuitry which converts the camera signal into a sequence of integers that is stored in semiconductor memory and then communicated to the scene recovery unit. The scene recovery unit generates from the sequence of integers communicated by the scene capture unit a signal which, when fed into a conventional television receiver, causes the scene recorded by the camera to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of occurrence to be displayed on another portion. In those situations where building access by authorized persons is significant, the scene capture unit is equipped with an event detector which aborts the processing of snapshots taken of authorized persons either entering or leaving the building.

Claims

1. A scene capture apparatus comprising:

a means for detecting a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

a television camera for converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal from which a replica of a single image of the original scene can be obtained;

a means for reducing the bandwidth of the analog electrical signal; and

a means for converting a portion of the reduced bandwidth analog electrical signal into a sequence of digital samples representative of a portion of a single image of the scene viewed by the television camera from which a replica of the reduced bandwidth analog electrical signal can be obtained, the remaining portions of the reduced bandwidth analog electrical signal being discarded.

2. A scene capture apparatus comprising:

a means for detecting a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

a means for converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal from which a replica of a single image of the original scene can be obtained; and

a means for converting a portion of the analog electrical signal into a sequence of digital samples representative of a portion of a single image of the scene from which a replica of the electrical signal can be obtained, the remaining portions of the analog electrical signal being discarded; and

a means for saving power, said power saving means supplying power to the scene converting means only from the time that the change detecting means detects a change in a scene until the sequence of digital samples representative of a portion of a single image of the scene has been obtained.

3. A scene capture apparatus comprising:

a means for detecting a first event, a first event being a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

a means for converting the scene into an electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained when a first event occurs; and

a means for identifying a first event that occurs within a predetermined time interval after the occurrence of a second event, the operation of the scene converting means being conditioned on the non-occurrence of the first event within the predetermined time interval after the occurrence of the second event.

4. A scene recovery apparatus which receives at a determinable time a sequence of digital samples that represent a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle, the apparatus comprising:

a means for determining the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received;

a means for augmenting the received digital samples with a plurality of augmenting digital samples representing augmenting data whereby the resulting sequence of digital samples can be converted to an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the augmenting data to be displayed on another portion, the augmenting data including the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received.

5. The scene recovery apparatus of claim 4 further comprising:

a means for generating from the augmented sequence of digital samples an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the augmenting data to be displayed on another portion.

6. A security apparatus comprising:

a means for capturing a single image of a scene when a change in the scene occurs, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle, the captured single image being represented by a sequence of integers;

a memory for storing the sequence of integers representing the captured scene;

a means for communicating the sequence of integers stored in memory to a remote location in a predetermined communication channel.

7. The security apparatus of claim 6 further comprising:

a means for controlling the errors occurring as a result of communicating data to the remote location.

8. The security apparatus of claim 6 wherein the scene capturing means comprises:

a television camera for converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal;

a means for reducing the bandwidth of the output signal from the television camera.

9. The security apparatus of claim 6 wherein the scene capturing means comprises:

a television camera for converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal;

a means for converting a portion of the analog electrical signal into a sequence of integers representative of a portion of a single image of the scene viewed by the television camera, the sequence of integers representative of the single image being stored in the memory, the remaining portions of the analog electrical signal not being used.

10. The security apparatus of claim 6 further comprising:

a means for delaying the transmission of the sequence of integers being communicated to the remote location for a predetermined period of time.

11. The security apparatus of claim 6 further comprising:

a means for communicating data from the remote location to the scene capturing means.

12. The security apparatus of claim 11 further comprising:

a means for recognizing interfering signals in the communication channel.

13. The security apparatus of claim 11 wherein the means for communicating data comprises a transmitter and a receiver at the location of the scene capturing means, the application of power to the transmitter causing the interruption of power to the receiver.

14. A security apparatus comprising:

a means for capturing one and only one image of a scene when a change in the scene occurs, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle, the captured one and only one image of a scene being represented by a sequence of integers;

a means for communicating the sequence of integers to a remote location in a predetermined communication channel;

a means for generating from the sequence of integers communicated by the scene capturing means and the time at which the sequence was received an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

15. The security apparatus of claim 14 wherein the scene capturing means further comprises:

a means for saving power, said power saving means supplying power to the scene capturing means only from the time that a change in a scene occurs until the sequence of integers that represents one and only one image of a scene has been obtained.

16. The security apparatus of claim 14 wherein the scene capturing means comprises:

a means for detecting a first event, a first event being a change in a scene;

a means for converting the scene into an electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained when a first event occurs; and

a means for identifying a first event that occurs within a predetermined time interval either before or after the occurrence of a second event, the continued operation of the security apparatus being conditioned on the non-occurrence of the first event within the predetermined time interval either before or after the occurrence of the second event.

17. The security apparatus of claim 14 wherein the generating means comprises:

a means for determining the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received;

a means for augmenting the received digital samples with other digital samples whereby the resulting sequence of digital samples can be converted to an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

18. The security apparatus of claim 17 wherein the generating means further comprises:

a means for generating from the augmented sequence of digital samples an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

19. The security apparatus of claim 14 further comprising:

a means for controlling the errors occurring as a result of communicating data to the generating means.

20. The security apparatus of claim 19 wherein the error control means is a means for detecting the presence of errors in the data communicated to the generating means.

21. The security apparatus of claim 19 wherein the error control means is a means for detecting and correcting errors in the data communicated to the generating means.

22. The security apparatus of claim 14 further comprising:

a communication channel for communicating data from the generating means to the scene capturing means.

23. The security apparatus of claim 22 further comprising:

a means for recognizing interfering signals in the communication channel.

24. The security apparatus of claim 22 wherein the means for communicating data comprises a transmitter and a receiver at the location of the scene capturing means, the application of power to the transmitter causing the interruption of power to the receiver.

25. A process for capturing a scene comprising the steps:

detecting a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal from which a replica of a single image of the original scene can be obtained;

reducing the bandwidth of the analog electrical signal; and

converting a portion of the reduced bandwidth analog electrical signal into a sequence of digital samples representative of a portion of a single image of the scene from which a replica of the reduced bandwidth electrical signal can be obtained, the remaining portions of the reduced bandwidth analog electrical signal being discarded.

26. A process for capturing a scene comprising the steps:

detecting a first event, a first event being a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

determining whether the first event occurred within a predetermined time interval after the occurrence of a second event;

converting the scene into an electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained when a first event occurs provided the first event did not occur within a predetermined time interval after the second event.

27. A process for recovering a scene from a sequence of digital samples received at a determinable time, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle, the process comprising the steps:

determining the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received;

augmenting the received digital samples with a plurality of augmenting digital samples representing augmenting data whereby the resulting sequence of digital samples can be converted to an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the augmenting data to be displayed on another portion, the augmenting data including the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received.

28. The process of claim 27 further comprising the step:

generating from the augmented sequence of digital samples an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the augmenting data to be displayed on another portion.

29. A process for providing security comprising the steps:

(a) capturing one and only one image of a scene when a change in the scene occurs, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle, the captured one and only one image of a scene being represented by a sequence of integers;

(b) communicating the sequence of integers to a remote location in a predetermined communication channel;

(c) generating from the sequence of integers communicated by the scene capturing means to the remote location and the time at which the sequence was received an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

30. The process of claim 29 wherein step (a) comprises the steps:

detecting a first event, a first event being a change in a scene;

determining whether the first event occurred within a predetermined time interval either before or after the occurrence of a second event;

converting the scene into an electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained when a first event occurs provided the first event did not occur within a predetermined time interval after the second event;

aborting steps (b) and (c) provided the change did occur within a predetermined time interval either before or after the occurrence of the second event.

31. The process of claim 29 wherein step (c) comprises the steps:

determining the time at which the sequence of digital samples was received;

augmenting the received digital samples with other digital samples whereby the resulting sequence of digital samples can be converted to an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

32. The process of claim 31 wherein step (c) further comprises the step:

generating from the augmented sequence of digital samples an electrical signal which, when introduced into a television receiver, causes the scene to be displayed on one portion of the television screen and the time of receipt of the digital samples to be displayed on another portion.

33. The process of claim 29 wherein step (b) further comprises the step:

controlling the errors occurring as a result of communicating data to the remote location.

34. The process of claim 33 wherein the controlling errors step comprises:

determining if errors are present in the data communicated to the remote location;

requesting that the data be retransmitted if errors are present.

35. The process of claim 33 wherein the controlling errors step comprises:

controlling errors by the use of error correcting codes;

correcting errors in the data received at the remote location.

36. A scene capture apparatus comprising:

a means for detecting a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

a means for converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained; and

a means for converting a portion of the analog electrical signal into a sequence of integers representative of a portion of a single image of the scene, the remaining portions of the analog electrical signal not being used.

37. A process for capturing a scene comprising the steps:

detecting a change in a scene, a scene being a visual perception of objects contained in a predetermined solid angle;

converting the scene in which a change is detected into an analog electrical signal from which a replica of the original scene can be obtained; and

converting a portion of the analog electrical signal into a sequence of digital samples representative of a portion of a single image of the scene, the remaining portions of the analog electrical signal not being used.