Speech animation with behavioral contexts for application scenarios

• US 7,599,838 B2
• Filed: 09/01/2004
• Issued: 10/06/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 09/01/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Duong, Townsend, Gong, Li, Yinger, Andrew
• Primary Examiner(s): Lerner; Martin
• Application Number:
  US10/932,411
• Publication Number:
  US 20060047520A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,861 Days
• Field of Search: 704/258, 704/260, 704/261, 704/266, 704/269, 704/270, 704/270.1, 704/276, 704/275, 345/473
• US Class Current: 704/258
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 13/00 Speech synthesis; Text to speech systems

Abstract

Methods and systems, including computer program products, for speech animation. The system includes a speech animation server and one or more speech animation clients. The speech animation server generates speech animation content that drives the expressions and behaviors of talking agents displayed by the speech animation clients. The data used by the server includes one or more references to behavioral contexts. A behavioral context corresponds to a particular application scenario and includes a set of expressions that are appropriate to the particular application scenario. A behavioral context can also be defined as a combination of two or more other behavioral contexts. The server automatically incorporates the expressions of a particular behavioral context into any data that references the particular behavioral context.

Claims

1. A computer program product, tangibly embodied in an information carrier, the computer program product being operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:

receiving a first request from a client application for first speech animation, the first request identifying data to be used to generate the first speech animation, wherein the identified data includes a tag having a parameter corresponding to a desired emotion and a reference to an application scenario of the requesting client application, the application scenario corresponding to a behavioral context that includes a set of expressions that are appropriate to the particular application scenario;

determining which application scenario prompted the first request based on other data information included in the first request;

retrieving the data and the set of expressions in the behavioral context;

generating the first speech animation based on the parameter and using the retrieved data and the set of expressions in the behavioral context; and

sending a response identifying the generated first speech animation to the client application.

2. The product of claim 1, wherein retrieving the data includes retrieving the data in real time.

3. The product of claim 1, wherein the data specifies text to be used to generate the first speech animation.

4. The product of claim 3, wherein the text includes variable elements.

5. The product of claim 1, wherein the data specifies a voice to be used to generate the first speech animation.

6. The product of claim 1, wherein the data specifies a pool of synonyms;

and generating the first speech animation includes selecting a synonym from the pool of synonyms.

7. The product of claim 1, wherein the first request further identifies context information taken from a live session of the client application;

and

generating the first speech animation includes incorporating the context information into the generated first speech animation.

8. The product of claim 7, wherein the context information includes information about a user of the client application.

9. The product of claim 1, wherein:

the client application is a web application; and

the first request is an HTTP request.

10. The product of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a second request from the client application for a second speech animation, the second request identifying data to be used to generate the second speech animation, wherein the data identified in the second request is different from the data identified in the first request, but contains a reference to the same behavioral context referenced by the data identified in the first request; and

generating the second speech animation using the identified data and the same set of expressions used to generate the first speech animation.

11. A system, comprising:

a speech animation server; and

a client application in communication with the speech animation server,

wherein the client application is operable to perform the following operations;

sending a request for speech animation to the speech animation server, the request identifying data to be used to generate the speech animation, the speech animation being speech synchronized with facial expressions;

receiving a response from the speech animation engine, the response identifying the generated speech animation; and

using the generated speech animation to animate a talking agent displayed on a user interface of the client application;

and wherein the speech animation server is operable to perform the following operations;

receiving the request for speech animation from the client application;

retrieving the data identified in the request, wherein the retrieved data includes a tag having a parameter corresponding to a desired emotion and a reference to an application scenario of the requesting client application, the application scenario corresponding to a behavioral context that includes a set of expressions that are appropriate to the particular application scenario;

determining which application scenario prompted the request based on other data information included in the first request;

generating the speech animation based on the parameter using the retrieved data and further using the set of expressions defined in the behavioral context; and

sending the response identifying the generated speech animation to the client application.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein retrieving the data includes retrieving the data in real time.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the data specifies text to be used to generate the speech animation.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the text includes variable elements.

15. The system of claim 11, wherein the data specifies a voice to be used to generate the speech animation.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein the data specifies a pool of synonyms;

and generating the speech animation includes selecting a synonym from the pool of synonyms.

17. The system of claim 11, wherein the request further identifies context information taken from a live session of the client application;

and generating the speech animation includes incorporating the context information into the generated speech animation.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the context information includes information about a user of the client application.

19. The system of claim 11, wherein:

the client application is a web application; and

the request is an HTTP request.

20. A method of generating a speech animation comprising:

receiving a request from a client application for a speech animation;

identifying data to be used to generate the speech animation in the request, the data including a tag indicating a desired emotion and a reference to an application scenario of the requesting client application;

assigning a behavioral context to the application scenario, the behavioral context including a set of expressions that are appropriate to the application scenario, wherein the reference of the data indicates the behavioral context;

determining which application scenario prompted the request based on other data information included in the request; and

generating the speech animation based on the tag and the reference.