Text to speech conversion system

• US 7,805,307 B2
• Filed: 09/30/2003
• Issued: 09/28/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Sharp Laboratories of America Incorporated (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Levin, Burton L., Pierson, Charles E.
• Primary Examiner(s): ALBERTALLI, BRIAN LOUIS
• Application Number:
  US10/676,273
• Publication Number:
  US 20050071167A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,555 Days
• Field of Search: 704/251, 704/260, 704/270, 704/231, 704/258, 704/271, 704/272, 382/310, 382/187, 382/189, 382/309, 382/159, 382/228, 382/227, 382/181, 382/153, 434/112
• US Class Current: 704/260
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/24 Aligning, centring, orientation detection or correction of the image

Abstract

A system for the automated conversion to audio of text displayed on a surface.

Claims

1. A cell phone comprising:

(a) a body portion containing a keypad, an audio receiver, and an audio transmitter;

(b) a digital camera in said body portion having an outwardly facing lens;

(c) a processor capable of receiving an image containing a text sequence from said digital camera, distinguishing individual words in said sequence, and causing said audio transmitter to recite said individual words in said sequence; and

(d) storage storing a plurality of templates organized into predefined categories, each of said categories associated with a unique audible signal recitable from said audio transmitter, and at least one of said categories including more than one template, where said processor identifies a selected one of said predefined categories based upon a manual input received after audible recitation of a said signal associated with the selected one of said predefined categories, and automatically identifies the layout format of text in an image captured by said digital camera based upon solely those ones of said plurality of templates within said identified predefined category.

2. The cell phone of claim 1 where at least one of said templates is in the layout format of a menu.

3. The cell phone of claim 1 where said processor is capable of correcting for at least one of a skew, blur, and distortion.

4. The cell phone of claim 1 where said processor includes a page prompt module that is capable of identifying a page number in the header or footer of an image, and prompting the audio device to recite a warning to a user if the apparatus receives images of pages of text in nonsequential order.

5. The cell phone of claim 1 where at least one of said templates is in the layout format of a newspaper.

6. The cell phone of claim 1 where one of said templates corresponds to a phone book.

7. The cell phone of claim 6 where said cell phone includes a button and said one of said templates instructs said processor to dial the phone number of a phone book entry being recited when the user presses said button.