System and method for indexing, searching, identifying, and editing multimedia files

• US 20070038612A1
• Filed: 10/16/2006
• Published: 02/15/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 07/24/2000
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: VMark, Inc. (VALID Soluciones Tecnológicas SA)
• Original Assignee: VMark, Inc. (VALID Soluciones Tecnológicas SA)
• Inventors: Lee, Sangwook, Oh, Sangwook, Kim, Hyeokman, Sull, Sanghoon, Chung, Min
• Application Number:
  US11/581,740
• Publication Number:
  US 20070038612A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/71 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7844 using original textual content or text extracted from visual content or transcript of audio data
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7847 using low-level visual features of the video content
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7867 using information manually generated, e.g. tags, keywords, comments, title and artist information, manually generated time, location and usage information, user ratings
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 3/4092 Image resolution transcoding, e.g. by using client-server architectures
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 2220/20 Disc-shaped record carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 2220/41 Flat as opposed to hierarchical combination, e.g. library of tapes or discs, CD changer, or groups of record carriers that together store one title
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/034 on discs G11B27/036, G11B27/038 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/105 of operating discs
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/28 by using information signals recorded by the same method as the main recording G11B27/22 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/34 Indicating arrangements indicating means incorporated in magazine or cassette G11B23/046 and G11B23/0875; indicating measured values in general G01D

Abstract

A method and system are provided for tagging, indexing, searching, retrieving, manipulating, and editing video images on a wide area network such as the Internet. A first set of methods is provided for enabling users to add bookmarks to multimedia files, such as movies, and audio files, such as music. The multimedia bookmark facilitates the searching of portions or segments of multimedia files, particularly when used in conjunction with a search engine. Additional methods are provided that reformat a video image for use on a variety of devices that have a wide range of resolutions by selecting some material (in the case of smaller resolutions) or more material (in the case of larger resolutions) from the same multimedia file. Still more methods are provided for interrogating images that contain textual information (in graphical form) so that the text may be copied to a tag or bookmark that can itself be indexed and searched to facilitate later retrieval via a search engine.

Claims

1. A method of searching for multimedia content, comprising:

receiving a first piece of information identifying the multimedia content;

using said first piece of information to locate a second piece of information identifying the multimedia content; and

performing a search for multimedia content based on said second piece of information.

2. The method of claim 1 additionally comprising performing a search based on said first piece of information.

3. The method of claim 2 additionally comprising presenting the results from said searches performed based on said first and said second pieces of information.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein said using said first piece of information includes performing a search based on said first piece of information to locate said second piece of information.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein said first piece of information comprises one of an image and positional information and said second piece of information comprises annotated text.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein said first piece of information comprises positional information and said second piece of information comprises image information.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein said first piece of information is received from a multimedia bookmark.

8. A method of searching for multimedia content, comprising:

receiving a first piece of information identifying the multimedia content;

using said first piece of information to locate a second piece of information identifying the multimedia content;

performing a search for multimedia content based on said second piece of information; and

collecting relevance information based on prior user searches, said relevance information being used to perform said search.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein said relevance information includes at least one of content or concept information.

10. The method of claim 8 wherein said relevance information is based on links, said method additionally comprising storing said links in a queue.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein said storing said links in a queue includes storing a new link at a head of said queue and deleting an oldest link from an end of said queue.

12. A method for searching for multimedia content based on a first piece of information saved in a multimedia bookmark, comprising:

transmitting said first piece of information saved in a multimedia bookmark from a client system to a server system in response to user selection of the multimedia bookmark;

using the first piece of information to locate a second piece of information;

generating a query based on said second piece of information;

searching one or more storage devices with said query; and

presenting results from said searching.

13. The method of claim 12 additionally comprising generating a query based on said first piece of information;

searching said one or more storage devices with said query; and

presenting results from said searching.

14. The method of claim 12 additionally comprising generating a query based on said first piece of information and wherein using said first piece of information includes performing a search based on said first piece of information to locate said second piece of information.

15. The method of claim 12 wherein said first piece of information comprises one of an image and positional information and said second piece of information comprises annotated text.

16. The method of claim 12 wherein said first piece of information comprises positional information and said second piece of information comprises image information.

17. The method of claim 12 wherein said first piece of information comprises image data, said method further comprising using the image data as a query frame for a frame based search of the storage devices.

18. The method of claim 12 wherein said first piece of information comprises positional information, said method further comprising using the positional information to locate a frame, and using said located frame as a query frame for a frame based search of the storage devices.

19. The method of claim 12 wherein said second piece of information comprises annotated text, and wherein said generating a query comprises using the annotated text as a keyword for a text based search of the storage devices.

20. The method of claim 12 additionally comprising collecting relevance information based on prior user input, said relevance information being used to perform said searching.