SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ENABLING MULTIPLE-STATE AVATARS

• US 20160239993A1
• Filed: 04/25/2016
• Published: 08/18/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 07/17/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: RITSKO, JOHN J., CASTELLI, VITTORIO, HAMILTON, RICK A. II, PICKOVER, CLIFFORD A.
• Granted Patent: US 10,424,101 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 13/40 of characters, e.g. humans, animals or virtual beings

Abstract

A method for rendering a virtual world avatar of a computerized system is disclosed. The method comprises defining a plurality of receptor points located on the virtual world avatar, wherein the plurality of receptor points is associated with at least one object that moves between the plurality of receptor points based upon at least one predetermined trigger, changing a state of at least one of the plurality of receptor points from a first state to a second state based upon a measurable quantity and a predetermined threshold to update the associated at least one object, and in response to the measurable quantity no longer satisfying the predetermined threshold, reverting the state of the at least one of the plurality of receptor points from the second state back to the first state.

Claims

1. A method for rendering a virtual world avatar of a computerized system, comprising:

defining a plurality of receptor points located on the virtual world avatar, wherein the plurality of receptor points is associated with at least one object that moves between the plurality of receptor points based upon at least one predetermined trigger;

changing a state of at least one of the plurality of receptor points from a first state to a second state based upon a measurable quantity and a predetermined threshold to update the associated at least one object; and

in response to the measurable quantity no longer satisfying the predetermined threshold, reverting the state of the at least one of the plurality of receptor points from the second state back to the first state.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one object comprises any of a static image, a live video, and a pre-recorded video.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one object moves from one of the plurality of receptor points to a vicinity near the virtual world avatar.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the changing of the state is limited to a predetermined subset of permitted states in accordance with a controller preference.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the state comprises any of a non-hybrid state and a hybrid state.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the hybrid state comprises any of a static image hybrid state and a video hybrid state.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the video hybrid state comprises any of a live video hybrid state and a pre-recorded video hybrid state.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises any of physical movements of a controller of the virtual world avatar and parameters associated with other virtual world avatars.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the physical movements comprise a quantity representative of a movement of any of a facial feature and a hand.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises a quantity representative of an audio signal.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises a quantity representative of a computer system capability.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises a quantity representative of an actuation of a monitored device.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the monitored device comprises any of a keyboard, a joy stick, and an audio detector.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises a quantity representative of a communication network performance.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the measurable quantity comprises a quantity representative of a controller computer processing capability.

16. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying the second state only to a subset of a plurality of controllers of the computerized system.

17. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

limiting the changing of the state of the at least one of the plurality of receptor points to a subset of a plurality of states.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

maintaining the second state of the at least one of the plurality of receptor points for a portion of a system session.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

maintaining the second state of the at least one of the plurality of receptor points for the entirety of the system session.

20. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

distributing avatar information to the controller by way of a peer-to-peer system.