Control apparatus and control method to control volume of sound

• US 9,426,270 B2
• Filed: 09/15/2011
• Issued: 08/23/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 09/29/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Saturn Licensing LLC (Sony Group Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Sony Corporation (Sony Group Corp.)
• Inventors: Sakai, Yusuke, Kondo, Masao
• Primary Examiner(s): Desir, Pierre-Louis
• Assistant Examiner(s): SHIN, SEONG-AH A
• Application Number:
  US13/233,184
• Publication Number:
  US 20120078619A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,804 Days
• Field of Search: 704/225, 704/231, 704/270, 704/275, 704/226, 704/246, 704/272, 704/233, 381/55, 381/107
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/165 Management of the audio stream, e.g. setting of volume, audio stream path
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/57 Arrangements for indicating or recording the number of the calling subscriber at the called subscriber's set at the operator set in a manual exchange H04M5/20
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/6016 in the receiver circuit
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72442 for playing music files
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/12 including a sensor for measuring a physical value, e.g. temperature or motion telephones including GPS signal receivers H04M2250/10

Abstract

An apparatus may include a control unit to selectively control volume of content sound and volume of speech sound according to a priority assigned to a user corresponding to speech sound and a priority assigned to content data. When volume control is to be performed on a priority basis, the control unit may selectively control the volume of the content sound and the volume of the speech sound based on the assigned priorities so that the volume of the sound having a higher priority becomes louder than the volume of the other sound.

Claims

1. An apparatus comprising:

a circuit that;

controls a first volume of a first content sound and a second volume of a second content sound according to respective first and second priorities set, wherein at least one priority of the first priority or the second priority is in a form of metadata,

wherein volume of sound of the first and second content sounds having a higher priority is greater than volume of sound of the first and second content sounds having a lower priority,

wherein the at least one priority is a step-wise value of a plurality of step-wise values representing respectively different levels of priority, in which the metadata indicates, for each respective phrase of phrases forming content sound to which the at least one priority corresponds, one of the plurality of step-wise values, and

wherein the circuit controls the first and second volumes by dynamically determining, for each phrase forming the content sound, the higher priority of the first and second content sounds, using the step-wise value corresponding to the phrase indicated by the metadata for the at least one priority.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the first and second volumes are controlled based on the first and second priorities only when the first volume and the second volume are determined to be output by the apparatus.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein, when the volume of sound having a higher priority is increased, the volume of sound having a lower priority is decreased.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the first volume is controlled in synchronization with the second volume.

5. A method comprising:

controlling, by a circuit or a processor, a first volume of a first content sound and a second volume of a second content sound according to respective first and second priorities, wherein at least one priority of the first priority or the second priority is in a form of metadata,

wherein volume of sound of the first and second content sounds having a higher priority is greater than the volume of sound of the first and second content sounds having a lower priority, and

wherein the at least one priority is a step-wise value of a plurality of step-wise values representing respectively different levels of priority, in which the metadata indicates, for each respective phrase of phrases forming content sound to which the at least one priority corresponds, one of the plurality of step-wise values; and

controlling, by the circuit or the processor, the first and second volumes by dynamically determining, for each phrase forming the content sound, the higher priority of the first and second content sounds, using the step-wise value corresponding to the phrase indicated by the metadata for the at least one priority.