Television – Format – Including additional information
Reexamination Certificate
1999-09-08
2002-01-29
Kostak, Victor R. (Department: 2611)
Television
Format
Including additional information
C386S349000, C380S203000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06342924
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to an additional information superposition method for superposing spectrum spread additional information on a video signal such that, for example, when the video signal is converted into another video signal of a different aspect ratio, the superposed additional information can be extracted from the video signal after the conversion, and a video signal outputting apparatus which employs the additional information superposition method.
Various contents information such as image information and sound information can be provided abundantly through various media such as a video tape, a digital video disk (DVD), the Internet and broadcasting media. Meanwhile, infringement on copyright by illegal duplication (copy) of various contents information provided through various media has come into question.
In order to cope with this problem, various countermeasures have been proposed. For example, information for duplication control or copyright information is added to contents information such as image information, and the additional information is used to prevent illegal duplication of the contents information or to pursue an illegal duplicator of the contents information.
Further, a method has been proposed to superpose additional information to be added to contents information making use of an electronic watermark process. The electronic watermark process is a process of to embedding information as noise in a portion of image data or music data which is not significant on the perception of human beings, that is, a portion which is not redundant to music or an image.
Additional information embedded in image data or music data using such an electronic watermark process as described above is difficult to be removed from the image data or music data. On the other hand, even after a filtering process or a data compression process is performed for the image data or music data, the additional information of the electronic watermark (electronic watermark information) embedded in the image data or music data can be extracted from the image data or music data.
In this manner, by making use of an electronic watermark process, electronic watermark information can be superposed on contents information such that it cannot be removed or modified readily. Further, since the electronic watermark information superposed on the contents information can be extracted with certainty, for example, by a recording apparatus, illegal duplication of the contents information can be prevented using the electronic watermark information superposed on the contents information.
An electronic watermark process which makes use of a spectrum spreading technique is known as one of such electronic watermark processes as described above. The electronic watermark process spectrum spreads additional information to convert it into a broad-band signal of a low level which can be regarded as noise with respect to an information signal such as image data and superposes the signal on the information signal such as image data.
Spectrum spreading of additional information is performed by multiplying the additional information by spread codes generated in a sufficiently short period. The additional information in the form of a broad-band signal of a low level obtained by spectrum spreading can be extracted as an original narrow-band signal of a high level by performing despreading of multiplying the additional information by the spread codes same as those used upon spectrum spreading at same timings.
Thus, it has been proposed to generate, when it is tried to superpose spectrum spread additional information (electronic watermark information) on a video signal, spread codes in synchronism with a vertical synchronizing signal such as, for example, in a one-frame period or a two-frame period and superpose additional information spectrum spread with the spread codes on the video signal.
Therefore, in order to extract the electronic watermark information superposed on the video signal, spread codes same as those used upon spectrum spreading can be generated at same timings to despread the additional information spectrum spread and superposed on the video signal by using a video synchronizing signal as a reference signal. Consequently, the additional information spectrum spread and superposed on the video signal can be extracted rapidly with certainty.
However, some of video signals provided through DVDs or broadcasting media are for forming an image having an aspect ratio of 16:9. In order to display an image of the aspect ratio of 16:9 on a monitor receiver or a like having a frame of another aspect ratio of 4:3 which is spread widely, the video signal must be converted into another video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 4:3.
In this instance, if the video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 16:9 has additional information added thereto which is spectrum spread with spread codes generated, for example, in synchronism with a video signal synchronizing signal, then when the video signal is converted into another video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 4:3, the additional information superposed on the video signal before such conversion cannot sometimes be detected from within the video signal after the conversion.
Several methods are available to convert a video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 16:9 to another video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 4:3 including, for example, a normal process, a letter box process and a pan scan process.
The normal process forms, from a video signal for forming an image of the aspect ratio of 16:9, another video signal for forming an entire image PW to be displayed on a screen GW of the aspect ratio of 16:9 as seen in
FIG. 17A
as another image PS on another screen GS of the aspect ratio of 4:3 as seen in FIG.
17
B.
The video signal formed by the normal process allows an entire image PW of the aspect ratio of 16:9 to be displayed as another image PS of the aspect ratio of 4:3 without any miss as seen from
FIGS. 17A and 17B
.
In this case, even if additional information spectrum spread with spread codes PN
1
, PN
2
, . . . generated, for example, in a one frame period is superposed in synchronism with a vertical synchronizing signal VD on the video signal for forming an image PW of the aspect ratio of 16:9 as seen in
FIG. 17C
, when the video signal is converted into another video signal for forming another image PS of the aspect ratio of 4:3, the additional information spectrum spread with the spread codes PN
1
, PN
2
, . . . is not lost as seen in FIG.
17
D.
Accordingly, from a video signal formed by the normal process for forming an image PS of the aspect ratio of 4:3, additional information spectrum spread and superposed on the video signal can be extracted by generating spread codes PN
1
, PN
2
, . . . in a one frame period in synchronism with a vertical synchronizing signal VD of the video signal and despreading the video signal with the spread codes.
Meanwhile, the letter box process forms, from a video signal for forming an image PW to be displayed on a screen GW of the aspect ratio of 16:9, another video signal for displaying the entire image PW as seen in FIG.
18
A as another image PSW on another screen GS of the aspect ratio of 4:3 as seen in FIG.
18
B.
In this instance, an image PSW of the aspect ratio of 16:9 is displayed in a predetermined area including a predetermined plurality of horizontal lines in a vertical direction in the screen GS of the aspect ratio of 4:3 as seen in
FIG. 18B
, and a pair of image non-displaying areas in which no image is displayed are provided at upper and lower portions of the screen GS.
Accordingly, where additional information spectrum spread with spread codes PN
1
, PN
2
, . . . generated, for example, in a one frame period is superposed on a video signal for forming an image PW of the aspect ratio of 16:9 as seen in
FIG. 18C
, if the video signal is converted into another video signal for forming another image PS of
Ikeda Nozomu
Kimura Yuji
Kohashi Takashi
Moriwaki Hisayoshi
Ogino Akira
Frommer William S.
Frommer & Lawrence & Haug LLP
Sony Corporation
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