Motion video signal processing for recording or reproducing – Local trick play processing – With randomly accessible medium
Reexamination Certificate
1999-05-10
2004-02-03
Boccio, Vincent (Department: 2715)
Motion video signal processing for recording or reproducing
Local trick play processing
With randomly accessible medium
C386S349000, C386S349000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06687454
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of Technology
The present invention relates to a playback apparatus for playback of a recording medium having recorded thereon audio data and also still picture data expressing a plurality of still pictures, together with information specifying timings during playing of the audio data at which respective ones of the still pictures are to be displayed by the playback apparatus.
In particular, the invention relates to such a playback apparatus which is applicable to a recording medium consisting of an optical readout type of compact disk (CD) having still picture and audio data recorded thereon as a digital bit stream, with the data being recorded as a plurality of data portions referred to as tracks which are managed as separate units. It should be noted that the term “track” is used in the following description and in the appended claims only with the significance defined above.
2. Description of Prior Art
With a prior art type compact disk (generally referred to in the following as a CD) which is an optical recording disk that is utilized only for recording music, each of respective musical items that are recorded on the CD are managed in units of tracks, i.e., with the recorded audio data portion which expresses one musical item being recorded as one track, and with successive tracks being recorded sequentially in a recording region of the disk. In addition, such a CD has recorded thereon track control information (TC) which indicates the respective leading addresses, final addresses and playing durations, etc. for each of the tracks which are recorded on the disk, where the term “address” is used here to signify a position of recorded data on a CD, expressed for example as a sector number. The track control information is used by the playback apparatus for selecting a specific track to be played, in response to a user input command which specifies playing of that particular track.
In recent years it has become possible to record a substantial amount of digital data, e.g., 600 MB, on a CD having a diameter of 12 cm, of the type which has in the past been generally used for recording music. For that reason, such CDs have come into use as data storage devices of read-only type, referred to as CD-ROMs, for recording various types of digital data. In addition, CD-ROMs have come into use for recording music information together with other types of information, for example video CDs which have recorded thereon audio data and also still picture or video data, with resultant pictures being displayed at predetermined times during playback of the audio data. Such video CDs are applied to uses such as digital video karaoke, music videos, animated cartoons, language teaching materials, teaching materials for infants, etc., so that the applications of CDs have expanded into a wide range. In addition, DVDs (digital video disks), which are a type of video CD having very large storage capacity, have now been put into practical use.
In the case of video CDs which have a file structure that is based on the ISO 9660 standard, the disk has a lead-in region at the inner periphery of the disk, a lead-out region at the outer periphery of the disk, and the tracks are successively numbered from
1
to
99
.
Data expressing a TOC (table of contents) is recorded in the lead-in region. The TOC contains information specifying various information that is necessary for playing selected tracks such as the starting addresses (i.e., the starting positions on the disk of each of the regions in which the respective tracks are recorded on the disk) etc., with the various tracks being assigned successive numbers. Track No.
1
(video CD track) has recorded therein various files for use in disk management, playback control data, still picture data, and an application program which is required for activating the operation of a CD-I player. Video/audio bit streams which have been subjected to MPEG 1 compression are recorded in each of the tracks numbered from
2
to
99
. Information indicating termination of the program is recorded in the lead-out region.
With the widening of the range of applications of CDs which has occurred as described above, a type of playback apparatus is now in use for playing video CDs which have audio data and video data recorded thereon, with the audio data formed into a plurality of tracks and the video data expressing a plurality of still pictures which start to be displayed at respectively predetermined time points during playback of the audio tracks. With such a video CD, the respective sets of data expressing the still pictures are recorded within the audio data tracks, i.e. each track can contain one or more sets of still picture data together with the audio data. Approximately 10 to 20 still pictures can be recorded on each track, and respectively displayed at predetermined time points during playing of a track.
FIG. 5
is a diagram for use in describing the general arrangement of recorded data on such a prior art type of CD in which both audio data and still picture data can be recorded in each track, with the audio data and the sets of still picture data being recorded in succession within a track. Track control information sets TC
1
to TC
3
are recorded in the TOC region at the innermost periphery of the disk, and the data of tracks
1
to
3
are successively recorded following the track control information sets TC
1
to TC
3
, i.e. in the recording region which succeeds that in which the track control data sets are recorded.
In
FIG. 5
, the track control information TC
1
consists of control information formed of the leading address and final address of the data recorded on track
1
, the playing duration of that track, etc. Similarly, the sets of track control information TC
2
and TC
3
respectively constitute control information formed of the leading address and final address on the disk, and the playing duration, for tracks
2
and
3
. Each of the sets of data recorded on tracks
1
to
3
is formed as a plurality of still picture/audio data blocks, with the internal configuration of such a block being shown in
FIG. 5
for the case of track
1
. Such a still picture/audio data block contains all of the data expressing one still picture, with the data being divided into a plurality of segments as shown, so that the block is formed of a plurality of segments of the data expressing that still picture, alternating with portions of the audio data of that block. During playing of the track containing such a block, the successive still picture data segments are sequentially read out from the recording medium and are stored in a memory. When all of these data segments have been stored, they are combined into a single data set, which is then decoded to generate a video signal expressing the corresponding still picture, which can thereby be displayed.
It can thus be understood that with such a method, by making each of the plurality of still picture data segments within each still picture/audio data block sufficiently short, periods of discontinuity in audio playback which result from reading out of still picture data from the recording medium can be made correspondingly short, so that effectively continuous playback of the audio data of a track can be achieved.
However with a prior art type of optical recording disk having the data recording arrangement described above, the timings at which the respective still pictures expressed by the sets of still picture data recorded in a track are displayed, during playing of the audio data of that track, are fixedly determined by the arrangement of data on the disk, i.e., by the respectively positions at which the sets of still picture data are located within each track. This can result in delays occurring in playing of the audio data, due to time required to execute disk control operations relating to the still picture data. Furthermore when the recorded data are arranged on the disk in such a way, then in the production of such optical recording disks, if it should become necessary to rearrange o
Boccio Vincent
Fletcher James A
Victor Company of Japan Ltd.
Woo Louis
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