Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system – Computer graphics processing – Graphic manipulation
Reexamination Certificate
2001-04-06
2004-03-30
Bella, Matthew C. (Department: 2676)
Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system
Computer graphics processing
Graphic manipulation
C345S636000, C345S676000, C345S215000, C345S215000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06714209
ABSTRACT:
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of digital image processing and, more particularly, to designs that enable users to archive their personal photo albums from Web-based e-commerce photo sites onto individual storage type media (e.g., disc-shaped media, such as CD-ROM, DVD, Photo CD, or the like) with a customized table of contents (TOC) imprinted onto the disc-shaped media.
2. Description of the Background Art
Consumer enthusiasm for accumulating collections of personal digital photographs has led to the popularity of temporarily storing and cataloging them as personal albums on the Web. Several commercial Internet services facilitate this activity by providing reasonable disk space for personal photo storage along with server-side Web application software for users to customize their albums, make those albums available to others on-line (sharing), and engage in further e-commerce with the providers, such as ordering printed copies.
Over time, the number of on-line albums and digital photographs belonging to a digital image enthusiast increases, as there is a limit to the commercially-available storage. Periodically, at least some of a consumer's albums are likely to be deleted from this storage. Understandably, the consumer may want to personally store some of these pictures and/or albums longer term, and in a manner to be able to view or use them without dependence upon an Internet connection. Although digital images can be copied to photographic paper, often people will want to retain their pictures in a digital format.
Typical low-bandwidth connectivity to the Internet and limited disk space on personal computers preclude the practicality for an individual downloading the pictures from the commercial Internet site for long-term storage onto a home computer. Additionally, one could want to retain some pictures for a long time, as with photographic prints—past the life expectancy of a consumer computer. The likely storage medium for very convenient, affordable, and permanent digital storage is disc-based media. Examples of disc-based media include “CD” or compact disc (including CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, and Photo CD) and DVD (including DVD-ROM and DVD-RAM). New disc-based media formats are introduced to the marketplace on a routine basis. For reducing complexity of the discussion which follows, the term CD will be used to simply refer generally to all disc-based media, including all forms of compact disc-based and DVD-based media, and similar media formats.
Current consumer CD technology is very inexpensive, and the storage capacity of a single disk, several hundred megabytes (or more), is sufficient to accommodate hundreds of full-resolution images in the common JPEG format. In fact, the commercial Internet photo-hosting services already transfer a consumer's albums, or assortment of pictures, to CDs as part of their e-commerce offerings. Extrapolating from this trend, many digital photo consumers will accumulate multiple photo-storing CDs just as film-based photographers accumulate multiple shoeboxes or albums of photo prints. The digital photo collectors are facing the same dilemma encountered by analog picture owners: how to easily retrieve/review individual pictures from their personal warehouses of images. The current method for finding an individual picture in a haystack of photo-storing CDs is to individually load each CD and then to individually click on each file within to see which picture it is.
Commercial CDs, such as music CDs, are easily identifiable because they have identifying labels pre-impregnated onto the non-data side of each CD. Music CDs generally only contain less than a dozen individual recordings that are indexed (as a table of contents) either onto the non-data side of the CD itself or into the CD cover case; so the consumer can quickly scroll through such a CD to find a specific song. However, a custom personally-compiled photo-storing CD has many more images than a music CD, and has no current methodology for marking its contents in a manner that facilitates navigation within.
Clearly, photo-CD enthusiasts need a way to easily catalog and identify what images a particular individualized CD holds for future reference. Previous attempts to address this problem have been to affix some form of paper label with the table of photo-contents onto the sleeve or box in which the CD is packaged. However, over time, the association, or matching, of a CD with its cover breaks down. CDs tend to get separated from their sleeves, thereby separating from their table of contents. People want to handle and use these inexpensive consumer products without undue care.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Digital photo enthusiasts tend to accumulate many digital pictures over time, such that they may elect to archive them in albums on disc-based media or “CDs”. Users need to identify which CD contains which album, and therefore which pictures. The present invention provides a Web-based system implementing a methodology that allows a customer to easily archive multiple albums that are on-line onto a CD along with a personalized table of contents printed onto the CD itself. This user-friendly index of the digital images within the CD saves the user from having to load the CD in a CD drive to be able to determine which pictures it contains.
The working environment of the system includes a user's browser, a photo Web site's server system, a user-definition-to-XML module, an index sizing module, an XML-to-label-image converter, a CD-Remote module, a CD-positioning robot, a CD “burner” (i.e., writer), and a label printer. The environment includes connectivity to the Internet. Operation occurs as follows. A user employs his or her browser (e.g., Microsoft Internet Explorer) to interact with the photo Web site connected by the Internet. The user-definition-to-XML module, which runs in the Web server, is the interface for the user to select the digital photos to be archived or stored (i.e., “burned”) into a target CD, and to design the TOC label that will be printed onto that CD. The user-definition-to-XML module allows the user, employing the browser, to select a desired table of contents (TOC) configuration (e.g., based on specification of album title and/or photo-facsimile indicia).
The user-definition-to-XML module coordinates with the index sizing module to ensure that the user is not attempting to overload the capacity of the printable surface area on the CD. For example, the maximum number of standard thumbnail images that can be imprinted onto the surface area of a CD is about 24 (e.g., arranged as two concentric circles; the inner circle allowing for a maximum of eight thumbnail images, and the outer circle able to handle 16). If the user chooses to use the option for both thumbnail images and an album title to accompany each image, the maximum number of TOC items is typically less than 24. Calculation of the surface area required for each image and/or text label can be determined simply by computing the dimensions of a bounding box that bounds each image and/or text label. A bounding box for an image, for instance, can be calculated based on the pre-existing and known dimensions of the image. A bounding box for a text label can be calculated based on font metrics known about the text label (which are available from the underlying operating system, such as Windows); see, e.g., Petzold, C.,
Programming Windows
, Fifth Edition, Microsoft Press, 1999, especially Chapter 17: “Text and Fonts”, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference. The index sizing module monitors the status of the unused capacity of the lab
Bella Matthew C.
LightSurf Technologies, Inc.
Smart John A.
Tran Tam
LandOfFree
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