Information reproducing apparatus and method

Motion video signal processing for recording or reproducing – Local trick play processing – With randomly accessible medium

Reexamination Certificate

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Details

C386S349000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06434326

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a record medium, such as a DVD or the like, and an information reproducing apparatus for reproducing the information on the record medium. More particularly, the present invention relates to a record medium, which can be reproduced by an information reproducing apparatus connected to an external device such as a personal computer or the like, and can be read in by a computer so as to control the external device, and an information reproducing apparatus for and an information reproducing method of reproducing the information on the record medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
For example, video information and audio information for sales promotion may be reproduced by an information reproducing apparatus, such as a VTR (Video Tape Recorder), a CD (Compact Disc) player, an LD (Laser Disc) player, an MD (Mini Disc) player, a DVD player or the like, to reproduce a record medium, such as a video tape, an optical disc or the like. Now, due to recent popularization of Internet, there are rapidly increased cases in which a seller servicing as a provider of the information for the sales promotion or the like has a home page of the Internet. Thus, in order to give the newest information and the detail information and provide the convenience for mail order by using the home page, the information for the sales promotion may include address information of the home page of the Internet, in many cases.
On the one hand, the operation controls, such as a reproduction and a stop of the player and the like, may be also performed through a personal computer by connecting such a player to the personal computer. Hence, due to the operation through the personal computer, after the video information or the audio information for the sales promotion is reproduced by the player, the home page corresponding on the Internet can be called by using the personal computer as necessary.
On the other hand, a standard of giving a linkage function with a home page to a disc, such as an inter disc or a video CD Internet is proposed (refer to Nikkei Multiple Media, pp. 33-34, January 1997, and an academic society journal of video information media, Vol. 51, No. 2, page 192, 1997). According to these standards, it may be considered that address information of a home page stored in a disc is read out by a personal computer to then access the home page by using this address information.
However, the communicating function to the Internet and the like which the personal computer has and the reproducing function of the player are perfectly independent of each other, in the configuration in which the operations of the player are controlled through the personal computer by connecting the above mentioned various players to the personal computer. Thus, this results in a problem that in order to call the home page through the Internet by using the personal computer, the address information of the home page to be image-displayed or audio-outputted must be inputted by a manual operation through a keyboard of the personal computer and the like.
On the other hand, according to the aforementioned standards, such as the inter disc, the video CD Internet and the like, the address information of a home page can be read out from the disc by a personal computer, similarly to the case in which a personal computer reads out an application program from a CD-ROM. Then, in accordance with this read out address information, the home page can be accessed through the Internet by the personal computer. Thus, these standards do not exceed the confine in which an input of the address information by the conventional manual operation is changed into an input of the address information through a CD-ROM drive or the like. Accordingly, the personal computer is used as a user interface to thereby carry out all the controls by using the program of the personal computer. Hence, in order to access the home page under these standards, it takes a long time to read in the OS and the like when the personal computer is started. Moreover, the system may be unstable because of the problems peculiar to the personal computer, such as the generation of a defective sector in a hard disc, the risk of an infection of a computer virus and the like. Especially, according to these standards, since the address information is treated so as to be correlated with an image recorded on the disc, the personal computer is required to have a high control ability. This results in problems that it takes a long time to start the operation and that a user operation becomes complex.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is proposed in view of the above mentioned problems. It is therefore an object of the present invent ion to provide: an information record medium, which can reduce a burden onto an external apparatus such as a personal computer or the like, when the control in relation to video information to be reproduced by an information reproducing apparatus is carried out for the external apparatus, and further enables an information reproducing apparatus to function as a user interface that is easy for a viewer to operate; the information reproducing apparatus; and an information reproducing method in the information reproducing apparatus.
The above object of the present invention can be achieved by an information record medium on which information to be reproduced by an information reproducing apparatus connected to an external apparatus is recorded. The information comprises: compressed video information; first information, which relates a predetermined image portion in a video image reproduced by the information reproducing apparatus on the basis of the video information, is defined with respect to a position of the predetermined image portion in the reproduced video image, and is recorded at a record position, where the first information can be reproduced simultaneously with the predetermined image portion by the information reproducing apparatus, on the information record medium; second information, which is defined in correspondence with the first information and is recorded at a predetermined record position on the information record medium; and third information, which indicates the record position of the second information on the information record medium, indicates a command to transmit the second information to the external apparatus after reading out the second information, and is recorded at a record position, where the third information can be reproduced simultaneously with the predetermined image portion by the information reproducing apparatus, on the information record medium.
According to the information record medium of the present invention, together with the compressed video information, the first, second and third information are recorded on the information record medium. The first information is high light information or the like in the DVD standard for example. The first information is correlated with the predetermined image portion in the video image reproduced by the information reproducing apparatus on the basis of the video information, and is defined with respect to the position of the predetermined image portion in the reproduced video image. On the other hand, the third information is high light command, the button command or the like in the DVD standard for example. The third information indicates the record position of the second information on the information record medium, and indicates the command to transmit the second information to the external apparatus after reading out the second information. And that, each of the first information and the third information is recorded at the record position where the first and third information respectively can be reproduced simultaneously with the predetermined image portion by the information reproducing apparatus, on the information record medium. Here, this “simultaneous reproduction” means a substantially simultaneous reproduction. More concretely, this “simultaneous reproduction” is not limited to

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