Television – Two-way video and voice communication – User positioning
Reexamination Certificate
1998-10-30
2001-02-27
Kuntz, Curtis A. (Department: 2743)
Television
Two-way video and voice communication
User positioning
C348S014160, C379S093210
Reexamination Certificate
active
06195116
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a video conferencing system, and more particularly, to a multi-point video conferencing system which improves the method for placing plural images transmitted from plural users separated geographically on the display of each terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1
is a schematic diagram of a conventional multi-point video conferencing system. The system of
FIG. 1
is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,446,491 issued Aug. 29, 1995 to Shinbata et al. and entitled “Multi-point Video Conference System” wherein each terminal comprises a shared frame memory to store information from other terminals.
The video conferencing system shown in
FIG. 1
includes a plurality of terminals for motion picture conferencing
10
a
through
10
d
, and a communications network
12
for transmitting and switching encoded motion picture data from the terminals
10
a
through
10
d
. Here, each of the terminals
10
a
through
10
d
have the same configuration.
FIG. 2
is a detailed block diagram of one of the terminals
10
a
through
10
d
shown in FIG.
1
. Each terminal includes a video camera
102
, an encoder
104
, a multi-point decoder
106
, and a display
108
.
The encoder
104
encodes and packetizes the motion picture signals output by the video camera
102
in units of blocks. The multi-point decoder
106
restores the packets received from the other terminals through the communications network
12
into the original motion pictures. The display
108
displays the data transmitted from the multi-point decoder
106
.
In particular, the multi-point decoder
106
includes an image processor, a channel selection controller, a shared frame memory and a display memory. The image processor processes an input image in a time divisional multiplexing scheme. The channel selection controller determines the transmission point of received packets according to the information of the received packets and notifies the image processor of the transmission point. The shared frame memory stores information of a plurality of images transmitted from the plurality of terminals. The display memory synchronously outputs video information stored in the shared frame memory.
The conventional multi-point video conferencing system having the aforementioned configuration is constructed to operate the multi-point video decoder in a time divisional multiplexing scheme to display information of a plurality of compressed images received from different terminals on a display device. In such a configuration, as the number of terminals involved in the video conference system increases, the amount of data to be calculated in a processor incorporated in the multi-point video decoder increases accordingly. Thus, to complete decoding within a limited time, the calculating capacity of the processor must be enhanced, which increases costs of the system.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
To solve the above problems, one object of the present invention is to provide a video conference system in which terminals extract only an object image from a picture including the object image and non-object features, such as a background. The extracted object image is transmitted to a controller to be synthesized with a background image, and a synthesized image is simultaneously transmitted to a plurality of terminals.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for implementing the video conference system.
In order to achieve one of the above objects, in a multi-point video conferencing system according to the present invention, each of a plurality of terminals encodes only an object image signal out of a photographed video signal, which includes the object image signal and a background signal, to output an encoded object signal, and receives and decodes a compression-encoded image signal to display a compressed image. A multi-point controller receives and decodes the encoded object signals from the plurality of terminals to restore object images, adjusts the size of the object images, synthesizes a background image with the size-adjusted object images, and compression-encodes the synthesized image to output the compression-encoded image signal to the plurality of terminals.
In order to achieve another one of the above objects, there is provided a method for implementing a multi-point video conferencing system having a plurality of terminals for a video conference and a multi-point controller for controlling data communications between the plurality of terminals. The method comprises the steps of: (a) separating a background image and an object image from a photographed picture; (b) compression-encoding only the object image to transmit an encoded object image signal; (c) decoding the encoded object image signal to reconstruct the object image; (d) adjusting the size of the reconstructed object image; (e) generating a background image; (f) synthesizing the background image with the reconstructed object images; (g) compression-encoding a synthesized image and simultaneously transmitting the same to the plurality of terminals; and (h) reconstructing and displaying the transmitted synthesized image.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5446491 (1995-08-01), Shibata et al.
patent: 6-70040 (1994-03-01), None
patent: 6-319130 (1994-11-01), None
patent: 7-67035 (1995-03-01), None
patent: 407067035 (1995-05-01), None
patent: 407250312 (1995-09-01), None
patent: 7-250312 (1995-09-01), None
patent: 8-84331 (1996-03-01), None
patent: 8-205115 (1996-08-01), None
patent: 9-83987 (1997-03-01), None
Japanese Abstract of 1-205673.
Japanese Abstract of 8-340521.
Kuntz Curtis A.
Ramakrishnaiah Melur
Samsung Electronics Co,. Ltd.
Sughrue Mion Zinn Macpeak & Seas, PLLC
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