Motion video signal processing for recording or reproducing – Local trick play processing – With randomly accessible medium
Reexamination Certificate
1997-10-14
2001-11-20
Tran, Thai (Department: 2615)
Motion video signal processing for recording or reproducing
Local trick play processing
With randomly accessible medium
C386S349000, C386S349000, C360S008000, C369S032010
Reexamination Certificate
active
06321026
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of video compression systems, and in particular to programmable DVD video encoders.
2. Description of the Related Art
A video program signal is converted to a digital format, and then compressed and encoded in accordance with one of several known compression algorithms or methodologies. This compressed digital system signal, or bitstream, which includes a video portion, an audio portion, and other informational portion, is then transmitted to a receiver. Transmission may be over existing television channels, cable television channels, satellite communications channels, and the like. A decoder is then typically employed at the receiver to decompress and decode the received system signal in accordance with the same compression algorithm used to encode the signal. The decoded video information may then be output to a display device, such as a television (TV) monitor.
Video compression and encoding is typically performed by a video encoder. The video encoder normally produces a compressed digital system signal that conforms to a recognized standard or specification agreed to among the senders and receivers of digital video signals. One such standard is DVD. It includes audio and video compression technologies, as well as provisions for other information streams. The video compression standard adopted by DVD was developed by the Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG). The MPEG standard concerns high-quality coding of possibly interlaced video, including high definition television (HDTV). A wide range of applications, bit rates, resolutions, signal qualities and services are addressed, including all forms of digital storage media, TV broadcasting and communications.
The MPEG standard, although it details the structure and syntax of the compressed bitstreams, does not provide complete system specifications. A nearly infinite number of bitstreams can be generated to represent an image sequence while conforming to the MPEG standard. Design considerations such as image preprocessing, motion estimation methods, the order of compressed frame types, bit-rate management, implementation complexity, coded image size, color space sampling, and field interleaving, all lead to different representations of the same image. It should be recognized that the different representations may have varying degrees of quality, both in terms of compression and accuracy, but they all conform to the MPEG standard. A somewhat lesser degree of freedom exists in the way a bitstream is decoded, but nevertheless exists. For example, note that some video degradation might be an acceptable tradeoff for reduced implementation complexity, or that the coded image characteristics (size, frame rate) might be incompatible with the display device and require some adjustments (scaling, pulldown). The MPEG standard carefully avoids addressing issues such as these, preferring instead to allow industries to “customize” encoder and decoder implementations to their best advantage.
Currently, the customization of the encoder and decoder implementations is performed by the system designers primarily using a combination of hardware and proprietary microcode, and the displayed image quality thereby determined. One drawback of this approach is that the digital media vendors cannot easily “improve” image quality to distinguish themselves from their competitors, nor can then easily upgrade their systems to incorporate the latest compression advances. It is desirable to provide a method for DVD media vendors to participate in the encoder and decoder customization process to produce media classes that provide for optimized trade-offs (e.g. capacity vs. image quality), and in so doing provide better performances for specific applications.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The problems outlined above are in large part solved by a recordable DVD disk which includes a read-only sector for specifying a video encoding algorithm to be used for compressing video programs that are to be recorded in the recordable region of the recordable DVD disk. Such disks may be used in a digital video recording system having a programmable video encoder. In one embodiment, the system accepts the recordable DVD disks having a read-only sector for storing customized video encoding algorithms and programs the programmable video encoder with the customized video encoding algorithms prior to encoding and recording a video signal on the disk. By designing the video encoding algorithms to optimize one or more of a number of desirable attributes, the DVD media vendors can then create “classes” of recordable DVD disks, i.e. high capacity, high quality, high speed, high image detail, high color resolution, variable frame rate, etc. One programmable video encoder for this embodiment would include an instruction memory for storing the customized video algorithms, a video buffer for buffering the video signal, and a CPU which encodes the video signal according to the customized video algorithms.
Broadly speaking, the present invention contemplates a recordable digital information storage medium for use in a programmable digital video recording system having a read head, a video encoder, and a record head. The video encoder is operatively coupled to the read head to receive a video encoding algorithm for encoding a video signal. The record head is operatively coupled to the video encoder to receive the encoded digital signal. The storage medium includes a read-only sector and a recordable sector. The read-only sector stores the video encoding algorithm and communicates the video encoding algorithm to the read head when the two are engaged in an operative relationship. The recordable sector receives and stores the encoded digital signal from the read head when they are engaged in an operative relationship.
The present invention further contemplates a recordable DVD disk for storing video bitstreams having an optimized attribute. The recordable DVD disk includes an algorithm sector and a recordable sector. The algorithm sector stores an MPEG-2 video encoding algorithm for encoding video signals into video bitstreams having the optimized attribute. The recordable sector records the video bitstreams. The optimized attribute may be image quality optimized relative to a predetermined disk capacity and/or record time.
The present invention still further contemplates a method for recording a video program on a recordable DVD disk. The method comprises: (i) designing a MPEG-2 video encoding algorithm for encoding video signals into video bitstreams having an optimized attribute, (ii) creating a recordable DVD disk with a read-only sector and a recordable sector; and (iii) placing the recordable DVD disk in a programmable video recording system. The read only sector stores the video encoding algorithm, and the recordable sector stores the video bitstreams.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5150339 (1992-09-01), Ueda et al.
patent: 5576757 (1996-11-01), Roberts et al.
patent: 5915018 (1999-06-01), Aucsmith
patent: 5973742 (1999-10-01), Gardyne et al.
LSI Logic Corporation
Tran Thai
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