Abstract: A system and method for receiving and displaying computer animations and graphical user interfaces, comprising interactive, animated, semi-transparent graphics and/or combined text or other displayable information. The animations are received from a data storage system or a network through a data stream, and possibly created, modified and destroyed either through the data stream or as a consequence of a user action on the interactive items. In addition, the animations are intended to be semi-transparently displayed over a background video content, either in a single or in a set of digital video file(s) or stream(s).

Abstract: The invention concerns a method for segmenting video images into elementary objects. Said method consists in defining (A) an initial boundary (CD) entirely surrounding the object (OBJ); defining (B), on the basis of the initial boundary (CD), an original active boundary (CAO) constituting of a set of nodes, each formed by a point of said contour and an elastic energy function representing the distance separating said node and a neighbouring node; subjecting (C) the original active boundary (CAO) to a convergent deformation, (D) by moving at least one node towards the natural boundary (CN) of the elementary object to obtain a current active contour (CAC); subjecting each current active boundary (CAC) to a deformation by iterations (E) as long as the condition is fulfilled, to obtain a final active boundary substantially identical to the object natural boundary. The invention is useful for processing fixed or video images.