Patents Examined by Diana Hickey
  • Patent number: 9430869
    Abstract: The subject matter of this specification can be embodied in, among other things, a method that includes generating intermediate values from an evaluation of one or more static expressions within shader programming code that is configured to modify an appearance of an image, compressing the intermediate values based on a determination of which intermediate values are duplicative, and storing the compressed intermediate values in a buffer accessible to an image rendering application.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 8, 2013
    Date of Patent: August 30, 2016
    Assignee: LUCASFILM ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY LTD.
    Inventors: Charlie A. Kilpatrick, Brian W. Smith
  • Patent number: 9390561
    Abstract: Methods for generating and displaying personalized virtual billboards within an augmented reality environment are described. The personalized virtual billboards may facilitate the sharing of personalized information between persons within an environment who have varying degrees of acquaintance (e.g., ranging from close familial relationships to strangers). In some embodiments, a head-mounted display device (HMD) may detect a mobile device associated with a particular person within an environment, acquire a personalized information set corresponding with the particular person, generate a virtual billboard based on the personalized information set, and display the virtual billboard on the HMD. The personalized information set may include information associated with the particular person such as shopping lists and classified advertisements.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 12, 2013
    Date of Patent: July 12, 2016
    Assignee: MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING, LLC
    Inventors: Cameron G. Brown, Abby Lee, Brian J. Mount, Daniel J. McCulloch, Michael J. Scavezze, Ryan L. Hastings, John Bevis, Mike Thomas, Ron Amador-Leon
  • Patent number: 9383959
    Abstract: An object is to provide a mobile electronic device and an input method that can display soft keys corresponding to each of the characters of different character kinds appropriately even in a state where the display screen of the display unit is used horizontally. In a state where the display screen is used vertically, the control unit splits the display screen into upper and lower sides and displays the plurality of soft keys in the display screen uniformly. In a state where the display screen is used horizontally, the control unit splits the display screen into right and left sides, and displays the first character kind character on one side, and displays the second character kind character on the other side, and displays a plurality of soft keys on either one of the one side or the other side in a right-left direction.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 25, 2012
    Date of Patent: July 5, 2016
    Assignee: KYOCERA CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yuuki Wada, Tsuneo Miyashita
  • Patent number: 9355483
    Abstract: A system, method, and computer program product are provided for shading primitive fragments. A target buffer may be recast when shaded samples that are covered by a primitive fragment are generated at a first shading rate using a first sampling mode, the shaded samples are stored in the target buffer that is associated with the first sampling mode and the first shading rate, a second sampling mode is determined, and the target buffer is associated with the second sampling mode. A sampling mode and/or shading rate may be changed for a primitive. A primitive fragment that is associated with a first sampling mode and a first shading rate is received and a second sampling mode is determined for the primitive fragment. Shaded samples corresponding to the primitive fragment are generated, at a second shading rate, using the second sampling mode and the shaded samples are stored in a target buffer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 19, 2013
    Date of Patent: May 31, 2016
    Assignee: NVIDIA Corporation
    Inventors: Eric B. Lum, Rouslan L. Dimitrov, Ignacio Llamas Ubieto, Patrick James Neill, Yury Uralsky, Albert Meixner
  • Patent number: 9341488
    Abstract: A method for improving and extending an existing digital road network and generating new networks from statistically relevant amounts of probe data recorded by GPS-enabled navigation devices. New probe data is matched to the existing digital map, then the data merged into the existing network using a time-dependent weight and/or accuracy-dependent weight. A recalculation date is established, and the weight value of a line segment and/or trace is adjusted as a function of the time span relative to the recalculation. The function may include setting a maximal time period divided into bins each having a respective weight reduction factor, or applying decay function. Through this technique, digital maps can be updated and extended without undue influence exerted by old trace data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 23, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 17, 2016
    Assignees: TomTom North America Inc., TomTom Germany GmbH & Co. KG
    Inventors: Heiko Mund, Clayton Richard Morlock
  • Patent number: 9342862
    Abstract: A system for displaying an image in a viewport includes a zoom subsystem (6) arranged for gradually zooming the image (401) towards a scale factor at which the image just fits within the viewport (302). The zoom (6) subsystem is arranged for keeping a fixed point (403) fixed within the viewport (302). The fixed point (403) depends on a pan/zoom parameter (7) of the image (401) at the time zooming starts. The fixed point (403) is a point of the image (401) which is being displayed in the viewport (302) at the time zooming starts. The image (401) is capable of being zoomed to a zoom level at which the image just fits within the viewport (302), while the fixed point (403) is kept fixed with respect to the viewport (302).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 28, 2011
    Date of Patent: May 17, 2016
    Assignee: Koninklijke Philips N.V.
    Inventors: Sorin Alexandru Cristescu, Tibor Duliskovich, Jacobus Sigbertus Marie Geraats, Harold Johannes Antonius Peeters, Wijnand Post
  • Patent number: 9311727
    Abstract: A tennis swing movement analyzing apparatus of the present invention includes an acquisition unit configured to acquire sampling data obtained by sampling a swing movement of a tennis racket by a user; a calculation unit configured to, based on the sampling data, calculate an indicator selected from among the velocity, the acceleration, the angular velocity, and the position of the tennis racket or a ball hit by the tennis racket and an arbitrary combination thereof; and a screen creation unit configured to create a GUI screen displaying a graph area that is divided into a plurality of areas respectively indicating types of swings and displaying the indicator in the graph area.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 15, 2012
    Date of Patent: April 12, 2016
    Assignee: Dunlop Sports Co. Ltd.
    Inventors: Yosuke Yamamoto, Hironori Takihara, Kuniyasu Horiuchi
  • Patent number: 9269281
    Abstract: A server apparatus renders a process result of software on an image memory that stores a display image to be displayed on a client terminal, detects an update area in which an update occurs between frames of an image. The server apparatus selectively switches and performs a first generation process and a second generation process according to the number of detected update areas. The first generation process is a process that generates a color map for each update area based on colors used in the update area. The second generation process is a process that generates a color map commonly used between the update areas based on colors used in images of the update areas. The server apparatus reduces the number of colors in an update area using the generated color map and transmits a compressed image of the update area to the client terminal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 14, 2012
    Date of Patent: February 23, 2016
    Assignee: FUJITSU LIMITED
    Inventors: Kazuki Matsui, Kenichi Horio, Ryo Miyamoto, Tomoharu Imai
  • Patent number: 9259647
    Abstract: The image generating program makes the image generating device perform: setting a number of increase or decrease objects in at least one of a plurality of regions on a field having the plurality of regions divided from each other and connected to each other; generating a display image including a display corresponding to the field and the set number of increase or decrease objects; generating the display image in which an increase or decrease number corresponding to a selected level is set in the region within a predetermined area; generating the display image in which the number of increase or decrease objects is increased or decreased on a basis of the set increase or decrease number; and ending the stage when the number of increase or decrease objects set in each of the regions becomes a predetermined value as a result of the increase or decrease.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 21, 2011
    Date of Patent: February 16, 2016
    Assignees: SONY CORPORATION, SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT INC.
    Inventors: Koji Tada, Wataru Kato, Masasuke Yasumoto, Masahiko Sato
  • Patent number: 9262848
    Abstract: A method of stroking a curved path with a fill of pre-determined thickness, where the path has line segments defined by a number of points, the method being performed by forming a number of projection lines normal to the curved path at the points, where each of the projection lines has a length based on the fill thickness, determining an intersection between a set of the projection lines, the intersection indicating the occurrence of a void in stroking the curved path, and then constructing one or more polygons filling in the void in the stroked path.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 1, 2013
    Date of Patent: February 16, 2016
    Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Evgeny Vostrikov, Ian Robert Boreham, Mindy Xie, Peter William Mitchell Ilbery
  • Patent number: 9230296
    Abstract: A method of controlling micromirrors of reset groups of a spatial light modulator (SLM) digital micromirror array is disclosed. In a first reset operation, the positions of a first subgroup of micromirrors of a reset group are set based on a first portion of a first bitplane and the positions of a second subgroup of micromirrors of the same reset group are set based on a first portion of a second bitplane. Then, in a second reset operation, the positions of the first subgroup are set based on a second portion of the second bitplane and the positions of the second subgroup are set based on a second portion of a first bitplane. In one example, subsets of alternating rows of micromirrors of the same reset group are successively set according to alternating data corresponding to different ones of first and second bitplanes.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 28, 2013
    Date of Patent: January 5, 2016
    Assignee: TEXAS INSTRUMENTS INCORPORATED
    Inventors: Todd Alan Clatanoff, Philip Scott King, Jeffrey Mathew Kempf
  • Patent number: 9214135
    Abstract: A computer-implemented method monitors a video-based graphic. The method includes displaying a video-based graphic. A position of a pointer is monitored. The method includes determining a transparency of the video-based graphic at a location of the pointer. An action is performed based on the determined transparency of the video-based graphic at a location of the pointer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 18, 2011
    Date of Patent: December 15, 2015
    Assignee: YAHOO! INC.
    Inventor: Lawrence Anthony Deguzman
  • Patent number: 9207900
    Abstract: A method and system for controlling the rendering of graphical data for remote display, e.g. for delivery over a network (6) to a remote client (7). At a source computer (1), graphical data is rendered and transmitted to the remote computer (7). At the remote computer (7), the transmitted rendered graphical data is received and presented for display. The rate of presenting at the remote computer (7) of the graphical data is monitored and the rate at which graphical data are rendered at the source computer (1) is controlled in response to the monitored rate of presenting at the remote computer (7).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 19, 2010
    Date of Patent: December 8, 2015
    Assignee: BRITISH TELECOMMUNICATIONS public limited company
    Inventor: Jeremy D Barnsley
  • Patent number: 9129419
    Abstract: A method monitors an evolution of a physical quantity. The method includes measuring the evolution of the value of the physical quantity, and displaying in a first graphical zone a bar graph representing the evolution of the value received from the sensor until this value reaches a first threshold, the graphical zone has a first displaying scale. When the monitored value reaches the first threshold, the bar graph is displayed and represents the evolution of the value received from the sensor in a second graphical zone. The second graphical zone is a zoom of a part of the first graphical zone and has at least a second displaying scale. At least one magnified portion of the second graphical zone is further displayed, the magnified portion having at least a third displaying scale.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 21, 2013
    Date of Patent: September 8, 2015
    Assignee: Siemens Aktiengesellschaft
    Inventor: Stephane Vanhoecke
  • Patent number: 9105106
    Abstract: For scaling an input image into an output image, the method comprises, for a point of the output sampling grid which is not in the input sampling grid: calculating a plurality of interpolated pixel values by applying respective interpolators; determining respective loss values associated with the interpolated pixel values; and providing a pixel value of the output image using at least one of the interpolated pixel values selected by minimizing the loss value.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 9, 2011
    Date of Patent: August 11, 2015
    Assignee: Zoran (France) S.A.
    Inventor: Christophe Bernard
  • Patent number: 8952988
    Abstract: An information processing apparatus includes first and second display control units and an operation region specifying unit. The first display control unit is configured to control display of an image of a content by displaying a plurality of article information pieces in a plurality of regions laid out in advance in the image, the article information pieces each being constituted of one of a character string and a picture image, and the article information pieces and the regions being correlated with each other. The operation region specifying unit is configured to specify on which of the regions in the image an operation is performed. The second display control unit is configured to control display of an additional image by displaying the article information pieces in a predetermined region in the image, the article information pieces excepting the article information piece correlated with the specified region.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 13, 2012
    Date of Patent: February 10, 2015
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshihito Ohki, Tatsushi Nashida, Shoichiro Moriya