Abstract: One aspect of the invention is directed to a system and method for video cataloging. The video is cataloged according to predefined or user definable metadata. The metadata is used to index and then retrieve encoded video. Video feature extractors produce metadata tracks from the video information, and each metadata track indexes the stored video information. A feature extractor registration interface registers the video feature extractors, providing for registration with the video engine of new video feature extractors with new metadata tracks.

Abstract: One aspect of the invention is directed to a system and method for video cataloging. The video is cataloged according to predefined or user definable metadata. The metadata is used to index and then retrieve encoded video.

Abstract: One aspect of the invention is directed to a system and method for video cataloging. The video is cataloged according to predefined or user definable metadata. The metadata is used to index and then retrieve encoded video.

Abstract: A similarity-based database of images, where images are preferably ranked and correlated in correspondence to biological preattentive similarity, supports a new type of interface for visual navigation within the database to the end that a human may perceive not only selected images resultant from a query, but the relationship between the selected images. In particular, navigation is within a display space whose geometric characteristics depend on the geometry of the perceptual space in which image similarity is measured. The display space is a subset of the three dimensional Euclidean space that, for many of the distance functions appropriate to the images, is contained in the unit cube. The perceptual intuition of the metric is given (i) in part by the distribution of images in the space, and (ii) in part by making the motion of the user uniform with respect to the metric of the space.

Abstract: A system and method for improving the retrieval performance of a query engine in a visual information retrieval (VIR) system by encoding domain-specific knowledge into the VIR system through a visual dictionary or "victionary". The victionary is a dictionary-like information-mapping module that is used to retrieve visual information at a "semantic" level. A VIR system that performs generic image processing is enhanced by adding a query transformation unit and a query expansion unit, i.e., the victionary. With these additional components, a user may present a query either as a text term (such as a keyword or phrase), or as an image (with weights) and execute a "semantic query". During semantic query processing, the victionary-enhanced system transforms the user's original term (or image query) to a set of equivalent queries, and internally executes all the equivalent queries before presenting the results to the user.

Abstract: A system and method for content-based search and retrieval of visual objects. A base visual information retrieval (VIR) engine utilizes a set of universal primitives to operate on the visual objects. An extensible VIR engine allows custom, modular primitives to be defined and registered. A custom primitive addresses domain specific problems and can utilize any image understanding technique. Object attributes can be extracted over the entire image or over only a portion of the object. A schema is defined as a specific collection of primitives. A specific schema implies a specific set of visual features to be processed and a corresponding feature vector to be used for content-based similarity scoring. A primitive registration interface registers custom primitives and facilitates storing of an analysis function and a comparison function to a schema table. A heterogeneous comparison allows objects analyzed by different schemas to be compared if at least one primitive is in common between the schemas.

Abstract: A system and method for content-based search and retrieval of visual objects. A base visual information retrieval (VIR) engine utilizes a set of universal primitives to operate on the visual objects. An extensible VIR engine allows custom, modular primitives to be defined and registered. A custom primitive addresses domain specific problems and can utilize any image understanding technique. Object attributes can be extracted over the entire image or over only a portion of the object. A schema is defined as a specific collection of primitives. A specific schema implies a specific set of visual features to be processed and a corresponding feature vector to be used for content-based similarity scoring. A primitive registration interface registers custom primitives and facilitates storing of an analysis function and a comparison function to a schema table. A heterogeneous comparison allows objects analyzed by different schemas to be compared if at least one primitive is in common between the schemas.

Abstract: A system and method for content-based search and retrieval of visual objects. A base visual information retrieval (VIR) engine utilizes a set of universal primitives to operate on the visual objects. An extensible VIR engine allows custom, modular primitives to be defined and registered. A custom primitive addresses domain specific problems and can utilize any image understanding technique. Object attributes can be extracted over the entire image or over only a portion of the object. A schema is defined as a specific collection of primitives. A specific schema implies a specific set of visual features to be processed and a corresponding feature vector to be used for content-based similarity scoring. A primitive registration interface registers custom primitives and facilitates storing of an analysis function and a comparison function to a schema table. A heterogeneous comparison allows objects analyzed by different schemas to be compared if at least one primitive is in common between the schemas.

Abstract: A system and method for content-based search and retrieval of visual objects. A base visual information retrieval (VIR) engine utilizes a set of universal primitives to operate on the visual objects. An extensible VIR engine allows custom, modular primitives to be defined and registered. A custom primitive addresses domain specific problems and can utilize any image understanding technique. Object attributes can be extracted over the entire image or over only a portion of the object. A schema is defined as a specific collection of primitives. A specific schema implies a specific set of visual features to be processed and a corresponding feature vector to be used for content-based similarity scoring. A primitive registration interface registers custom primitives and facilitates storing of an analysis function and a comparison function to a schema table. A heterogeneous comparison allows objects analyzed by different schemas to be compared if at least one primitive is in common between the schemas.

Abstract: Immersive video, or television, images of a real-world scene are synthesized, including on demand and/or in real time, as are linked to any of a particular perspective on the scene, or an object or event in the scene. Synthesis is in accordance with user-specified parameters of presentation, including presentations that are any of panoramic, magnified, stereoscopic, or possessed of motional parallax. The image synthesis is based on computerized video processing--called "hypermosaicing"--of multiple video perspectives on the scene. In hypermosaicing a knowledge database contains information about the scene; for example scene geometry, shapes and behaviors of objects in the scene, and/or internal and/or external camera calibration models. Multiple video cameras each at a different spatial location produce multiple two-dimensional video images of the scene. A viewer/user specifies viewing criterion (ia) at a viewer interface.

Abstract: Each and any viewer of a video or a television scene is his or her own proactive editor of the scene, having the ability to interactively dictate and select--in advance of the unfolding of the scene and by high-level command--a particular perspective by which the scene will be depicted, as and when the scene unfolds. Video images of the scene are selected, or even synthesized, in response to a viewer-selected (i) spatial perspective on the scene, (ii) static or dynamic object appearing in the scene, or (iii) event depicted in the scene. Multiple video cameras, each at a different spatial location, produce multiple two-dimensional video images of the real-world scene, each at a different spatial perspective. Objects of interest in the scene are identified and classified by computer in these two-dimensional images. The two-dimensional images of the scene, and accompanying information, are then combined in the computer into a three-dimensional video database, or model, of the scene.

Abstract: Each and any viewer of a video or a television scene is his or her own proactive editor of the scene, having the ability to interactively dictate and select--in advance of the unfolding of the scene and by high-level command--a particular perspective by which the scene will be depicted, as and when the scene unfolds. Video images of the scene are selected, or even synthesized, in response no a viewer-selected (i) spatial perspective on the scene, (ii) static or dynamic object appearing in the scene, or (iii) event depicted in the scene. Multiple video cameras, each at a different spatial location, produce multiple two-dimensional video images of the real-world scene, each at a different spatial perspective. Objects of interest in the scene are identified and classified by computer in these two-dimensional images. The two-dimensional images of the scene, and accompanying information, are then combined in the computer into a three-dimensional video database, or model, of the scene.