Abstract: In a system for displaying medical images, medical images are generated from views internally within a body by means of x-rays, CAT scan, or MRI. The images are spaced in time or are views of spaced slices through tissue or through an organ within a body. The spacing between the images is such that the display of the images as a motion picture would result in the motion being depicted as jerky in the motion picture. A video processor generates dense motion vector fields between adjacent frames of the original set of images and, from the dense motion vector fields, generates interpolated images between the images of the original set. The interpolated images are assembled into a motion picture set of images, which are displayed by a video display device.

Abstract: In an Internet telephony system, personal computers are interconnected by means of the Internet to transmit and receive voice sounds detected by microphones connected to the personal computers. Each personal computer is provided with a capability to adjust the sensitivity of the microphone at the remote personal computer. By means of the same control, each personal computer can also adjust the gain of the local speaker.

Abstract: In a system for displaying medical images, medical images are generated from views internally within a body by means of x-rays, CAT scan, or MRI. The images are spaced in time or are views of spaced slices through tissue or through an organ within a body. The spacing between the images is such that the display of the images as a motion picture would result in the motion being depicted as jerky in the motion picture. A video processor generates dense motion vector fields between adjacent frames of the original set of images and, from the dense motion vector fields, generates interpolated images between the images of the original set. The interpolated images are assembled into a motion picture set of images, which are displayed by a video display device.

Abstract: A system for determining an individual phone rate for a user from an originating device to a destination device comprises a user calling pattern information module, a destination gateway provider module, a margin multiplier calculator module, and an individual rate calculator module. The user calling pattern information module stores information about the user such as the destinations the user calls or desires to call frequently and the percentage of time the user calls or plans to call the frequently called destinations. Such information may be inputted directly from the user or may be determined from the user's historical billing records. The destination gateway provider information module stores information relating to the cost and profit margin of the provider servicing the connection to the destination device.

Abstract: In a video processing system selected frames are eliminated to reduce the amount of video data. The frames are selected for elimination by scoring the frames to determine which frames can be eliminated and then most easily recreated from the remaining video after the elimination has taken place. When frames are eliminated, residuals are produced representing the difference between the recreated frames and the corresponding original frames which were eliminated. The frame elimination and generation of residuals is carried out in repeated cycles to progressively reduce the size of the remaining video until the amount of data in the computed residuals for each frame in the reduced video equals or exceeds the amount of data in the corresponding frames.

Abstract: The present invention includes a method or Internet phone for automatically dialing up a phone call connection across an Internet connection. Initially the caller manually dials a recipient's telephone number, and once the telephone call connection is made, the caller party's Internet phone automatically starts a dialing routine which notifies the recipient party's Internet phone that a phone call connection over an Internet connection is desired. The dialing may be a differential ringing sequence, a differential timing sequence or a single ringing interval. Upon the dialing routine being detected by the recipient party's Internet phone, the parties end the telephone connection and proceed to make separate connections to the Internet, including a connection to a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP). The caller party and recipient party Internet phones submit information related to their respective Internet protocol address and telephone numbers.

Abstract: In a video display system, a video is divided into scenes at scene cuts and the scenes are divided into subsequences of uniform duration. The sub sequences are combined into composites called super-frames, which are compressed. The compressed super-frames are played back by being decompressed and the video frames are derived from the super-frames to achieve a simulated version of the original video.

Abstract: In a video camera surveillance system, a video processor determines dense motion vector fields between adjacent frames of the video. From the dense motion vector fields moving objects are detected and objects undergoing unexpected motion are highlighted in the display fo the video. To distinguish expected motion from unexpected motion, dense motion vector fields are stored representing expected motion and the vectors representing the moving object are compared with the stored vectors to determine whether the object motion is expected or unexpected. In an alternative embodiment, the video surveillance system comprises a panning camera and the frames of the video are arranged in a mosaic. Object motion in the video is detected by means of dense motion vector fields and the predicted position of objects in the mosaic is detected based on the detected object motion.

Abstract: In a video processing system a video processor is connected to receive a video from a video motion picture source. The video processor detects when a sequence of frames in a received video represents camera motion such as camera panning rates or camera zooming rates outside of predetermined guidelines. The system corrects for the guidelines being exceeded by retiming the video frames to be within the guidelines and then produces new frames by interpolation at standard video frame rates between the retimed frames.

Abstract: In the motion picture display system, successive frames of a motion picture are compared to determine the dense motion vector fields representing the change of position of image elements in the images represented by the frames. Interpolated frames are generated by scaling the vectors of the dense motion vector fields to a fraction of their original magnitudes and moving image elements in the corresponding frames to positions in the interpolated frames in accordance with the dense motion vector fields. The invention is used to eliminate jerky motion in low frame rate motion pictures and also to provide slow motion in high frame rate motion pictures.

Abstract: In a pixel based display system, zoom logic is added to the data stream of a RAMDAC. In the zoom logic, horizontal lines of image data are stored in locations spaced apart in an intermediate frame buffer. The horizontal scan lines are read into a single line buffer and then the data is read from the single line buffer to generate an enlarged display image. Digital filtering may be employed to generate interpolated values for pixels between the original values in the zoomed image.

Abstract: In a pixel display system, a plug-to-plug compatible pixel decoder palette is provided which is responsive to a predetermined sequence of commands on an I/O data channel to switch the mode of operation of the pixel decoder palette. The pixel coder palette comprises a random access memory used as a look-up table to store colors to be displayed and the I/O channel is used to store new colors in or read colors out from the random access memory. The different modes of operation of the pixel decoder palette involve operating on intensity values represented by 6-bit bytes and 8-bit bytes and involve continuous edge graphics wherein pixels bridging boundaries between objects are displayed as mixes of the colors on each side of the boundary.

Abstract: In a pixel based color display system, a pixel responsive control is provided for high speed loading of new colors in the random access memory of the system used as a look-up table. In the system, pixel words representing addresses in a random access memory in which colors to be displayed are stored are applied in sequence to the random access memory to cause the colors to be read out in sequence to generate red, green and blue video signals representing the colors read out from the random access memory. The pixel responsive control responds to a predetermined pixel word in the stream of pixel words applied to the address port of the random access memory to cause a new color to be stored in a selected storage location of the random access memory. The new color and the address in which the new color is to be stored is specified in the pixel words immediately following the predetermined pixel word.

Abstract: In a pixel based color display system, aliasing is minimized by controlling the colors in pixels, bridging boundaries of objects of the image to be blends of the colors on each side of the boundary. Blends are controlled in accordance with pixel words containing mix values. Provision is made for drawing lines one pixel line with aliasing minimized in the boundaries of the lines wherein the same mix value controls the blend in adjacent pixels bridging the leading and trailing edge of a diagonal line.

Abstract: An encoder (12) in an image-display system converts explicitly represented pixel values from an image source (14) into mix-run-encoded representations thereof and stores them into the locations of a display memory (16). A display mechanism (18) draws the resultant stored data from the display memory and interprets them in accordance with a mix-run-encoding scheme of a type previously used for anti-aliasing purposes. As a consequence, the system is able to provide a wide range of color shades with only modest-sized display and palette memories (16 and 36).

Abstract: Smoothing information consisting of a mix value which indicates what percentage of the new color is to be displayed in a given pixel is stored in a pixel-plane memory. The value for the percentage for the old color is derived by subtracting the indicated percentage from 100%. Three methods for encoding the mix value for a pixel are disclosed.The first method allocates specific bits for color and mix values. The second method encodes either mixing or color values in each pixel word. The subsequent pixel word is checked before deciding the proper treatment of a given pixel. The third method encodes either a color value or multiple mix values in each pixel word. The mix information is then displayed as a set of sub-pixels.

Abstract: In a display system for generating a display of graphic objects over a video camera picture, the graphic objects to be displayed are represented by transition specifications stored in a memory. The transition specifications contain data identifying the horizontal position at the start of each transition between the camera picture and the graphic object, the width of the transition, the brightness in the graphic object, and a weight step value corresponding to the inverse of the width of the transition. As the electron beam of a cathode ray tube display device traverses a transition, a weighting value is continuously computed by changing the weighting value from the beginning value on one side to the final value on the other side in steps equal to weight step size. The computed weighting value is used to control the mixing of the video camera picture signal and a video signal representing the graphic objects in the transitions between the video camera picture and the graphic objects.

Abstract: In a cathode ray tube display system in which objects to be displayed are represented by digital signals, a technique is employed to reduce distortion caused by aliasing. The objects to be displayed are represented in a memory by transition specifications which represent the object to be displayed by defining the character of the edges of the object to be displayed. From the transition specifications, a video signal is generated and applied to the cathode ray tube display device to display the object represented by the stored transition specifications. The circuitry generating the video signal causes the video to change in steps across the width of a transition from the brightness prior to the edge to the final brightness of the other side of the edge with the width of the transition varying in accordance with the slope that the edge makes with the raster scan line.