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US5552824A Expired / Lapsed US ⏱️ 0.0 years remaining

Line object scene generation apparatus

Assignee: Lynx System Developers Inc
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Filing: 1994-06-28
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Granted: 1996-09-03
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Expires: 2014-06-28
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Abstract

Abstract A system for recording and displaying a time-sequential scene on a computer comprising a digital camera, an image timer, and a main control computer. The digital camera transmits a sequence of digital image frames to the timer representative of the image of a body passing a plane in space. Each frame represents a line object of the body, thus forming a fractional part of the scene. Once the frame reaches the image timer, it is digitally marked with a time reference and buffered into a block of information. The main control computer stores blocks of information from the image timer for a variety of processing and features available to the user. The invention also provides a compression system for compressing a sequence of digital image frames for storage into a selected memory, preferably a virtual memory subsystem, or hard-disc drive. Preferred constructions for adjusting camera pixel processing of light values, time-marking the images, creating color palettes for interactive viewing of color images, and video data coding to accommodate the high volume of line image data are described.

Inventors

  • 👤 Douglas J. DeAngelis
  • 👤 Kirk Sigel
  • 👤 Mike Ciholas

Bibliographic Details

Application Number —
Jurisdiction US
Data Source google_patents
Last Synchronized 2026-11-09 17:00
CPC Classifications
H; H04; H04N; H04N7/00; H04N7/12; H04N7/122; A; A63; A63B; A63B71/00; A63B71/06; A63B71/0605; G; G04; G04F; G04F13/00; G04F13/02; G07; G07C; G07C1/00; G07C1/22; G07C1/24; H04N23/00; H04N23/60; H04N23/63; H04N23/70; H04N23/76; A63B2220/00; A63B2220/80; A63B2220/806

Claims Analysis

Total Claims: 7
Claim 1
Independent Claim 117 words
An event recording video camera comprising optical means for imaging a visual field; a line sensor for converting a fixed line portion of the imaged visual field into electrical signals representative of a line of pixels of the image of said field, the line of pixels constituting a frame representative of said fixed line portion at an instant in time; circuit means in said camera for processing said electrical signals to form a digital output stream containing digitized pixel values of a sequence of frames at a high scanning rate; a buffer for storing said digital output stream before transmission; and compression means for compressing data in said buffer to reduce bandwidth thereof before it is transmitted.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim 117 words
An event recording video camera comprising optical means for imaging a visual field; a line sensor for converting a fixed line portion of the imaged visual field into electrical signals representative of a line of pixels of the image of said field, the line of pixels constituting a frame representative of said fixed line portion at an instant in time; circuit means in said camera for processing said electrical signals to form a digital output stream containing digitized pixel values of a sequence of frames at a high scanning rate; a buffer for storing said digital output stream before transmission; and compression means for compressing data in said buffer to reduce bandwidth thereof before it is transmitted.
Claim 3
Dependent Claim 60 words
An event recording camera according to claim 1, further comprising selection means responsive to contents of the buffer for selecting a compression mode, said selection means selecting a first mode of compression when said buffer is relatively empty, and selecting a second mode of compression when said buffer is relatively full, said second mode compressing more than said first mode.
Claim 4
Dependent Claim 19 words
A video camera according to claim 2, wherein one of said compression modes includes line to line differencing compression.
Claim 5
Dependent Claim 34 words
A video camera according to claim 2, wherein said compression means includes noise band quantization means, for compressing two digitized pixels that differ only by a threshold noise amount to a single compressed value.
Claim 6
Dependent Claim 17 words
A video camera according to claim 2, wherein said compression mode includes frame to frame predictive coding.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim 24 words
A video camera according to claim 2, wherein said pixel values include color values and said compression mode compresses values for each color separately.

USPTO Annuity & Maintenance Windows

Annuity Stage Window Opens Payment Deadline Surcharge Period Until Estimated Fee Status
3.5 Years (Year 4) 1999-09-03 2000-03-04 2000-09-03 $2000.00 Window Closed / Lapsed
7.5 Years (Year 8) 2003-09-03 2004-03-04 2004-09-03 $3760.00 Window Closed / Lapsed
11.5 Years (Year 12) 2007-09-03 2008-03-04 2008-09-03 $7700.00 Window Closed / Lapsed

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