GB2327167A

GB2327167A - Identification of television commercials

Info

Publication number: GB2327167A
Application number: GB9714484A
Authority: GB
Inventors: John Robert Emmett
Original assignee: REGISTER GROUP Ltd
Current assignee: REGISTER GROUP Ltd
Priority date: 1997-07-09
Filing date: 1997-07-09
Publication date: 1999-01-13
Also published as: GB9714484D0

Abstract

A method of creating a register of television commercials comprises detecting electronically a first parameter indicating a start of a commercial segment, assigning an identification code to the commercial segment in accordance with one or more electronically measured parameters, detecting electronically a second parameter (which may be the same as the first parameter) indicating the end of the commercial segment, and subsequently comparing the identification code to a catalogue of such codes.

Description

Identification of Television Commercials The present invention relates to the identification of television commercials, called commercial segments, in a television transmission and to a system for recording instances of transmission of commercial segments.

The advertising industry requires information on advertising campaigns. Such information includes the number of times a particular TV commercial segment is broadcast, the country, the channel, and the time of transmission. The commercial segments themselves are catalogued according to a variety of parameters, such as product or product type, advertiser, etc. Typically, this information is collected manually to provide a register.

W093/22875 discloses a system in which broadcast segments are assigned an identification code or signature electronically. The signature is compared with a database of such signatures and so the occurrences of a segment are collated. The production of a signature is based on a pattern recognition technique. Such techniques require considerable computer processing power and much effort to ensure that matches and mismatches are adequately detected. As part of the system for identifying new segments (i.e. segments not yet having a signature on the database), parameters or cues such as fade to black (indicating a start or end of a segment) and duration are monitored to determine whether a commercial segment BE se has been detected.

A first aspect of the present invention provides a method of creating a register of television commercials, comprising detecting electronically a first parameter indicating a start of a commercial segment, assigning an identification code to the commercial segment in accordance with one or more electronically measured parameters, detecting electronically a second parameter (which may be the same as the first parameter) indicating the end of the commercial segment, and subsequently comparing the identification code to a catalogue of such codes.

By creating an identification code and confirming the existence of a segment before referring to the catalogue, the processing requirements are reduced.

Very preferably one or more parameters are measured which, alone or in combination, will provide a substantially unique identifier, a signature, to individual commercial segments. In particular, parameters are selected which reduce the likelihood of different commercial segments, that is different creative works, being accorded the same signature, or of broadcasts of the same commercial segment being accorded different signatures.

Preferably the parameters for creating the identification code are measured as a transmission is broadcast.

In a preferred form the system comprises, means for detecting electronically an indicator of a start of a commercial segment, means for recording the segment from the detection of a start, means for measuring electronically parameters of the segment and assigning electronically an identification code based on the measured parameters, means for detecting an indicator of an end of the segment, means for evaluating from the existence of the indicators and/or the measured parameters whether a commercial segment has been received, means for comparing the identification code to a catalogue of such codes if the evaluation indicates that a commercial segment has been received, and means for recording a coincidence between the identification code and a code in the catalogue.

Preferably, the means for recording the coincidence also records calendrical information such as date and time of the transmission.

Preferably, the receiver includes means for receiving transmitted television signals for a plurality of channels. Preferably the means for recording the coincidence records an identifier of the channel. This may include an identifier of the geographic origin of the signal, and/or the initial off air reception point if the signal is relayed to a central station, for example, by wire, retransmission or on tape.

Very preferably the commercial segment is stored at least temporarily and the means for determining a coincidence provides an indicator when a coincidence is not determined. A human operator may then analyse the stored commercial segment to determine if the commercial segment is new, i.e. the parameters are not previously stored, and may add the new commercial segment to the register. Preferably means is provided for identifying previously catalogued commercial segments having similar parameter values.

Preferably the human operator applies other parameters to the new segment, such as the name of the advertiser and the product type, which are not readily identifiable electronically. These can then be stored against the electronically created signature.

Thus the invention provides a system in which a signature is created electronically for a broadcast creative work, in particular a commercial segment. The signature is compared to a database of signatures and the transmission of an identified signature is recorded on the database.

A television transmission will normally incorporate an identifiable indicator at the start of each commercial break, i.e. sequence of commercial segments. A typical example is a black or blue frame. Thus, detection of this will normally indicate that a commercial break has started. However, there is a degree of uncertainty in this since some other transmitted programs may incorporate the "indicator" for other reasons. Typically, a commercial break will last for a length of time which is relatively short, one minute or three minutes, for example. Thus, by detecting the occurrence of another parameter indicative of a commercial break or a segment within this time scale, the system can confirm that a commercial break is being monitored.

In addition to detecting a commercial break, it is desirable to detect commercial segments within the break. There are parameters which are usually indicative of the end of a commercial segment, such as audio silence, and this may be used as an indicator in conjunction with video parameters such as are associated with a frozen frame or a fade to black. Again, there may be some uncertainty in this. Commercial segments are typically transmitted for an on integral number of time units, for instance ten seconds, long. Hence the presence of an audio silence dose to the end of a time unit will be a strong indicator that a segment has ended.

Measurement of the parameter values to confer a signature on a commercial segment may be a continuous process, it is not essential to first identify a commercial break or a commercial segment. Thus, when an indicator of the start of a segment is identified the parameters, whose values provide the signature, are measured. If a second indicator of a segment is not identified within a predetermined time, then the measured parameters values may be discarded, and the process repeated at the next segment start indicator.

Another aspect of the invention provides a system for applying an electronically identifiable identification code to a broadcast work, comprising measuring electronically a plurality of quantities which have integer values and operating on the integer values to create the signature.

Preferably, the broadcast work is a video work, and the quantities comprise one or more of: the run time of the work measured to a multiple of five seconds, the rum time of the work measured as a number of frames or fields, the number of shots in the work, the number of frames or fields in a shot, the number of fades.

Other aspects and preferred features of the invention will be apparent from the following description and the accompanying claims.

The invention will be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which Figure 1 is a schematic presentation of a system forming an embodiment of the invention, Figure 2 is a flow diagram illustrating the operation of the system of Figure 1.

Referring to Figure 1 of the drawings, a television signal is shown as being received by an aerial 2 and fed to an analyser 4. The analyser 4 is tunable to receive a particular television channel. It will be appreciated that the television signal may be received by cable - a so-called cable channel. Also television broadcasts may be received at a remote location and transmitted by land line to the analyser 4, or recorded, on tape for example, and then replayed for use by the analyser 4.

The analyser 4 detects the existence of a television commercial segment, as will be described hereinafter, assigns a signature to the commercial segment and feeds the signature, calendric information and other identifying information such as the channel to a database 6. The television commercial segment is also fed to a temporary store 8 which incorporates a tape drive, or other storage 10 for recording the segments. A local processing unit 12 allows an operator to access the temporarily stored segment and the database 6.

Figure 2 shows a flow chart for a simplified procedure for identifying commercial breaks and applying a signature to the commercial segments.

At step S1 a parameter indicating the start of a commercial break is detected, such as a plain colour video field and a timer To is set to zero and run to count elapsed time.

At step S2, parameters for determining a signature are measured.

At step S3, a second parameter indicating the presence of a commercial break or segment is identified. A comparison is made with the timer and the elapsed time Tel is less than a predetermined time Trnax, it is determined that a signature of a commercial sequence is being measured. If Tei > Tmax it is determined that a commercial break is not present.

Within step S2, individual segments within a break are monitored.

A switch from a commercial break to a program may be less easy to identify. Thus, a time-out calculation may be made and the parameter values of the last monitored open-ended "segment" may be discarded.

A wide variety of parameters may be measured to ascribe a signature to a commercial segment. The choice of parameters must take into account the characteristics of different transmission systems, distortions which may occur in transmission or recording, a variation of analogue parameters such as volume or signal strength.

Typical of parameters which may be measured are (i) the run time of a commercial segment - preferably as a count of picture frames rather than clock time; (ii) an integer count of the number of shots within a commercial segment, a shot being identified by the degree of frame to frame or field to field change in the video signal.

(iii) an integer count of the number of picture frames or fields for each shot; (iv) differential comparisons of non-integer video parameters, such as luminance or chrominance levels, measured either inside a picture area (inter frame measurement), or measured between picture frames with respect to time, (intra frame measurement).

(v) differential comparisons of audio parameters, such as the measurement of levels of closely associated frequency bands. These frequency bands may be chosen for centre frequency and bandwidth, by a process of statistical analysis of a large number of different occurrences, in order to determine the frequencies and bandwidths associated with the greatest mean variation between occurrences.

(vi) an integer count of the number of fades in a commercial segment, a fade being identified by the first and second differentials (rate of change, and rate of rate of change) of intra frame vision parameters, such as the luminance level.

The values of such parameters are expected to be substantially independent of the transmission process, i.e. they are present in the original production of the commercial segment and can be expected to be measurable and unchanged in the received, or off-air transmission.

Where parameters are measured which are prone to distortion in the transmission process, it is desirable to make comparative measurements within the segments using parameters which are subject to similar levels and types of distortion.

Preferably a measured value is given an alphanumeric code, the combination of codes providing an alphanumeric signature which, in time, may convey some familiarity or meaning to an operator. For instance, the most common most expected values of a particular character, could be allocated to the vowel letters of that alphabet which is applicable to the language understood by the operator. Conversely, any unexpected or unusual measured value could be allotted to an unusual character.

By these means, the character allocation process is able to convey a measure of confidence in the signature. This may be of use to a human operator, highlighting any signatures which may then benefit from further and more detailed examination, for instance, using the separately stored creative material.

Furthermore, measured values not subject to integer certainty, may be allocated a character within a known sequence or string. In this case, the data base may assimilate a statistical variation in any particular allocated character, by a process of adjacent character searching. Over a statistically significant sample of any one occurrence, the data base can then go through a learning process in order to optimise the search area for each character within the signature.

As an example of the signature, consider a 30 second long occurrence of a commercial containing 8 pictorial shots, the first of which has a length of 66 frames. The first four characters of the signature might then be; CBI5 The analysis of this being; C=30 seconds, 1=8 shots, and B5 is the most and least significant characters representing 66, the frame count.

For many purposes such a signature size would suffice for the purposes of separation of creative occurrences, but should there be a need within the database for "tie breaking" amongst a group of closely allied signatures, additional characters based on the parameters listed above may be brought into play. The selective process of using the additional characters increases the normal search accuracy as it minimises the possibility of a mismatch being created by parameters of lesser importance and accuracy. As an example of a possible mismatch, consider a transmission fault that resulted only in an audio impairment. The signature resulting from this occurrence may be allocated an audio character which would not present a ready match if it were required as part of the match process in every case. However in the case of many occurrences, the first few, preferably integer, parameters are sufficient and necessary for a complete database match.

Claims

CLAIMS:

1. A method of creating a register of television commercials, comprising detecting electronically a first parameter indicating a start of a commercial segment, assigning an identification code to the commercial segment in accordance with one or more electronically measured parameters, detecting electronically a second parameter (which may be the same as the first parameter) indicating the end of the commercial segment, and subsequently comparing the identification code to a catalogue of such codes.

2. A method as claimed in claim 1, in which one or more measured parameters are integer quantities.

3. A method as claimed in claim 2, in which the electronically measured parameter or parameters are selected from the group comprising the run time measured to a quantised value, the number of shots, the number of frames or fields in a shot and the number of fades.

4. A method as claimed in claim 1, 2 or 3, wherein the parameter indicating a start or finish of a segment is a fade to a uniform colour, such as black.

5. A method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein a third parameter (which ,may be the same as the first or second parameter) is detected, and it is determined that a commercial segment is not present if the third parameter is not detected within a predetermined period of the first parameter.

6. A method as claimed in claim 5, wherein the first parameter is indicative of the start of a commercial break.

6. A method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the end of a commercial segment is determined on the basis of a parameter occurring at or dose to one of a set of predetermined times since the start of the commercial segment.

7. A system for creating a register of television commercials, comprising a receiver for receiving a transmitted television signal, means for detecting electronically an indicator of a start of a commercial segment, means for recording the transmitted segment from the detection of a start, means for measuring electronically parameters of the segment and assigning electronically an identification code based on the measured parameters, means for detecting an indicator of an end of the segment, means for evaluating from the existence of the indicators and/or the measured parameters whether a commercial segment has been received, means for comparing the identification code to a catalogue of such codes if the evaluation indicates that a commercial segment has been received, and means for recording a coincidence between the identification code and a code in the catalogue.

8. A system as claimed in claim 7, wherein the means for comparing the identification code and a code stored in the catalogue includes means for varying the area of the search within the catalogue according to the statistics of the stored catalogue of parameter values.

9. A system as claimed in claim 7 or 8, wherein the means for recording the coincidence also records calendrical information such as date and time of the transmission.

10. A system as claimed in claim 7, 8 or 9, wherein the receiver includes means for receiving transmitted television signals for a plurality of channels.

11. A system as claimed in claim 7, 8, 9 or 10, wherein the means for recording the coincidence records an identifier of the channel.

12. A system as claimed in any one of claims 7 to 11, wherein the means for determining a coincidence provides an indicator when a coincidence is not determined, and means is provided for adding the respective code to the catalogue.

13. A system as claimed in any one of claims 7 to 12, wherein means is provided for identifying previously catalogued commercial segments having similar parameter value(s).

14. A system as claimed in any one of claims 7 to 13, wherein additional parameters are stored against the electronically created signature.

15. A system for applying an electronically identifiable identification code to a broadcast work, comprising measuring electronically a plurality of quantities which have integer values and operating on the integer values to create the signature.

16. A system as claimed in claim 15, wherein the broadcast work is a video work, and the quantities comprise one or more of: the run time of the work measured to a multiple of five seconds, the rum time of the work measured as a number of frames or fields, the number of shots in the work, the number of frames or fields in a shot, the number of fades.