WO2018043769A1

WO2018043769A1 - Streaming service method for providing multi-platform interoperability, and apparatus for method

Info

Publication number: WO2018043769A1
Application number: PCT/KR2016/009646
Authority: WO
Inventors: 박우출
Original assignee: 전자부품연구원
Priority date: 2016-08-30
Filing date: 2016-08-30
Publication date: 2018-03-08
Also published as: KR20180025365A; KR102133293B1

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for providing content to a plurality of image devices having mutually different specifications, the present invention selecting, at the abstraction level of a terminal apparatus, image content suitable for each of a plurality of VR image output devices produced according to diverse specifications by diverse manufacturers, and transmitting the image content to the VR image output devices connected to the current terminal apparatus, thereby allowing image content to be provided that is optimized for the VR image output devices a user is currently using.

Description

Streaming service method and device for providing interoperability in multiplatform

The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for providing content to a plurality of video devices having different specifications, and more particularly, when there are a plurality of virtual reality (VR) devices that can be connected to a terminal device, The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for delivering video content that meets the specifications of each VR device to the VR device in order to transmit the optimized video content to each VR device.

The contents described in this section merely provide background information on the present embodiment and do not constitute a prior art.

Recently, the demand for a virtual reality (VR) service that allows people to experience what is possible inside a computer software program through the senses of human eyes, hearing, etc. using special glasses and gloves is increasing. have.

In order to respond quickly to the increasing demand for VR services, companies in the VR industry are developing devices that can output various VR images such as VR glasses.

However, each company has different specifications according to each company or type of VR video output device, and by providing content converted to the same format to VR video devices having different specifications, it does not provide content optimized for each VR video device. There was a problem.

In order to solve the above-mentioned problem, an abstraction layer for providing video content that conforms to the specifications of a plurality of VR video output devices is added to a terminal device, and according to the specifications of each of the plurality of VR video output devices through the abstraction layer. The present invention provides a method and an apparatus capable of providing an optimal image content to a user by delivering the image content conforming to the specification of the VR image output device currently connected to the terminal device to the VR image output device.

The terminal device according to the present invention for achieving the above object is connected to the VR video output device, the VR video communication interface unit for transmitting and receiving the specification information and video content of the VR video output device and the VR video communication interface unit And acquiring the spec information from the VR image output device through the VR image output interface to control the image contents corresponding to the spec information to the VR image output device. .

In this case, the controller selects the video content corresponding to the obtained spec information from among a plurality of video contents corresponding to each specification of a plurality of VR video output apparatuses having different specifications, and selects the selected video content as the VR video. It may include an abstraction layer for transmitting to the output device, and further comprising a storage unit for storing a plurality of video content corresponding to each specification of a plurality of VR image output device having different specifications, the abstraction layer is the storage The video content corresponding to the acquired spec information may be selected from the plurality of video contents stored in the unit, and may be transmitted to the VR image output device.

The apparatus may further include a communication unit configured to transmit / receive data with a server, wherein the controller requests the image content corresponding to the obtained specification information to the server, receives the requested image content from the server, and sends the request to the VR image output device. I can deliver it.

The server according to the present invention for achieving the above object is a storage unit for storing a plurality of video content corresponding to each specification of a plurality of VR video output device having different specifications and a plurality of video content to the VR The controller may include a controller configured to convert the image output apparatus to meet the specifications of the image output apparatus and control the image output apparatus to be stored in the storage unit.

The control unit may further include a communication unit configured to transmit and receive data with the terminal device, wherein the control unit receives spec information of a specific VR video output device from the terminal device, selects video content corresponding to the spec information, and selects the selected video content. It may be controlled to transmit to the terminal device, and further comprising a communication unit for transmitting and receiving data with the terminal device, the control unit may control to transmit all of the converted at least one image content to the terminal device.

According to the present invention, by selecting the video content corresponding to each of the plurality of VR video output devices manufactured by various manufacturers in various specifications in the abstraction layer of the terminal device, by delivering to the VR video output device currently connected to the terminal device, Can provide video content optimized for the current VR video output device.

1 is a system diagram illustrating a content providing system according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

2 is a block diagram illustrating a main configuration of a server according to the present invention.

3 is a block diagram illustrating a main configuration of a terminal device according to the present invention.

4 is a diagram illustrating a hierarchical structure of a terminal device according to the present invention.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS To make the features and advantages of the present invention more clear, the present invention will be described in more detail with reference to specific embodiments shown in the accompanying drawings.

However, in the following description and the accompanying drawings, detailed descriptions of well-known functions or configurations that may obscure the subject matter of the present invention will be omitted. In addition, it should be noted that like elements are denoted by like reference numerals as much as possible throughout the drawings.

The terms or words used in the following description and drawings should not be construed as being limited to the ordinary or dictionary meanings, and the inventors may appropriately define the concept of terms for explaining their own invention in the best way. It should be interpreted as meaning and concept corresponding to the technical idea of the present invention based on the principle that the present invention. Therefore, the embodiments described in the present specification and the configuration shown in the drawings are only the most preferred embodiments of the present invention, and do not represent all of the technical ideas of the present invention, and various alternatives may be substituted at the time of the present application. It should be understood that there may be equivalents and variations.

Specific terms used in the following description are provided to help the understanding of the present invention, and the use of such specific terms may be changed to other forms without departing from the technical spirit of the present invention.

In the following description and claims, it is assumed that the content providing system according to the present invention is a VR video image content providing system.

VR (Virtual Reality), or virtual reality, is an imaging technology that makes humans believe that artificially created space is real through meeting or deceiving the five senses.

Therefore, VR video can be said to provide more realistic visual and auditory sensory information. In particular, recently, the production of VR video using a 360-degree photographing technique has been actively performed.

The 360-degree shooting technique is a technique that captures 360 degrees, or all scenes that a person thinks can move his head.

Considering the limits of the human field of view or the camera's field of view as a certain distance, this technique is to shoot a large spherical scene with this distance as a radius.

With the development of the VR contents industry, VR video output devices capable of outputting 360-degree images are being manufactured. Since the specifications of each VR video output device are different, 360-degree images captured in one format are displayed. When provided to the VR image output device in a batch, there is a problem that can not provide the content optimized for each specification.

Therefore, in order to solve this problem, a method for providing image content optimized for each specification of the VR image output apparatus needs to be devised.

Accordingly, the present invention is to solve the above-described problem by further implementing an abstraction layer that can provide a video content conforming to the specifications of the VR video output device to the terminal device connected to the VR video output device.

Next, a method of providing VR image content in the system according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a view showing the main configuration of the VR image content providing system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 1, the VR image content providing system according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention may include a server 200, a terminal device 300, and one or more VR image output devices 400, and the server 200. ) And the terminal device 300 may transmit and receive data through the communication network (100).

Then, with reference to Figure 1 will be described schematically for each component.

First, the communication network 100 serves to transfer data for data transmission and reception between the server 200 and the terminal device 300, and may use both a wired communication method and a wireless communication method, but is not limited to WLAN (Wireless LAN) and Wi-Fi. Wireless communication methods such as (Wi-Fi), Wibro, Wimax, High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), Long Term Evolution (LTE), and Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A) are preferable. something to do.

However, in addition to the above-described wired and wireless communication methods, all types of communication methods to be developed in the future may be implemented.

The server 200 is a device for storing a 360 VR image photographed by a 360 degree camera and providing it to the terminal device 300.

The server 200 converts the images captured by the 360-degree camera to meet the specifications of each of the plurality of VR image output apparatus 400 in order to provide image contents optimized for various VR image output apparatus 400. Can be stored.

In this case, the server 200 may receive and store specification information for each manufacturer or model of the VR image output apparatus 400, and based on the specifications of the VR image output apparatus 400 stored therein, each VR image output apparatus ( It is possible to convert the image content optimized for 400).

Meanwhile, the server 200 receives spec information of the VR image output apparatus currently connected to the terminal apparatus 300 from the terminal apparatus 300, selects image contents corresponding to the spec information, and terminal the selected image contents. Alternatively, the terminal 300 may transmit the converted video content to the terminal device 300 to select content corresponding to the specification of the currently connected VR video output device 400. It can be provided to the VR image output device 400.

The terminal device 300 is a device for providing the optimized image content to the VR image output device 400 by transferring the image content provided from the server 200 to the VR image output device 400.

The terminal device 300 is connected to the VR image output device 400, and may obtain specification information of the currently connected VR image output device 400.

Based on the specification information, the image content optimized for the currently connected VR image output device 400 may be selected and transmitted.

In this case, the terminal device 300 may transmit the acquired spec information to the server 200 to request an optimized video content corresponding to the spec information, and only the video content corresponding to the spec information from the server 200 may be requested. By receiving the received image and transmitting the same to the VR image output device 400, the user may provide optimized image content to the user.

On the other hand, the terminal device 300 receives all the video content from the server 200, selects the video content that meets the specifications of the VR image output device 400 currently connected to the terminal device 300, The selected streaming content may be delivered to the VR image output device 400. In order to perform this role, an abstraction layer is added to the network layer of the terminal device 300.

A detailed description of the network layer of the terminal device 300 to which the abstraction layer is added will be described later.

The VR image output device 400 is a device that outputs a VR image provided from the terminal device 300.

The VR image output device 400 has different specifications for each manufacturer or model, but the degree or method of processing the VR image provided from the terminal device 300 is slightly different according to these specifications. Even if the video content is converted to, the video content of different quality is provided.

Therefore, the VR image output device 400 according to the present invention receives the image content corresponding to the specification of the VR image output device 400 from the terminal device 300 to provide an optimal image content to the user.

The content providing system according to the exemplary embodiment of the present invention has been described above.

Hereinafter, the main configuration and operation process of the server 200 in the content providing system according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention will be described.

2 is a block diagram for explaining the main configuration of the server 200 according to the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 2, the server 200 may include a communication unit 210, a storage unit 230, and a control unit 250.

The communication unit 210 is a device for transmitting and receiving data with the terminal device 300 through the communication network 100, the specification information about the VR image output device 400 currently connected to the terminal device 300 from the terminal device 300 The mobile terminal receives the video content transmission request and transmits the video content corresponding to the specification information or the plurality of video contents converted according to the specifications of each VR video output device 400 to the terminal device 300.

The storage unit 230 is a device for storing image content. The storage unit 230 may receive and store 360 image content captured by the image capturing apparatus.

In particular, the present invention may store a plurality of video contents converted corresponding to the specifications of each of the plurality of VR video output devices having different specifications.

In this case, the storage unit 230 may store the converted image content by matching the specification information corresponding to each image content.

In addition, the storage unit 230 may store specification information about the main VR video output device 400 before the video content is converted.

The controller 250 is an apparatus for controlling the overall operation of the server 200.

Looking at the operation of the server 200 is generally controlled by the control unit 250 according to an embodiment of the present invention, when receiving one image content from the image capturing apparatus, the image content is stored in the storage unit 230 At the same time, based on the specification information of the main VR image output device 400 stored in the storage unit 230, the control unit converts the image content to correspond to each specification information and stores it in the storage unit 230. Can be.

Subsequently, when there is a request for transmitting the video content from the terminal device 300, the terminal device 300 may control to transmit all of the converted video content to the terminal device 300, together with the request for transmitting the video content, the current terminal device. The user may also receive specification information of the VR image output apparatus 400 connected to the 300, select image content corresponding to the specification information, and transmit the selected image content to the terminal device 300.

The main configuration and operation process of the server 200 have been described above.

Hereinafter, the main configuration and operation of the terminal device 300 according to the present invention will be described.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a main configuration of the terminal device 300, and FIG. 4 shows image contents corresponding to specifications of each of the plurality of VR image output devices 400 implemented in the terminal device 300. As shown in FIG. A diagram for explaining a network hierarchy for selectively transmitting.

First, referring to FIG. 3, the terminal device 300 according to the present invention includes an input unit 310, a communication unit 330, a storage unit 350, a VR image communication interface unit 370, and a controller 390. Can be.

The input unit 310 is a device for receiving a user's command, may receive information about the image content that the user wants to watch, and receive a request for the image content from the server 200.

On the other hand, through the input unit 310, in order to receive the image content of the desired quality, the specification information from the user so that the user can adjust the specification information transmitted to the server 200 or selected in the abstraction layer at will Can receive an adjustment command.

If the user adjusts the specification information through the input unit 310, the terminal device 300 is adjusted based on the specification information adjusted by the user instead of the specification information of the currently connected VR image output device 400. By selecting the video content corresponding to the spec closest to the spec information and delivering the video content through the VR video communication interface 370, the user can watch the video content having a desired format or quality.

The communication unit 330 is a device that transmits and receives data with the server 200 through the communication network 100.

The communication unit 330 may transmit / receive data through wired or wireless communication similarly to the communication unit 210 of the server 200, but it will be preferably wireless communication.

The terminal device 300 may request and receive image content transmission from the server 200 through the communication unit 330, and may receive the received image content. The currently connected VR image may be selectively transmitted to the server 200 by the server 200. The specification information of the output device 400 may be transmitted to the server 200.

The storage unit 350 stores the video content and specification information of the VR image output apparatus 400, and the plurality of video contents converted by the server 200 based on the specification information of each VR image output apparatus 400. All of the received and stored in the storage unit 350, when the specification information of the VR image output device 400 is transmitted to the server 200, the server 200 receives and stores the selected video content It may be.

In this case, when the server 200 transmits the content in the streaming method, the storage unit 350 may include a buffer for temporarily storing the content in the streaming method.

The VR video communication interface unit 370 is a device for transmitting and receiving data with the VR video output device 400 connected to the terminal device 300, the terminal device 300 through the VR video communication interface unit 370, Specifications information of the currently connected VR image output device 400 may be received, and the optimized image content may be transmitted to the currently connected VR image output device 400 through the VR image communication interface 370.

Finally, the control unit 390 of the terminal device 300 is a device for controlling the overall operation process of the terminal device 300. Looking at the operation process of the terminal device 300 controlled by the control unit 390, VR image communication When the specification information is acquired from the VR image output apparatus 400 through the interface unit 370, the image content corresponding to the specification information is transferred to the VR image output apparatus 400.

At this time, the control unit 390 of the terminal device 300 transmits the acquired spec information to the server 200, requests and receives the server 200 to transmit the image content corresponding to the acquired spec information, and receives the received. Image content may be transmitted to the VR image output apparatus 400.

On the other hand, when the terminal device 300 receives one or more video contents from the server 200, the terminal device 300 selects the video content corresponding to the specification information from the received video content, VR image output device In order to select the video content to be transmitted to the VR video output device 400, an abstraction layer for selecting the video content may be added to a network layer, which is illustrated in FIG. 4. Let's take a look at it in detail.

Referring to FIG. 4, the control layer 390 of the terminal device 300 includes an application layer 391 and an abstraction layer 393 among the network layers for performing a network with the VR image output device 400. ) May be included.

Here, the application layer 391 is a layer designed for communication connection between processes connected through a network, and is a layer held for unifying communication protocols and methods between two connected processes.

This application layer 391 protocol establishes a host-to-host connection using the underlying transport layer protocol.

The application layer 391 of the terminal device 300 according to the present invention is for establishing a connection between the VR image output device 400 and the terminal device 300.

The abstraction layer 393 is generally a layer that hides a detailed part of a specific function. In the present invention, the abstraction layer 393 selectively selects a video content that conforms to the specification of the VR image output device 400. It serves to transmit to the VR image output device 400 through the unit 370.

In detail, the abstraction layer 393 may be an image corresponding to specification information currently connected to the terminal device 300 among a plurality of image contents corresponding to each specification of the plurality of VR image output apparatuses 400 having different specifications. It selects content and delivers the selected video content to the VR image output device 400 through the VR image communication interface 370.

In this case, the image content selected by the abstraction layer 393 may be selected from contents stored in the storage 350 of the terminal device 300, or may be selected from the image content transmitted from the server 200, and the VR image output device may be selected. May be sent to 400.

In the present invention, the abstraction layer 393 is included in the network layer of the terminal device 300, and through the abstraction layer 393, the image content corresponding to the specifications of the various VR video output device 400 outputs the VR video. By delivering to the device 400, it is intended to provide an optimal image content to the user.

In the above, the main configuration and operation process of the terminal device 300 according to the present invention has been described.

As described above, the specification includes the details of a number of specific implementations, but these should not be understood as being limited to the scope of any invention or claimable, but rather may be specific to a particular embodiment of a particular invention. It should be understood as a description of the features.

In addition, although the operations are depicted in the drawings in a particular order, it should not be understood that such operations must be performed in the specific order or sequential order shown in order to obtain desirable results or that all illustrated operations must be performed. In certain cases, multitasking and parallel processing may be advantageous. Moreover, the separation of the various system components of the above-described embodiments should not be understood as requiring such separation in all embodiments, and the described program components and systems will generally be integrated together into a single software product or packaged into multiple software products. It should be understood that it can.

The foregoing description presents the best mode of the invention, and provides examples to illustrate the invention and to enable one skilled in the art to make and use the invention. The specification thus produced is not intended to limit the invention to the specific terms presented. Thus, although the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the above examples, those skilled in the art can make modifications, changes and variations to the examples without departing from the scope of the invention.

Therefore, the scope of the present invention should be determined by the claims rather than by the described embodiments.

The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for providing content to a plurality of video devices having different specifications, and more particularly, when there are a plurality of VR devices that can be connected to a terminal device, an image optimized for each VR device. In order to transmit content, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for delivering video content that meets the specifications of each VR device to the VR device.

Therefore, the contents providing method and apparatus can contribute to the development of the VR video contents industry. In addition, the present invention has industrial applicability because the present invention is not only commercially available or commercially viable, but also practically clearly implemented. .

Claims

A VR video communication interface connected to a VR video output device to transmit and receive specification information and video content of the VR video output device; And

When the spec information is acquired from the VR video output device through the VR video communication interface, the video content corresponding to the spec information is controlled to be delivered to the VR video output device through the VR video communication interface. Control unit;

Terminal device comprising a.
The method of claim 1, wherein the control unit

Selecting a video content corresponding to the acquired spec information from among a plurality of video contents corresponding to each specification of a plurality of VR video output devices having different specifications, and transferring the selected video content to the VR video output device; Abstraction layer;

Terminal device comprising a.
The method of claim 2,

A storage unit for storing a plurality of video contents corresponding to the specifications of each of the plurality of VR image output apparatuses having different specifications;

Further comprising, the abstraction layer is

The terminal device, characterized in that for selecting among the plurality of video content stored in the storage, the video content corresponding to the acquired spec information and to deliver to the VR image output device.
The method of claim 1,

Communication unit for transmitting and receiving data with the server;

Further comprising, the control unit

And requesting the video content corresponding to the acquired specification information from the server, receiving the requested video content from the server, and delivering the requested video content to the VR video output device.
A storage unit for storing a plurality of video contents corresponding to the specifications of each of the plurality of VR image output apparatuses having different specifications; And

A control unit for converting one image content into conformity with a specification of each of the plurality of VR image output apparatuses and controlling the image content to be stored in the storage unit;

Server comprising.
The method of claim 5,

Communication unit for transmitting and receiving data with the terminal device;

Further comprising, the control unit

Receiving specification information of a specific VR video output device from the terminal device, selecting video content corresponding to the specification information, and controlling to transmit the selected video content to the terminal device.
The method of claim 5,

Communication unit for transmitting and receiving data with the terminal device;

Further comprising, the control unit

And transmit the converted at least one image content to the terminal device.