JP2000101999A - Interactive video system, video reproducing method and storage medium with its program recorded thereon - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To reproduce and edit video images in an arbitrary route, at an optional place and in an arbitrary direction according to a user's will, based on a one-time photographed record data file. SOLUTION: A camera system, in which each digital video camera is respectively arranged in four directions which are the proceeding direction, direction opposite to proceeding, direction to the right side of the proceeding and direction left side of the proceeding at photographing for a street map and a sightseeing district guide simultaneously photographs the video in the four directions and stores as files 1 to 4 in a storing means 40. Walking through is made arbitrarily in the oute, and animation made in matching with the movement is shown on a displaying means 32, in such a manner that a file switching means 34 and a clocking means 35 control the photographed data, when reproduction is performed with reproduction to a normal direction and reproduction to a return direction which is added from a keyboard or a mouse 20.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a technique for reproducing data obtained by photographing a street, sightseeing spot, station premises, and the vicinity of a station with a video camera by a moving picture technique in a desired direction and in a desired direction. The present invention relates to an interactive video system to be played, a playback method for editing using the video system, and a recording medium on which a program for realizing the playback method is recorded.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Street guide maps that have become more widely used than before.
Sightseeing spot maps are guide maps explaining the location of destinations,
A still image photograph of a magazine or the periphery of an object, C
Many are sold in the form of D-ROMs and the like, and their contents are composed of planar information. Therefore, when the user actually goes to the destination based on those guide maps, the user actually compares the actual scenery in his / her field of view with the guide map, and decides on the target of the guide map by himself / herself. Try to reach the destination while checking and confirming. However,
The guide map used here often describes only a limited and necessary minimum object due to space limitations, etc., and is deformed, so you can grasp the sense of distance and direction Hard to do. As a result, it is easy to miss the destination or the target object depending on the actual situation of the surrounding buildings or the road shape. Therefore, there has been a destination guidance system based on a video image that provides guidance in an actual scene. this is,
Video data captured by a video camera is edited using a computer system, and the video data is displayed on a display device. However, with regard to a destination guidance system using a moving image such as a video image, an image determined according to a procedure determined at the time of shooting the image is reproduced in a one-way manner regardless of the user's (viewer's) intention. However, there is no freedom to see what the user wants to see, and it does not provide any video information according to the user's request from one video storage medium.

On the other hand, as a document relating to this, there is, for example, a video generating apparatus described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 6-282628. In this device, direction input means is provided for inputting a direction in a direction in which the operation lever is tilted, and inputting a speed at an angle of the tilt, whereby a display position is calculated by the display position calculating means from the input direction and speed. There is disclosed an apparatus in which the display position is recorded in a storage means, and thereafter, the recording / reproduction switching means is set to a reproduction state, and the display positions are sequentially read from the storage means and output to a display device. Thus, by outputting the video reproduction control signal to the video signal reproducing device, the user can easily input graphics synchronized with the video image. However, when this apparatus is used to generate a street guide map, a tourist spot guide map, and the like, the map is generated only at the will of the creator of the guide map, regardless of the will of the user (watcher). Since the data is reproduced in one way, the problem that the user does not have a degree of freedom to see what he wants to see cannot be solved at all.

[0004]

As described above, in the conventional destination guidance system using moving images, images are reproduced only in a predetermined procedure regardless of the user's intention.
It is impossible to see the desired target from the desired direction, and it is easy to miss the destination or the target depending on the situation and shape of the surrounding buildings. In other words, only one-way information is provided to the user from the storage medium, which is hardly an interactive video system.

[0005] Therefore, an object of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned problems of the prior art and to meet various demands of users when creating moving picture images such as street maps and tourist spot guide maps. It is an object of the present invention to provide an interactive video system and a video reproducing method capable of freely editing and reproducing a guide image of a destination / object as desired by a user, and a recording medium recording the computer program. .

[0006]

In order to achieve the above object, in the video reproducing method according to the present invention, when photographing a street map or a sightseeing spot guide map, in the traveling direction, traveling backward direction, traveling right direction, traveling left direction. With a camera system in which one digital video camera is arranged in each of the four directions,
Simultaneously shoot images in two directions. By controlling the reproduction at the time of reproduction by adding reproduction in the normal direction and reproduction in the return direction to the photographed data, the arbitrary direction in the traveling direction forward / left / right / rear at any point in one route can be determined. The video to be viewed can be reproduced, and the user can arbitrarily move back and forth along the route. Further, in the interactive video system of the present invention, data recorded by moving a video camera that integrates a plurality of video cameras that capture images in different directions is recorded into a plurality of files corresponding to each video camera. A direction / viewpoint input means for storing and inputting a traveling direction instruction and a viewpoint direction instruction at the time of reproduction, a file switching means for switching a file to be reproduced based on the instruction data, a moving image file reading means, There are provided timing means for synchronizing data positions, and moving image display means for displaying moving image data read by the display device. Thus, according to the intention of the viewer (user) based on the data file of one shooting record, an arbitrary route,
It becomes possible to edit and reproduce video images at any point and in any direction.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a camera system for capturing video contents of an interactive video system according to the present invention. The interactive video system of the present invention arranges one digital video camera in each of four directions of a traveling direction, a traveling reverse direction, a traveling right direction, and a traveling left direction when photographing a street map, a tourist spot guide map, and the like. And simultaneously capture images in four directions. In other words, by shooting in a 360 ° field of view and storing it together with related content such as a target, switching between four images from storage in response to various requests of the user allows editing in an arbitrary order. To be able to. As shown in FIG. 1, four digital video cameras are
A camera system is constructed by arranging them on a plane at an angle of 0 degrees.
The camera A shoots in the traveling direction, the camera B shoots in the left direction, the camera C shoots in the right direction, and the camera D shoots in the opposite direction. While traveling continuously from the X point to the Y point along the path of the bold line 1 while continuously photographing with four cameras, the entire four apparatuses traveled along the XY path while photographing a 360 ° field of view. .

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of walk-through reproduction in one path of the interactive video system of the present invention. When video data shot by the camera system of FIG. 1 is played back by the playback system, switching to video of video data shot by four cameras A to D at arbitrary points according to a user's instruction. Thus, for example, when the camera is switched at the time shown in FIG. 2A, the image is reproduced in the visual field shown in FIG. That is,
In FIG. 2A, first, the camera A takes a picture of the front from the point X while advancing by the time 3 and then switches to the camera B to take a picture of the left while advancing the time 4 and then the camera A again.
And advance by time 5 to photograph the front. Where Y
Since the vehicle reaches the point, it switches to camera C for a momentary time 6 to photograph the right side in order to show the state of rotation, then switches to camera D, advances by time 7, photographs the back, and then captures the camera C And shoot the right side while proceeding for time 8. The camera is switched to the camera D again, and the rear side is photographed while proceeding for the time 9. When returning to the reverse direction, the video data is processed by the reverse reproduction. According to this method, an image freely walk-through freely from a certain point to a certain point in a field of view of 360 degrees is displayed to the user. In other words, it is completely free to proceed in a curved line like 3 ', 4', 5 'without going straight like 3, 4, 5 in FIG. The image is edited into a shape and has no discomfort. Since the moving image in this case is a digital video, the reproduction from the middle is also switched instantaneously and accurately, and when moving in a curved line, the distant image is reduced and reproduced by performing zoom processing, and the nearby image is reproduced. The video is controlled so as to be enlarged and reproduced.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a reproduction system of the interactive video system according to the present invention. In FIG. 3, reference numeral 10 denotes a display device for displaying an image, reference numeral 20 denotes an input device constituted by a keyboard device or a mouse for inputting user's instruction data, and reference numeral 30 denotes a control device of a computer. The system itself. A moving image file reading means 31 for reading a moving image from a file 40 storing moving images taken by four cameras A to D in advance, a moving image display means 32 for displaying the read moving image on a screen, A direction / viewpoint input unit 33 for inputting a direction and a speed according to an instruction from the input device 20 of a keyboard or a mouse; a file switching unit 34 for switching to any one of the files 1 to 4 to be read; A clocking means 35 is provided for referring to the time when an instruction to switch the direction, speed, etc. is issued from. A storage device 40 stores digital video data captured by a video camera, and includes four files corresponding to each capturing camera. Specifically, file 1 contains the photographing data of camera A, file 2 contains the photographing data of camera B, file 3 contains the photographing data of camera C, and file 4 contains the photographing data of camera D. Store the data respectively.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of a display screen and a keyboard of the display device of the reproduction system shown in FIG. In FIG. 4, reference numeral 11 denotes a moving image display area, reference numeral 20 denotes a keyboard, reference numeral 12 denotes a button for instructing a moving direction and stop of a video (camera), and reference numeral 13 denotes a video speed to be displayed, that is, a moving speed. A button 14 for instructing a viewpoint direction to be displayed. For each button, user's instruction data is input by operating a mouse or pressing a function key of a keyboard.

Next, a processing procedure of the reproduction system will be described using an example of a user's display instruction shown in FIG. In FIG. 4, first, the user uses the operation buttons 12 to 14 shown on the keyboard 20 while looking at the display screen 11, the viewpoint direction is “forward”, the traveling direction instruction is “forward”, and the image speed is "Normal" is input. When the direction / viewpoint input means 33 shown in FIG.
The file switching means 34 specifies a moving image file to be read based on the traveling direction instruction data, and instructs the moving image file reading means 31. At this time, time data indicating the file type and the data position to be read (reproduction start time is set to zero minutes and zero seconds) ) Is also passed as a parameter. The timing data is a value obtained by counting the image reproduction time by the timing unit 35. The moving image file reading means 31 reads video data from the corresponding file based on the parameters. Here, as shown in FIG. 2A, since the viewpoint direction is “front” and the time is 3, the file 1 is initially read for the time 3.

When the video data is read, the moving image display means 32 continues the display processing until the next instruction is input at the input video speed. In this case, since the video speed is "normal", an image is displayed when the image proceeds at the same speed as the shooting speed. When the viewpoint direction is set to “left” in the next instruction input, the file switching means 34 passes the file type to be read and the time measurement data (time 4) up to that point to the moving image file reading means 31 as parameters. The moving image data in the “left” direction is read by the moving image file reading means 31 and displayed and reproduced by the moving image display means 32. In this case, as shown in FIG.
Only the moving image of file 2 is read. Next, when "reverse" is pressed by the traveling direction instruction button, the file switching means 34 gives an instruction to read the moving image data in the backward direction to the moving image file reading means 31 based on the traveling direction instruction data, 32 is reproduced in the reverse direction. In this case, as shown in FIG. 2A, the moving image of the file 4 is read for the time 7.

The moving image file reading means 31, the moving image display means 32, and the direction / view point input means 33 described above.
The file switching means 34 and the timing means 35 are realized by computer programs, and the respective computer programs are recorded on a recording medium 36 called, for example, a CD-ROM, and installed from the recording medium 36 into the computer device 30. Being working.

In the above embodiment, the digital video camera 4
The example in which the cameras are arranged on a plane at an angle of 90 degrees to each other, and the video captured by moving linearly from the X point to the Y point is reproduced, but as another embodiment, the number of integrated cameras is limited to four. The camera may be moved forward from the X point to the Y point. For example, the camera may be moved in three directions: forward, left, and right. , Make an integrated camera U-turn at point Y
You may shoot while returning to the point. Also, the movement of the integrated camera is not necessarily a linear movement, for example, even if the image is taken while changing the direction freely by turning right or left, etc.
The same effect as the above embodiment can be realized (FIG. 2).
(Refer to 3 ', 4', 5 'of (b).)

[0015]

As described above, according to the present invention,
A video image can be reproduced on an arbitrary route, an arbitrary point, and an arbitrary direction according to the viewer's intention based on one photographing record data file. It is suitable as a method.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a camera system for capturing video content of an interactive video system according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of walk-through reproduction in one path of the interactive video system of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of an interactive video playback system according to the present invention.

4 is a diagram showing an example of a display screen and a keyboard of the reproduction system in FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 display display device, 11 moving image display area,
Reference numeral 12: travel direction instruction button, 13: video speed instruction button, 14: viewpoint direction instruction button, 20: keyboard device and mouse, 30: CPU, 40: storage device, 1: camera shooting path, 3-9: walk-through path , 3 '~
5 ': Curved walk-through path, A, B, C, D ...
camera.

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A video reproducing method using a video photographing apparatus in which a plurality of video photographing apparatuses for photographing images in different directions are integrated, and a video reproducing system for reproducing data recorded by moving the apparatus. Inputting a moving direction instruction and a viewpoint direction instruction of the imaging device at an arbitrary reproduction time point; and reproducing a moving image in an arbitrary moving direction and an arbitrary viewpoint direction on a display device according to the input instruction. An interactive video playback method, comprising: 2. An interactive video system comprising a video photographing apparatus in which a plurality of video photographers for photographing images in different directions are integrated, and a video reproducing system for reproducing data recorded by moving the apparatus. A plurality of files for storing moving images captured by each of the video photographing machines; a direction / viewpoint input unit for inputting a playback direction instruction and a viewpoint direction instruction during reproduction; File switching means for instructing switching of a file to be reproduced based on the moving image file; moving image file reading means for reading a moving image from one of the plurality of files; and time counting means for synchronizing a data position at the time of switching the read file. Moving image display means for displaying moving image data read by the display device. Video system. 3. A recording medium wherein each step of claim 1 is converted into a computer program, and the converted program is recorded.