JP4100375B2 - RECORDING DEVICE, RECORDING METHOD, PROGRAM, RECORDING MEDIUM, AND IMAGING DEVICE - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a recording apparatus that records video data, audio data, and the like on a recording medium, and more particularly to a recording apparatus that records information for distinguishing the recording medium in a predetermined format on the recording medium. The present invention relates to a recording method, a program, and a recording medium used in such a recording apparatus. Furthermore, the present invention relates to an electronic camera provided with such a recording apparatus.

  For example, a configuration of a portable video camera in which an optical disk recording device and a video camera are integrated is proposed. In such a recording apparatus, a plurality of data in which several scenes are recorded is recorded as a file on the optical disc.

  In addition, such a recording apparatus includes a display unit such as a liquid crystal display panel or an organic electroluminescence display panel, and a sound generation unit such as a speaker, so that the recording / reproducing function can also reproduce and edit recorded data. The device is known.

  In order to facilitate the process of searching for desired data, for example, image data, in the data recorded on the recording medium by the user, management information (index) for some images, sounds, etc. of the plurality of recorded image data It has been proposed that recording is performed at a predetermined position of the disc-shaped recording medium, for example, the innermost peripheral area.

  An index file is a file in which information for identifying the contents of one or more files recorded on a recording medium is collected. The index file includes attribute information and excerpt information. As an example, the index file contains, for example, four types of data: property, text, thumbnail, and intro. The property is data indicating the title and the attribute of each AV file. The text is data indicating a character string of a title related to each AV file. The thumbnail and intro data are one typical screen of the file and typical audio data of several seconds.

  When deleting a file registered in an index file, a file referenced from another file cannot be deleted. However, in order to examine the file reference relationship, it is necessary to analyze all actual files. This analysis takes time, and the file erasing operation takes time.

  SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a recording method and a recording apparatus that can speed up the process of deleting a file. Another object of the present invention is to provide a program for causing a computer to execute such a recording method and a computer-readable recording medium on which the program is recorded. Furthermore, the present invention provides an imaging apparatus that employs such a recording method.

To solve the problems described above, the inventions, the index by the index data relating to each of a plurality of files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the real data of a plurality of files to accommodate a predetermined format A recording device for generating a file and recording an index file on a recording medium,
Index data consists of at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
File attribute information corresponding full § Lee information specifying the files that reference Le, 該Fu Airu is either valid or whether the information and 該Fu Airu refer to other file information and Including reference relationship data including
The text data and thumbnail data are recording devices that indicate the attributes of the file and accommodate a plurality of pairs of corresponding text and thumbnails .

The inventions is to generate an index file by the index data relating to each of a plurality of files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the real data of a plurality of files to accommodate in a predetermined format, records the index file A recording method for recording on a medium,
Index data consists of at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
File attribute information corresponding full § Lee information specifying the files that reference Le, 該Fu Airu is either valid or whether the information and 該Fu Airu refer to other file information and Including reference relationship data including
Text data and thumbnail data are recording methods that indicate attributes of the file and accommodate a plurality of pairs of corresponding text and thumbnails .

The inventions is to generate an index file by the index data relating to each of the plurality of files files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the real data of a plurality of files file accommodating a predetermined format, the index file Is a recording method for recording on a recording medium,
Index data consists of at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
File attribute information corresponding full § Lee information specifying the files that reference Le, 該Fu Airu is either valid or whether the information and 該Fu Airu refer to other file information and Including reference relationship data including
The text data and thumbnail data are programs for causing a computer to execute a recording method that indicates the attributes of the file and accommodates a plurality of sets of corresponding text and thumbnails .

The inventions is to generate an index file by the index data relating to each of the plurality of files files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the real data of a plurality of files file accommodating a predetermined format, the index file Is a recording method for recording on a recording medium,
Index data consists of at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
File attribute information corresponding full § Lee information specifying the files that reference Le, 該Fu Airu is either valid or whether the information and 該Fu Airu refer to other file information and Including reference relationship data including
The text data and the thumbnail data are computer-readable recording media on which a program for causing a computer to execute a recording method in which a plurality of text and thumbnail sets corresponding to the attributes of the file are indicated and stored .

The inventions may, in an imaging apparatus for recording an image signal which is obtained by photographing an image of an object on a recording medium,
An index file is generated by storing index data related to each of a plurality of file files recorded on a recording medium in association with each of actual data of the plurality of file files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium An index recording device adapted to
Index data consists of at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
File attribute information corresponding full § Lee information specifying the files that reference Le, 該Fu Airu is either valid or whether the information and 該Fu Airu refer to other file information and Including reference relationship data including
The text data and the thumbnail data are image pickup apparatuses that indicate attributes of the file and accommodate a plurality of sets of corresponding text and thumbnails, respectively .

  In the recording device, the recording method, the program, the recording medium on which the program is recorded, and the imaging device including the recording device according to the present invention, the entry management information includes information indicating the file reference relationship. Since the file reference relationship can be managed without accessing the file, it is possible to determine whether or not the file can be erased at high speed, and to present a warning to the user at high speed. Furthermore, by having the entry valid / invalid information, it is not necessary to erase the corresponding entry when erasing the file, the rewriting of the recording medium can be limited to the minimum area, and high-speed erasure processing can be performed. Also, based on this valid / invalid information, an entry for erasure (invalid processing) is detected, and the entry to be added to the detected entry is overwritten, thereby eliminating the need to change the entry data and its management area. This enables high-speed entry addition processing.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. In each drawing, the description of the same configuration may be omitted. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration example of a digital recording / reproducing apparatus to which the present invention can be applied. The digital recording / reproducing apparatus includes a video encoder 11, an audio encoder 12, a video decoder 13, an audio decoder 14, a file generator 15, a file decoder 16, a memory 17, a memory 20, a memory controller 18, and a system control microcomputer 19. , Error correction code / decoder 21, drive control microcomputer 22, data modulator / demodulator 23, magnetic field modulation driver 24, operation unit 26, servo circuit 30, spindle motor 31, magnetic field head 32, and optical pickup 33. On a recording medium (here, a magneto-optical disk) 40, digital data is recorded by the magnetic field head 32 and the optical pickup 33 by magnetic field modulation. The recorded data is read from the recording medium 40 by the optical pickup 33.

  The video signal is supplied from the video input terminal to the video encoder 11 and compressed and encoded. The audio signal is supplied from the audio input terminal to the audio encoder 12 and compressed and encoded. Each output of the video encoder 11 and the audio encoder 12 is called an elemental list.

  In the present embodiment, the digital recording / reproducing apparatus is provided in a camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus. An image captured by a video camera is supplied as the video signal, and the video camera generates a video signal by supplying imaging light of a subject to an imaging element such as a CCD (Charge Coupled Device) by an optical system. The audio signal is supplied with the sound collected by the microphone.

  For example, when the compression encoding is MPEG, the video encoder 11 is an A / D converter, a format converter, an image rearranger, a subtractor, a DCT, a quantizer, a variable length encoder, a buffer The electronic circuit includes a memory, a rate control unit, an inverse quantization unit, an inverse DCT unit, an addition unit, a video memory, a motion compensation prediction unit, and a switch.

  The video signal supplied to the video encoder 11 is digitized by an A / D converter, converted to a spatial resolution used for encoding by a format converter, and output to an image rearranger. The image rearrangement unit rearranges the order of the pictures in an order suitable for the encoding process. That is, the I picture and the P picture are encoded first, and then rearranged in an order suitable for encoding the B picture.

  The output of the screen rearrangement unit is input to the DCT unit via the subtraction unit, and DCT encoding is performed. The output of the DCT unit is input to the quantization unit and quantized with a predetermined number of bits. The output of the quantization unit is input to the variable length coding unit and the inverse quantization unit. The variable-length encoding unit is encoded with a variable-length code that assigns a shorter code to data with a higher appearance frequency, for example, a Huffman code, and the encoded data is output to a buffer memory of the memory. The buffer memory outputs encoded data as an output of the video encoder at a constant rate. The rate control unit controls the quantization operation of the quantization unit so as to maintain a predetermined bit rate by monitoring the buffer memory because the amount of code generated by the variable length coding unit is variable.

  On the other hand, in the case of an I picture and a P picture, since they are used as a reference screen by the motion compensation prediction unit, the signal input from the quantization unit to the inverse quantization unit is input to the inverse DCT unit after being inversely quantized. Inverse DCT is performed. The output of the inverse DCT unit is added to the output of the motion compensation prediction unit by the addition unit and input to the video memory. The output of the video memory is input to the motion compensation prediction unit. The motion compensation prediction unit performs forward prediction, backward prediction, and bidirectional prediction, and outputs the results to the addition unit and the subtraction unit. These inverse quantization unit, inverse DCT unit, addition unit, video memory and motion compensation prediction unit constitute a local decoding unit, and the same video signal as that of the video decoder is restored.

  The subtraction unit performs subtraction between the output of the image rearrangement unit and the output of the motion compensation prediction unit, and forms a prediction error between the video signal and the decoded video signal decoded by the local decoding unit. In the case of intra-frame coding (I picture), the switch causes the subtraction unit to simply pass data without performing subtraction processing.

  Returning to FIG. 1, for example, in the case of MPEG / Audio layer 1 / layer 2, the audio encoder 12 includes electronic circuits such as a subband encoding unit and an adaptive quantization bit allocation unit. The The audio signal is divided into subband signals of 32 bands by the subband encoding unit, quantized according to psychoacoustic weighting by the adaptive quantization bit allocation unit, formed into a bit stream, and then output.

  In order to improve coding quality, in the case of MPEG / Audio layer 3, an adaptive block length modified discrete cosine transform unit, aliasing reduction butterfly unit, nonlinear quantization unit, variable length coding unit, etc. are further introduced. Is done.

  The output of the video encoder 11 and the output of the audio encoder 12 are supplied to the file generator 15. The file generator 15 has a video elementary stream and a file structure that can be handled by computer software that can reproduce video, audio, text, and the like synchronously without using a specific hardware configuration. Convert the data structure of an audio elementary list. For example, QuickTime (hereinafter abbreviated as “QT” as appropriate) is known as such software. Hereinafter, a case where QT is used will be described. The file generator 15 multiplexes the encoded video data and the encoded audio data. The file generator 15 is controlled by the system control microcomputer 19.

  The QuickTime movie file that is the output of the file generator 15 is sequentially written into the memory 17 via the memory controller 18. The memory controller 18 reads a QuickTime movie file from the memory 17 when data writing to the recording medium 40 is requested from the system control microcomputer 19.

  Here, the transfer rate of QuickTime movie encoding is set to a transfer rate lower than the transfer rate of write data to the recording medium 40, for example, 1/2. Therefore, while the QuickTime movie file is continuously written in the memory 17, the reading of the QuickTime movie file from the memory 17 is intermittent while being monitored by the system control microcomputer 19 so that the memory 17 does not overflow or underflow. To be done.

The QuickTime movie file read from the memory 17 is supplied from the memory controller 18 to the error correction code / decoder 21. The error correction code / decoder 21 once writes this QuickTime movie file in the memory 20 and interleaved (interleaved).
) And redundant data of error correction codes. The error correction code / decoder 21 reads the data with the redundant data added from the memory 20 and supplies it to the data modulator / demodulator 23.

  When recording the digital data on the recording medium 40, the data modulator / demodulator 23 modulates the data so as to facilitate clock extraction at the time of reproduction and to avoid problems such as intersymbol interference. For example, a (1, 7) RLL (run length limited) code, a trellis code, or the like can be used.

  The output of the data modulator / demodulator 23 is supplied to the magnetic field modulation driver 24 and the optical pickup 33. The magnetic field modulation driver 24 drives the magnetic field head 32 according to the input signal and applies a magnetic field to the recording medium 40. The optical pickup 33 irradiates the recording medium 40 with a recording laser beam according to the input signal. Data is recorded on the recording medium 40 by the magnetic field modulation method.

  The recording medium 40 is a disk-shaped recording medium, for example, a magneto-optical disk (MO). In addition to the magneto-optical disk, a rewritable disk-shaped recording medium such as a phase change disk or a magnetic disk can be used.

  Here, the index file described later is preferably recorded in the innermost circumference of the disk-shaped recording medium, for example, in a recording portion following the lead-in, from the viewpoint of readability.

  In this embodiment, an MO, for example, a relatively small disk such as about 4 cm in diameter, about 5 cm in diameter, about 6.5 cm in diameter, or about 8 cm in diameter is used. The recording medium 40 is rotated by the motor 31 at a constant linear velocity (CLV), a constant angular velocity (CAV), or a zone CLV (ZCLV).

  The drive control microcomputer 22 outputs a signal to the servo circuit 30 in response to a request from the system control microcomputer 19. The servo circuit 30 controls the entire drive by controlling the spindle motor 31 and the optical pickup 33 in accordance with this output. For example, the servo circuit 30 performs movement servo, tracking servo, and focus servo in the radial direction of the recording medium 40 on the optical pickup 33 to control the rotation of the spindle motor 31. The system control microcomputer 19 is connected to an operation unit 26 through which a user inputs a predetermined instruction.

  At the time of reproduction, the optical pickup 33 irradiates the recording medium 40 with a laser beam with an output for reproduction, and receives the reflected light with a photodetector in the optical pickup 33 to obtain a reproduction signal. In this case, the drive control microcomputer 22 detects a tracking error and a focus error from the output signal of the photodetector in the optical pickup 33 so that the read laser beam is positioned on the track and focused on the track. The optical pickup 33 is controlled by the servo circuit 30. Further, the drive control microcomputer 22 controls the movement of the optical pickup in the radial direction in order to reproduce data at a desired position on the recording medium 40. The desired position is determined by the system control microcomputer 19 giving a signal to the drive control microcomputer 22 in the same manner as in recording.

  The reproduction signal from the optical pickup 33 is supplied to the data modulator / demodulator 23 and demodulated. The demodulated data is supplied to the error correction code / decoder 21, the reproduction data is temporarily stored in the memory 20, and deinterleaved and error correction are performed. The error-corrected QuickTime movie file is stored in the memory controller. 18 and stored in the memory 17.

  The QuickTime movie file stored in the memory 17 is output to the file decoder 16 in response to a request from the system control microcomputer 19. In order to continuously reproduce the video signal and the audio signal, the system control microcomputer 19 reads the reproduction signal of the recording medium 40 from the memory 17 and reads it from the memory 17 and supplies it to the file decoder 16. By monitoring the data amount, the memory controller 18 and the drive control microcomputer 22 are controlled so that the memory 17 does not overflow or underflow. In this way, the system control microcomputer 19 reads data intermittently from the recording medium 40.

  The file decoder 16 separates the QuickTime movie file into a video elementary stream and an audio elementary file under the control of the system control microcomputer 19. The video elementary stream is supplied to the video decoder 13, is subjected to compression coding decoding, becomes a video output, and is output from the video output terminal. The audio elementary stream is supplied to the audio decoder 14, subjected to compression coding decoding, and is output as an audio output from the audio output terminal. Here, the file decoder 16 outputs so that the video elementary stream and the audio elementary stream are synchronized.

  For example, in the case of MPEG, the video decoder 13 is a memory buffer memory, a variable-length code decoding unit, an inverse quantization unit, an inverse DCT unit, an addition unit, a video memory, a motion compensation prediction unit, a screen rearrangement unit, and a digital / Analog converter (hereinafter abbreviated as “D / A”). The video elementary list is temporarily stored in the buffer memory and input to the variable length decoding unit. The variable length decoding unit decodes macroblock coding information and separates a prediction mode, a motion vector, quantization information, and a quantized DCT coefficient. The quantized DCT coefficient is restored to the DCT coefficient by the inverse quantization unit, and converted to pixel space data by the inverse DCT unit. The addition unit adds the output of the inverse quantization unit and the output of the motion compensation prediction unit, but does not add when decoding an I picture. All the macroblocks in the screen are decoded, and the screen is rearranged in the original input order by the screen rearrangement unit, converted into an analog signal by D / A, and output. Further, in the case of an I picture and a P picture, the output of the adder is used as a reference screen in the subsequent decoding process, and is therefore stored in the video memory and output to the motion compensation prediction unit.

  For example, in the case of MPEG / Audio layer 1 / layer 2, the audio decoder 14 includes electronic circuits such as a bit stream decomposition unit, an inverse quantization unit, and a subband synthesis filter bank unit. The input audio elementary stream is separated into a header, auxiliary information, and a quantized subband signal by the bitstream decomposition unit, and the quantized subband signal is inversely quantized with the number of bits allocated by the inverse quantization unit. Are output after being synthesized by the subband synthesis filter bank.

  FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing the outer shape of the camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus. The camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus 50 includes a main body 51, a lens unit 52, a sound collecting microphone 53, and a display panel 54. The digital recording / reproducing apparatus shown in FIG. The video signal is generated by supplying imaging light of the subject to the imaging device via the optical system of the lens unit 52. The audio signal is generated by the sound collection microphone 53. On the display panel 54, a display corresponding to a reproduced image or operation content is performed. The display panel 54 includes a liquid crystal display and a piezoelectric element. The user inputs a desired operation by pressing the display portion with the pointing device 55.

  The display panel 54 is used to display a monitor image at the time of shooting or to display a reproduction image of a recording medium. Further, image information recorded as an index file, for example, a thumbnail image (Thumbnail Picture) is displayed on the display panel 54. Specifically, a plurality of thumbnails are displayed in alignment on the display panel 54. Since the number of thumbnails that can be displayed on the display panel 54 at a time is limited, the scrolling of thumbnails can be performed by a scroll key displayed on the display panel 54 or a key operation provided on the main body 51. A desired file among the thumbnails is designated by the pointing device 55 or the cursor, and a file handling image data and audio data corresponding to the designated thumbnail is reproduced.

  Such a camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus 50 generates file excerpt information when formatting a recording medium or after shooting. In the present embodiment, the index file is generated in the format of a QuickTime movie file, for example. By generating in the format of a QuickTime movie file, a plurality of actual data such as video data and audio data and the excerpt information of the file can be recorded in the same format, and the recording / reproducing apparatus reproduces all in QT. be able to.

  The following outlines the QuickTime movie file. QT is software that manages various types of data along a time axis, and is an OS extension function for synchronously playing back moving images, sounds, texts, and the like without using special hardware. QT is disclosed in, for example, “INSIDE MACINTOSH: QuickTime (Japanese version) (Addison Wesles)”.

  The basic data unit of a QT movie resource is called an atom, and each atom contains size and type information along with its data. In QT, the minimum unit of data is handled as a sample, and a chunk is defined as a set of samples.

  FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a configuration example of a QuickTime movie file. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a configuration example of a video media information atom. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the video media information atom in FIG. 3 in more detail, and shows the case where the track is video information.

  3 and 4, the QuickTime movie file is roughly composed of two parts, a movie atom 101 and a movie data atom 102. The movie atom 101 is a part for storing information necessary for reproducing the file and information necessary for referring to actual data. The movie data atom 102 is a part that stores actual data such as video data and audio data.

  The movie atom 101 includes a movie header atom 111 that contains information about the entire movie, a movie clipping atom 112 that specifies a clipping region, a user-defined data atom 113, and 1 Alternatively, a plurality of track atoms 114 are included.

  A track atom 114 is prepared for each track in the movie. The track atom 114 includes a track header atom 131, a track clipping atom 132, a track matte atom 133, an edit atom 134 and media. Information relating to individual data of the movie data atom 102 is described in an atom (media atom) 135. In FIG. 3, the track atom 114-1 of one video movie is shown, and the other track atoms are omitted.

  The media atom 135 includes a media header atom 144, a media information atom (in FIG. 3 and FIG. 4, a video media information atom 145), and a media handler reference atom. (Media handler reference atom) 146 describes information defining a component for interpreting movie track data and media data.

  The media handler performs mapping from media time to media data using the information of the media information atom.

  The media information atom 145 includes a data handler reference atom 161, a media information header atom, a data information atom 163, and a sample table atom (sample). table atom)) 164.

  The media information header atom (video media information header atom 162 in FIG. 4) describes information about the media. The data handler reference atom 161 describes information related to handling of media data, and includes information for designating a data handler component that provides a means for accessing media data. The data information atom 163 includes a data reference atom and describes information about the data.

  The sample table atom 164 contains the information necessary to convert the media time into a sample number that points to the sample location. The sample table atom 164 includes a sample size atom 172, a time-to-sample atom 173, a sync sample atom 174, a sample description, It consists of an atom (sample description atom) 175, a sample-to-chunk atom 176, a chunk offset atom 177, and a shadow sync atom 178. Is the case.

  The sample size atom 172 describes the size of the sample. How many seconds of data are recorded in the time sample atom 173? The relationship between the sample and the time axis is described. The synchronization sample atom 174 describes information related to synchronization and designates a key frame in the medium. The key frame is a self-contained frame that does not depend on the preceding frame. The sample description atom 175 stores information necessary for decoding a sample in the medium. A media can have one or more sample description atoms, depending on the type of compression type used in the media.

  The sample chunk atom 176 identifies the sample description corresponding to each sample in the media by referring to the table in the sample description atom 175. The sample chunk atom 176 describes the relationship between the sample and the chunk, and the sample position in the media is based on the information of the first chunk, the number of samples per chunk, and the sample description ID (sample description-ID). Identified. The chunk offset atom 177 describes the start bit position of the chunk within the movie data, and defines the position of each chunk within the data stream.

  In FIG. 3, for example, the movie data atom 102 includes a predetermined number of audio data encoded by a predetermined compression encoding method and image data encoded by a predetermined compression encoding method. Stored in units of chunks consisting of samples. Note that the data does not necessarily need to be compressed and encoded, and linear data can also be stored. For example, when dealing with text or MIDI, the movie data atom 102 includes actual data such as text or MIDI. Correspondingly, the movie atom 101 includes a text track, MIDI track, or the like. included. Each track in the movie atom 101 is associated with data stored in the movie data atom 102.

  In such a hierarchical structure, when reproducing data in the movie data atom 102, the QT sequentially follows the hierarchy from the movie atom 101, and based on the atoms 172 to 178 in the sample table atom 164. Then, the sample table is expanded in the memory to identify the relationship between the data. And QT reproduces data based on the relationship between each data.

  Since the QT has such a data structure, the index file of this embodiment accommodates actual data of file excerpt information in a movie data atom, and accommodates management information of the actual data in a movie atom. The movie data atom of this index file is hereinafter referred to as an index data atom, and the movie atom is referred to as an index atom.

  Here, the index file depends on the data handled by the file recorded on the recording medium, but in the present embodiment, the file data is image data and audio data. Hereinafter, such a file is abbreviated as “AV file”.

  When an AV file is recorded on the recording medium in this way, the index file contains, for example, four types of data: property, text, thumbnail, and intro. The property is data indicating the attribute of each AV file, and has information for referring to the actual data of the AV file. In an index file, only properties that contain attribute information are essential files. The text is data indicating a character string of a title related to each AV file. The thumbnail is a representative piece of image data of each AV file. Although the thumbnail of the AV file can be arbitrarily given by the user, for example, it may be automatically set to be the first image data of the first AV file.

  The intro is representative short-time audio data of each AV file. The intro of the AV file can be arbitrarily given by the user. For example, the AV file may be automatically set to be audio data for the first few seconds, for example, 5 seconds in the AV file. These titles, thumbnails, and intros are provided with an accommodation area in the index file as necessary in consideration of search convenience and the like. The property data needs to be registered, but even if the title, thumbnail, and intro storage areas are secured, all the title, thumbnail, and intro data need not be registered. .

  FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of an index file created using a QuickTime movie file. In FIG. 5, the index file is composed of an index atom 201 and an index data atom 202.

  The index data atom 202 contains actual data of properties, text, thumbnails, and intros. The property, text, thumbnail, and intro actual data 231, 232, 233, and 234 relating to each AV file are entry # 1 to entry #n (first and subsequent areas of the index data atom 202). n is an integer of 2 or more).

  The index atom 201 corresponds to the movie header atom 211 and the actual data of the property, text, thumbnail, and intro, respectively, and the track atom (property) 212, track atom (text) 213, and track atom (thumbnail) 214. And a track atom (intro) 215. As described above, only the track atom (property) 212 and the actual property data 231 are essential.

  FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example of a track atom (property). In FIG. 6, a track atom (property) 212 includes AV file property # 1, AV file property # 2,..., AV file property #n defined as chunks related to property data corresponding to each AV file. .., L_PRn, and start byte positions 0, L_PR1, L_PR1 + L_PR2,..., L_PR1 +... + L_PRn−1. The data length is, for example, a variable length displayed in units of bytes.

  The relationship between track atom (text), track atom (thumbnail), track atom (intro) and actual text data, thumbnail actual data, and intro actual data is also related to the above-mentioned track atom (property) and properties. This is similar to the relationship of actual data.

  FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating an example of actual property data. The actual property data consists of entry management information and file attribute information. The entry management information is information for managing the entry itself, and includes an entry number (entry number), an entry property (entry property), and a folder property (folder property).

  The entry number starts from 0 and is a unique number in the index file. The entry number indicates in which entry the actual data of the property is stored. The entry number is 4-byte data with the 0th byte as the start byte position. The camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus 50 can find the area where the disc title is stored in the index file by searching for this entry number.

  The entry property is 1-byte data with the 4th byte as the start byte position, and indicates the attribute and state of the entry. Each entry property 1, entry property 2, entry property 3, and entry property 4 is 1 bit. include.

  That is, the entry property 1 identifies (0: folder, 1: file), and the entry property 2 identifies (0: normal, 1: system). “Normal” means an entry of actual data of the above-described property, and “system” means an entry in which a definition of a flag to be described later is described. The folder property is 4-byte data with the 5th byte as the start byte position, and indicates the folder to which the entry belongs.

  The entry property 3 identifies (0: valid, 1: invalid) regarding the entry, and the entry property 4 indicates whether the file registered in the entry refers to another file (0: no reference) , 1: with reference).

  File attribute information includes version (version), flag (data), data type (data type), production date (creation time), editing date (modification time), duration (duration), file identifier (binary file identifier), referer It consists of a referred counter, a referencing file list, and a URL file identifier.

  The version is 1-byte data with the 9th byte as the start byte position, and is the version number of the file registered in the entry. The flag is 2-byte data with the 10th byte as the start byte position, and is used to identify the attribute of the file. The data type is 1-byte data with the 12th byte as the start byte position, and indicates the type of data (moving image, still image, audio, etc.) in the title file or AV file related to the property.

  The production date and time indicates the date and time when the title file or AV file related to the property is produced, and is 4-byte data with the 13th byte as the start byte position. The editing date and time indicates the date and time when the title file or AV file related to the property is modified, and is 4-byte data with the 17th byte as the start byte position. The duration indicates the length of time required for the title file or AV file related to the property to be played back, and is 4-byte data with the 21st byte as the start byte position. The file identifier is binary data indicating the location of the file related to the property, and is 6-byte data with the 25th byte as the start byte position.

The referred counter indicates the number of files referenced from another file, and is 4-byte data with the 31st byte as the start byte position. The referencing file list indicates the reference source when the file is referenced from another file, and has a variable length L with the 35th byte as the start byte position. This is RF data. In the referencing file list, an entry number or an ID indicating the actual location of the file is described. The URL file identifier is URL format data indicating the location of a file, and (35 + L RF) Variable length L with the byte as the start byte position FI data.

  The entry management information described above can have a virtual hierarchical structure as shown in FIG. FIG. 8A is an example of entry management information extracted from the property information of each of a plurality of entries from # 0 to # 8. FIG. 8B shows the hierarchical structure represented by the entry management information shown in FIG. 8A. It is shown. Hereinafter, AV file management based on entry management information will be described.

  In the example of FIG. 8, by the entry property 1 and the entry property 2, the entry numbers # 0, # 3, and # 4 are folders, # 1, # 5, # 6, and # 7 are files, and # 2 and It is indicated that # 8 is system information. Entries # 2 and # 8 are not included in the hierarchy. Further, the folder property indicates that the entry number # 1 and # 3 are higher in the folder with the entry number # 0, and the entry number # 4 and # 5 are higher in the folder with the entry number # 3. It is shown that the entry number # 6 and # 7 are higher in the folder with the entry number # 4. Therefore, the hierarchical structure shown in FIG. 8B is defined by these entry management information.

  FIG. 9A shows an index file. As shown in FIG. 9A, entries # 2 and # 8, which are system information, are composed of property, text, and thumbnail data, like other normal entries. Since the intro is not indispensable, the system information entries # 2 and # 8 do not have intro data in FIG. 9B. As with other normal entries, system entries are managed by the track atom (property) 212, track atom (text) 213, and track atom (thumbnail) 214 of the index atom 201. FIG. 9B shows a part of the property information from entry # 0 to # 8, and is the same as FIG. 8A.

  FIG. 10 shows an example of retaining flag information in entry # 2 which is system information. The flag is 2 bytes (16 bits), and the meaning of the flag is defined according to the bit position where 1 is set. Therefore, up to 16 types of attributes can be defined by flags. The maximum number that can be defined can be appropriately limited. In the example of FIG. 10, the fourth bit from the beginning (MSB) of the first byte of the flag is set to 1. The value of the flag is 0x1000 (0x is a notation representing a hexadecimal number). In this case, the text data is “BASEBALL”, and the thumbnail data is a thumbnail (icon) related to baseball.

  FIG. 11 shows an example of retaining flag information in entry # 8, which is system information. In the example of FIG. 11, the eighth bit from the MSB of the first byte is set to 1. The value of the flag is 0x0100. In this case, the text data is “SKI”, and the thumbnail data is a thumbnail (icon) related to skiing.

In the example shown in FIGS. 10 and 11, the meaning of one bit of the flag is defined by one entry. As shown in FIG. 12, the meaning of a plurality of, for example, 2-bit flags may be defined by one entry, for example, # 2. For example, the 4th and 8th bits from the MSB of the first byte are set to 1, respectively. The value of the flag is 0x1100. In this case, the text data is “BASEBALL” and “SKI”.
The data of two thumbnails, that is, a thumbnail (icon) related to baseball and a thumbnail (icon) related to skiing are recorded.

  As described above, when a plurality of bits of a flag are defined in one entry, the correspondence between the flag, the text, and the thumbnail is determined in advance. For example, the text and thumbnails are arranged in order from the MSB side bit of the flag. In the case of text, it is delimited by an arbitrary number of characters, and text information is recorded in order at each delimiter. Alternatively, a plurality of texts may be distinguished by embedding tags using a description language such as HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language). Thumbnails are also stored. Rules for which pixels of the thumbnails make up a picture and corresponding from the picture in which location are set, pixel position information is stored using text tags, thumbnails It can also be handled by storing it in the comment information.

  FIG. 13 shows a file organization method when the meaning of the 2-bit flag is defined by entry # 2. FIG. 13A shows entry management information and flags for entries # 0 to # 7. This entry management information (entry number, entry property 1, entry property 2, folder property) is the same as the information from entry # 0 to # 7 in FIG. 8 or FIG. The entry # 2 is system information, the flag is set to 0x1100, and holds the definition information of the two flags as described with reference to FIG.

  The flag of the entry # 1 that is a file is 0, and the attribute of the file # 1 is not defined. The attribute of the file of entry # 5 is defined as “BASEBALL” by the flag 0x1000. The flags of entry # 6 and # 7 are both 0x0100. This flag indicates that the attribute is “SKI”.

  The hierarchical structure shown in FIG. 13B is defined by the entry management information and the flag shown in FIG. 13A described above. File attribute information can be defined by a flag. Therefore, when playing back a recording medium on which an index file is recorded, for example, an optical disc, by specifying a file attribute specified by a flag, it is possible to display only those having the attribute specified in the index file, for example. . Furthermore, by designating a desired one of the displayed index files, an AV file corresponding to the designated index file can be designated. Therefore, the AV file desired by the user can be searched at high speed. Furthermore, since the flag definition is described by the system information, it is only necessary to define a necessary range, and there is an advantage that the amount of data does not increase. Further, the definition of the flag may be different for each recording medium, and there is an advantage that the versatility is excellent.

  It is possible to adopt either a method in which the device has system information for defining a flag in advance, or a method in which the user himself / herself sets a flag definition. For example, in one embodiment, 2 bytes are prepared as a flag. Therefore, 1 byte is assigned to a flag defined by an image pickup apparatus equipped with a device, for example, an optical disc recording / playback device, and the other 1 byte is assigned to a flag that can be defined by the user. You may do it.

  Next, a description will be given of a method for indicating an entry reference relationship using a part of entry management information and file attribute information. FIG. 14A shows an example of property information necessary to indicate the reference relationship of entries from entry # 0 to entry # 7. Entry property 1 to entry property 4 are defined in the entry property (1 byte). Entry property 1 is used for identifying files and folders, and entry property 2 is used for identifying normal information and system information. The folder property indicates the upper folder. These entry properties 1 and 2 and the folder property are the same as those described above.

  The entry property 3 identifies (0: valid, 1: invalid) regarding the entry, and the entry property 4 indicates whether the file registered in the entry refers to another file (0: no reference) , 1: with reference). The referred counter indicates the number of files that are referenced from another file, and the referencing file list indicates the reference source of a file that is referenced from another file.

  In the example of FIG. 14A, all entries are valid, entry property 3 is all 0, and files registered in entries # 5 and # 6 refer to other files. The entry property 4 of 6 is set to 1. Also, the reference counter of entry # 1 is set to 2, and is referenced from two files. The two files of the reference source are files registered in entries # 5 and # 6 shown in the referencing file list, respectively.

  The AV file registered in entry # 1 is referred to as AV file A, and the AV files registered in entries # 5, # 6, and # 7 are referred to as AV files B, C, and D, respectively. The property information shown in FIG. 14A corresponds to the reference relationship between files as shown in FIG. 14B. That is, since the files C and D registered in the entries # 5 and # 6 refer to the file A registered in the entry # 1, the entry property 4 of the entries # 5 and # 6 becomes 1, respectively. The 1 reference counter is 2, and the referencing file list of entry # 1 is 5 and 6.

  When an AV file is to be deleted from among the AV files recorded on the recording medium, the AV file referenced from another AV file cannot be deleted. This can be determined based on whether the value of the referenced counter in the file attribute information is 0 or not. In the example of FIG. 14, the value of the referenced counter of the AV file A is 2, and it can be seen that this file A cannot be deleted.

  When the AV file is deleted, there are two methods for processing the corresponding entry. One method is a method of actually deleting the corresponding entry # 6 when, for example, the AV file C is deleted, as shown in FIG. As shown in FIG. 16, the other method is a method of changing the value of entry property 3 of entry # 6 to a value (1) meaning invalidity without deleting entry # 6. Any method may be used.

  The method of actually deleting an entry along with the deletion of an AV file is more advantageous than the method of not deleting an entry in terms of the capacity of the recording medium. From the viewpoint of processing time, the method of actually deleting an entry is disadvantageous compared with the method of not deleting an entry because it is necessary to rewrite not only the actual data of the entry but also the track atom.

  The file deletion process will be described with reference to FIG. This process is performed under the control of the system controller (microcomputer) in the camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus described with reference to FIG. In the first step S1, deletion of the file (AV file) x is selected in the file list display. For example, the file x to be deleted is selected from a list of files displayed on the display panel (see FIG. 2) and a plurality of thumbnails displayed by dividing the screen.

  In step S2, it is determined whether or not the value of the referenced counter of the entry in which the file x is registered in the index file is zero. If it is not 0, it means that another file refers to the file x, and the file x cannot be deleted, so that an exception process is performed (step S3). For example, a message is displayed to the user that it cannot be deleted.

  If the value of the referenced counter is determined to be 0 in step S2, it is determined whether or not the value of entry property 4 is 1 in step S4. That is, it is determined whether or not the file x refers to another file. In the case of entry property 4 = 1, in step S5, an entry whose referencing file list is the entry number of file x (which may be the ID of file x), that is, an entry referenced by file x is searched.

  In step S6, the presence or absence of such an entry is determined. If it is determined that there is no entry, exception processing is performed in step S7. For example, a message indicating that there is a data mismatch is presented to the user. Since the entry property 4 is 1 in step S4, there should be an entry that is referred to by the file x. Nevertheless, the absence of such an entry means that a data inconsistency exists.

  If it is determined in step S6 that there is an entry referenced by the file x, in step S8, the value of the referenced counter of the entry is decremented. In step S9, the entry number of file x (which may be the ID of file x) is deleted from the referencing file list.

  Next, in step S10, it is determined whether or not to delete the entry of the file x. In the process of FIG. 17, when deleting the AV file x, it is possible to select whether or not to actually delete the corresponding entry in the index file. For example, the processing is selected based on the remaining free space of the recording medium. When the remaining free space is large, a method not to delete an entry is selected, and when the remaining free space is small, a method to actually delete an entry is selected.

  When the process for deleting the entry corresponding to the file x is selected in step S10, as shown in FIG. 15, the corresponding entry is deleted from the index data atom in step S11, and deleted in step S12. Data after the entry is moved to fill the empty logical space. In step S13, the management file data is updated in the index atom. If it is determined in step S10 that the entry corresponding to file x is not to be deleted, the value of entry property 3 of the entry is updated to 1 (meaning an invalid entry) in step S15.

  The processing up to step S13 or S15 is data rewriting processing on a semiconductor memory provided in a system controller of a system, for example, a camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus. Then, immediately before ejecting the recording medium, the data on the recording medium is updated at an appropriate timing such as every predetermined time (step S14). That is, the AV file x on the recording medium is deleted and the index file on the recording medium is updated.

  Next, processing for adding a new entry after deleting a file will be described with reference to FIG. In step S21, file X addition processing is started. In step S22, an entry indicated as invalid by the entry property 3 is searched. Here, an entry whose entry property 3 has a value of 1 is defined as invalid.

  If it is determined in step S22 that there is an invalid entry, a new entry is overwritten in the invalid entry area in step S23. FIG. 19 shows processing when entry # 6 is an invalid entry, for example. It is not necessary to rewrite the index atom, which is management data in the index file.

  On the other hand, if it is determined in step S22 that there is no invalid entry, new entry information is added to an arbitrary location in the index file in step S25. In step S26, the management information for each track of the index atom is updated to define the added entry. FIG. 20 shows a process of adding a new entry as entry #n.

  The processing up to step S23 or S26 is data rewriting processing on a semiconductor memory provided in a system controller of a system, for example, a camera-integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus. Then, immediately before ejecting the recording medium, the data on the recording medium is updated at an appropriate timing such as every predetermined time (step S24).

  As described above, since the property information includes the reference relationship information of the file, the reference relationship can be managed without accessing the actual file, and whether or not the deletion can be performed can be determined at high speed.

  The present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment of the present invention, and various modifications and applications can be made without departing from the gist of the present invention. For example, the present invention can be applied to the case of recording and reproducing digital audio signals. For example, the genre (classic, jazz, rock, popular, etc.) of the AV file (music data) may be identified by a flag. Further, when defining the attribute information described in the flag, the attribute information may be defined with respect to the entire range of the index file, or the attribute information may be defined within a predetermined range of a part of the index file. Furthermore, in the above description, an example using QuickTime has been described. However, the present invention may be applied when other application software is used.

1 is a block diagram showing a configuration example of a digital recording / reproducing apparatus to which the present invention can be applied. It is a basic diagram which shows the external shape of the digital recording / reproducing apparatus integrated with a camera which can apply this invention. It is an approximate line figure showing an example of 1 composition of a QuickTime movie file. It is an approximate line figure showing an example of 1 composition of a video media information atom. It is a basic diagram which shows an example of the index file produced using a QuickTime movie file. It is a basic diagram which shows an example of a track atom (property). It is a basic diagram which shows an example of the actual data of a property. It is a basic diagram which shows the specific example of a part of property information, and the hierarchical structure of a file and a folder. It is a basic diagram which shows the structure of an index file, and a specific example of a part of property information. It is a basic diagram which shows an example which registers the content of one flag by entry # 2. It is a basic diagram which shows the other example which registers the content of one flag by entry # 8. It is a basic diagram which shows an example which registers the content of two flags by entry # 2. It is a basic diagram which shows the example of a part of property information containing a flag, and the hierarchical structure of a file and a folder. It is a basic diagram used for description of the property information which shows the reference relationship of a file. It is an approximate line figure used for explanation of an example of processing of property information at the time of file deletion. It is an approximate line figure used for explanation of other examples of processing of property information at the time of file deletion. It is a flowchart used for description of the process of property information at the time of deletion of a file. It is a flowchart used for description of the process at the time of file entry addition. It is an approximate line figure used for explanation of an example of processing at the time of file entry addition. It is an approximate line figure used for explanation of other examples of processing at the time of file entry addition.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 11 ... Video encoder 12 ... Audio encoder 13 ... Video decoder 14 ... Audio decoder 15 ... File generator 16 ... File decoder 17, 20 ... Memory 18 ... Memory controller 19 ... System control microcomputer 21 ... Error correction code / decoder 23 ... Data modulator / demodulator 24 ... Magnetic field modulation driver 26 ... Operation unit 30 ... Servo circuit 31 ..Motor 32 ... magnetic field head 33 ... optical pickup 40 ... recording medium 50 ... camera integrated digital recording / reproducing apparatus 51 ... main body 52 ... lens part 53 ... sound collecting microphone 54 ... Display panel 55 ... Pointing device 201 ... Index atom 202 ... Index data atom 231 Properties 232 ... text 233 ... thumbnail 234 ... intro

Claims (5)

An index file is generated by storing index data related to each of a plurality of files recorded on a recording medium in association with each of actual data of the plurality of files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium A recording device adapted to
The index data includes at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
The file attribute information is information for specifying the file referred to notate § i le on the corresponding information on whether and 該Fu or Airu is enabled or disabled 該Fu prevent file with reference to the other files Including reference relationship data including
The above-mentioned text data and thumbnail data are recording devices which indicate attributes of the file and accommodate a plurality of sets of corresponding text and thumbnails, respectively . An index file is generated by storing index data related to each of a plurality of files recorded on a recording medium in association with each of actual data of the plurality of files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium And a recording method for
The index data includes at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
The file attribute information is information for specifying the file referred to notate § i le on the corresponding information on whether and 該Fu or Airu is enabled or disabled 該Fu prevent file with reference to the other files Including reference relationship data including
A recording method in which the text data and thumbnail data indicate the attributes of the file and each accommodate a plurality of sets of corresponding text and thumbnails . An index file is generated by storing index data relating to each of the plurality of file files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the actual data of the plurality of file files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium A recording method for recording in
The index data includes at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
The file attribute information is information for specifying the file referred to notate § i le on the corresponding information on whether and 該Fu or Airu is enabled or disabled 該Fu prevent file with reference to the other files Including reference relationship data including
A program for causing a computer to execute a recording method in which the text data and thumbnail data indicate the attributes of the file and each accommodates a plurality of sets of corresponding text and thumbnails . An index file is generated by storing index data relating to each of the plurality of file files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the actual data of the plurality of file files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium A recording method for recording in
The index data includes at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
The file attribute information is information for specifying the file referred to notate § i le on the corresponding information on whether and 該Fu or Airu is enabled or disabled 該Fu prevent file with reference to the other files Including reference relationship data including
The text data and the thumbnail data are computer-readable recording media on which a program for causing a computer to execute a recording method in which a plurality of text and thumbnail sets corresponding to the attributes of the file are shown is stored. In an imaging device that records an image signal obtained by capturing an image of a subject on a recording medium,
An index file is generated by storing index data relating to each of the plurality of file files recorded on the recording medium in association with each of the actual data of the plurality of file files in a predetermined format, and the index file is recorded on the recording medium Equipped with an index recording device adapted to record,
The index data includes at least file attribute information, text data, and thumbnail data.
The file attribute information is information for specifying the file referred to notate § i le on the corresponding information on whether and 該Fu or Airu is enabled or disabled 該Fu prevent file with reference to the other files Including reference relationship data including
The imaging device , wherein the text data and thumbnail data indicate attributes of the file and each accommodates a plurality of corresponding text and thumbnail sets .

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