SE2030132A1 - BeMyCam - Google Patents

Abstract

SummeryBeMyCam is an Special online video service that enables remotely positioned people to receive live video streams from any location around the world using any ordinary smartphone with a camera and a person handling the smartphone at the location, with the ability to direct the camera person at the scene to capture the desired images and/or video, Figure 1 Media Capture Device.In addition to streaming video to the requester, a copy is recorded in the storage system where the requester can access through his/ her account, Figure 1 Media Control and Management Applications.The quality of the images and/or video is HD and UHD/4K, so the requester can project the images and/or video on large screens for group watching, Figure 1 Media DisplayDevices.

Description

DESCRIPTION TECHNICAL FIELD [000l] The present invention relates to live video communication.

BACKGROUN D ART 2. 2. id="p-2" id="p-2" id="p-2"

[0002] No prior art of this type exist to the best of knowledge ofthe inventor.

DISCLÛSURE ÛF IN VEN TIÛN Problems to BeSolved by the Invention 3. 3. id="p-3" id="p-3" id="p-3"

[0003] Requirement by people to have alive, video access toremote places Where they do not have access to, or Were it is notpossible for them to have direct contact With the people andevents in the scene. Some examples are listed beloW: l. Reporters or investigators Who need to have a live, visual account of an event from the scene it took place or is taking place.

Construction company executives or project managers WhoWant the ability to inspect certain locations at a constructionsite from close range, While they are in a geographicallydistant location.

Educators Who Want to take their students class to thePyramids in Egypt and/or the great Wall in China, Louverand/ or museum, cultural and educational places.

Sports fans Who Want to Watch a game that is notbroadcasted live.

Art enthusiasts Who Want to visit a neW eXhibit across thecountry, or the globe.

Executives and marketers Who cannot attend a conferencephysically but Want to be there and see and hear theconference talks and connect With people.

Elderly and/ or disabled people Who are interested in visitingvarious historical and cultural locations, touristic sites, andsimilar place around the World.

Field Workers, scientists and other professionals in the fieldcan use this service to send streaming media to theirheadquarters or different parties in their organization.

A company that needs to “see” the premises/ facilities/Warehouses of another client company A neW tenant shopping around to rent or buy a neW house/apartment Which is too far of a distance to travel in person (a service that realtors can also provide) 11. Emergency Health situations in remote and/ or rural areasWhere there is no immediate clinical assistance (throughWhich the level of emergency and following steps needed tobe taken are established) 4. 4. id="p-4" id="p-4" id="p-4"

[0004] Many people require aerial camera shots from some placesof their interest Where they are not present or have no means ofacquiring aerial images and/or video. BeMyCam service canutilize local dEyes With commercial or recreational drones thatare Willing to join the BeMyCam system to provide camera services in their locality torespond to these requirements.

Means for Solving the Problem . . id="p-5" id="p-5" id="p-5"

[0005] ln order to achieve the objective, the present inventionadopts the following means: 1. A cloud-based Web application (or portal) is built forconnecting those requesting live, on-scene camera service(called “requester”) and those Who are interested to takevideo shots from the area they are located for the requesters(called Distant Eye, or dEye). The name of the Webapplication/portal is “BeMyCam° or “BeMyCam Portal”. 2. Both requesters and dEyes sign up for an account in theBeMyCam portal. They can post and/ or receive requestsand offers, stream video, communicate With each otherthrough text, voice and video through their account. 3. dEyes register their location, the areas they are Willing toWork in, the type and features of their camera/smartphone,their availability, etc. in their profile. This information Will be make available to the requesters requesting BeMyCamservice in those areas. 4. In their account space, requesters are able to see a map ofthe areas in Which they request BeMyCam service and thelocation of all dEyes in those areas, along With theinformation about their camera and availability. They canselect the dEyes from the map and send messages to themabout the details their requested services.

. During broadcasting, the requester can communicate Withthe dEye through voice and direct the camera at the scene inreal-time. 6. The system relies on cellular systems to transfer the livevideo from the scene. 7. A streaming server in the cloud receives and streams thevideo to the BeMyCam application. 8. BeMyCam application displays the video to the requester ina screen inside the requester°s portal account, accessiblethrough a common Web broWser. 9. The quality of the images and/or video is HD and UHD/4K,so the requester can project the images and/or video on largescreens for group Watching. lO. The video image is recorded and stored in a cloud and/ orother storage server, and a link to the recording is madeavailable to the requester after the BeMyCam session isclosed.

EFFECT OF THE INVENTION 7. 7. id="p-7" id="p-7" id="p-7"

[0007] This invention will have a high positive impact on theprofessional activity and quality of work performed by variousprofessions; media reporters, managers, executives, supervisors,educators, law enforcement officers, etc., provide high qualityeducational aid to students at all educational level, and will raisethe quality of life of the elderly, disabled and entertainment eventsenthusiasts in sports, arts and culture. There are many other areaswhere this invention could have a positive impact (healthcare,crisis and disaster management, rescue operations, scientificevaluation, etc.).

BEST MODE TO CARRY OUT THE INVENTION 8. 8. id="p-8" id="p-8" id="p-8"

[0008] The best mode is a cloud-based system that is able to usehigh performance video streaming applications and servers with ahigh degree of scalability and cost efficiency. All systemcomponents, when designed and built in the cloud, can beupgraded regularly at the lowest possible costs, incorporating thelatest technologies in high- quality video streaming and highperformance web application development into the BeMyCamsystem. 9. 9. id="p-9" id="p-9" id="p-9"

[0009] The BeMyCam service will be a subscription-basedsystem, centrally controlled and monitored by trainedadministrators based on strict rules in order to comply with localand intemational communication and privacy laws andregulations.

APPLICABILITY [00l0] As described above, there are many useful applications forthis invention in various fields and areas. Below are briefdescriptions of ten (10) example use cases: [00l l] Education: The teacher of the l0b class in Breilia middleschool in Hammerfest, Norway has heard about BeMyCam”s capabilities and decides to arrange a visit to the Louvre museumin Paris for her students. She signs up for an account inBeMyCam and searches for dEyes in Paris who are fluent inEnglish and know the museum well enough to assist the teacherto realize her educational goal. She finally finds two dEyes, oneof whom is a Danish student studying arts in Paris. She is veryexcited as the dEye both knows the museum and can understandNorwegian. The teacher sets a date and time for the visit andcoordinates with the dEye the set schedule, and arranges with himthe best route they can take in the museum for the one-hour visit.She also coordinates with the Museum for this. She also invitesseveral other teachers to see this innovative and very valuableteaching aid so that they may use it in their classes as well. Thestudents are very excited too, as they have only seen the world”smost prominent museum in documentary reports and pictures.When the live video visit starts, the teacher with the consultationof the dEye go through the museum halls, directing the dEye todifferent locations when necessary or asking him to elaborate onsomething if needed. The students watch the amazing art workson a large screen in their classroom with their teacher explainingthe different pieces of art there. Other teachers are very impressedand as a result, the school makes BeMyCam visits one of its mostvaluable educational aids to all classes. 12. 12. id="p-12" id="p-12" id="p-12"

[0012] Construction: A construction company in South Africa isbuilding a highway bridge on the Olifants River. Since the bridgeis state funded, the department of transportation supervises theconstruction activities, they desire to have regular on-sceneinspections and reports about the progress of the project. Thedepartment head office is in Pretoria, about 2OOOk1n away fromthe construction site. The inspector responsible for this bridgecreates a BeMyCam account, and searches for dEyes in thevicinity of the bridge. He spots three dEyes within lOkm of thebridge, and sends them his request. All three respond with their schedule to handle the job. The inspector selects one of them andnegotiates the price, and asks the dEye to go to the project siteand take a test shot so the inspector can check the functionality ofthis innovative inspection method for doing his duty. The dEyegets to the site and takes live shots from different parts of thebridge and the construction activity, directed by the inspector inreal-time. The inspector downloads the recorded session fromBeMyCam portal and creates his report, adding screenshots fromthe recorded video. 13. 13. id="p-13" id="p-13" id="p-13"

[0013] Journalism: An accident has taken place in a rural area inOklahoma, US, as a car has crashed into a passing train Withchemical cargo. The local TV does not have immediate access tothe location, and it Will take time to get a helicopter ready, and thecost is prohibitive in most cases. The reporter decides to useBeMyCam service, so she signs into her account in BeMyCamportal, searches for all dEyes in that area in Oklahoma, and seesthem on a map of the location. On the map, she starts sendingmessages to dEyes Who are closest to the location of the accident.Out of four dEyes, she gets tWo offers Who can go to the sceneimmediately, one of them having a drone as Well. The reporterdecides to send both dEyes to the scene, one to shoot on theground, and the second one from air. In a feW minutes, the firstdEye arrives at the scene and connects his camera to the portaland starts communicating With the reporter. The reporter talks tothe dEye and directs him to different locations on the scene. Thesecond one is also ready noW, and she directs him as Well. Shedoesn”t Worry about the shots, as they are automatically recordedat broadcast quality in the cloud, Where she can doWnload itanytime she Wants. At the same time, she can broadcast thestreamed video directly on the air if needed, reporting to thepublic herself, and have an assistant direct the tWo cameras at thescene of the accident. 14. 14. id="p-14" id="p-14" id="p-14"

[0014] Journalism in Dangerous Locations: In anothersituation, a journalist who is covering the Syrian crisis and who isstationed near the border in Turkey is told that there has been newbombing with heavy casualties. She cannot go to the scene herselfdue to the danger and if she gets footage from local people, itwould not be considered her official footage, and also by the timeshe can get there, it will be too late. Other media have alreadypublished the news. She immediately goes to the BeMyCamportal and finds the nearest dEye in the area that she has perhaps worked with beforeas well. The dEye is in fact in the same town and startsbroadcasting live scenes immediately and she starts to direct himas to where to go, what to film, etc. That footage is in fact hersand she can use it immediately on a live broadcast. . . id="p-15" id="p-15" id="p-15"

[0015] Entertainment: A local football team in Härnösandnorthern Sweden is having a match with another football team inBergnäset in the north. The game takes place in Bergsvallenfootball ground in the northern city of Luleå. The game is notbroadcasted, but many football fans in Härnösand would like towatch the game live. The Härnösands football club sets up a largescreen in a hall with the capacity for 500 people for this game.The club”s communication manager connects to its BeMyCamaccount and looks for dEyes in Luleå. He locates 5 dEyes, andcontacts them through the BeMyCam messaging system. Hecomes to agreement with three dEyes to cover the event. Hearranges them around the football ground in order to get acomplete coverage of the game for his fans. The day before thegame, all dEyes go to the Bergsvallen football ground to rehearse,and the communication manager checks their location, shooting,and the quality of broadcast, and configures his display system inthe hall accordingly with the help of his IT assistant. He alsosends another person from the club to report the game live while the game is broadcasted by the three dEyes. On the day of thegame, the hall is full of fans, and the broadcast starts and becomesa success With many happy fans. 16. 16. id="p-16" id="p-16" id="p-16"

[0016] Tourism: Saint J oseph”s is an elderly nursing home in thestate of Maine in the US. Asides from healthcare andrehabilitation, they provide their residents With art lessons,cooking groups, fundraisers, bingo, cocktail parties, danceclasses, gardening club, spa days, movie matinees, and Weeklyperformances by local entertainers. When the managerresponsible for entertainment and quality of life for the residentsbecame aWare of the capabilities of BeMyCam, she struck on anidea to arrange a live visit to the Forbidden City in Beijing, Chinafor her residents. She lo gs into her BeMyCam account andsearches for dEyes in Beijing. To her surprise, there are 124dEyes registered in Beijing Who can do the job. She sends amessage to all of them asking Which ones knoW the ForbiddenCity inside and out, and 22 reply, tWo of them With the ability tofly a drone. She comes to agreement With one dEye With droneand another one for going inside the city. They arrange a time for the visit on Friday. She creates excitement among theresidents by announcing the event. They setup the large screen inthe gathering room, Which becomes full When the visit starts. Themanager directs the dEyes at the scene, While also responding tosuggestions by the residents on Where to point at or zoom in. Theshots are sWitched betWeen the aerial vieW and to vieW on theground by the manager. They ask questions from the dEyes Whoexplain about the artifacts and different parts of the city. The visitlasts tWo hours, and becomes one of the most memorableexperiences the residents have had in this nursing home. 17. 17. id="p-17" id="p-17" id="p-17"

[0017] Science: Recently researchers from Oman”s Ministry ofHeritage and Culture and the University of Heidelberg discovered45 tombs on eastem Oman's Al Saleel Mountain that date back to Iron Age some 3,000 years ago. The discovery Was so importantthat they Wanted to have the archeologist anywhere in the Worldto see the site and the research team”s effort live. The programrequester and the archeology department media manager at theUniversity of Heidelberg open a BeMyCam account and looks fordEyes in Oman. There is one dEye in the city of El Kamil nearthe location Who can travel there. They make arrangements forthe dEye to go to the site immediately. Three hours later the dEyearrives at the excavation site and starts linking With the mediamanager in Heidelberg for testing the images and/or video qualityand shooting procedure. The media manager sent out event alertto all relevant universities and museums beforehand announcingthe event schedule, and giving them a link and login credentials toconnect to the broadcast screen on BeMyCam. They expectednearly 2000 visitors, and so made arrangements With BeMyCamto allocate the required bandWidth. This event starts on time andgoes on for one and half hours. The stream of questions andpositive feedback from the visiting institutions made the programmanager at Heidelberg to schedule another session for the nextday and coordinate it With the dEye. 18. 18. id="p-18" id="p-18" id="p-18"

[0018] Business and Trade: Dasco storage solutions in Canadahas ordered 3000 laptop lockers from Hangzhou DongchengElectronics Co. in China. Dasco has hired the quality inspectioncompany SGA to thoroughly inspect the products and plant, andthe finished product before loading into containers for shipping.HoWever, Dasco”s Quality Assurance Would like to have afirsthand report from the scene, both of the quality and standardsof the product and the processes, and the Way SGA is inspecting andsee Whether they can rely on their report. The Dasco QA inspectorin charge of this project uses BeMyCam to find tWo dEyes in J iubao ToWn, Hangzhou for this job. He arranges With the dEyes to be at the manufacturing plant on Hanghai Road at 8:00 AM andconnect With SGA inspectors before they start their inspection.Dasco QA arranges With the plant manager to allow one dEye toindependently Walk through the plant, and he assigns one dEye toaccompany the SGA inspector. The streamed live images and/orvideo are displayed on tWo large displays and the four membersof the QA team Watch and direct the dEyes for tWo hours until theproducts and the Whole process is inspected in detail. 19. 19. id="p-19" id="p-19" id="p-19"

[0019] Manufacturing: A company decides to manufacture someof the parts used in its industrial products in China in order tobetter compete against other brands. They source five candidatesto consider, and the management team requires to have a firsthandlook at their plant and operation before evaluating them andselecting the final manufacturer. The team requests the company°smedia relations department to provide a means of remotelyvisiting the plants. A technical lead from the media departmentsearches for dEyes in three cities in China Where the fivemanufacturers have their main facilities reside. She selects onedEye for each plant, and arranges a suitable time With themanagement team to visit each plant, giving each visit l hours”time. Then schedules the visit With the dEyes. She also considershaving a standby dEye as Well in case the first one is not able tomake it. The first scheduled visit starts, and the plant supervisorand a translator accompany the dEye in the visit. Themanagement Watches the live video image on the large screen inits board room. Each manager asks the dEye to shoW differentparts of the plant that is of interest, and ask questions from thesupervisor in real time. The BeMyCam visits provides a live,firsthand vieW and very valuable information to the managementteam, and helps them tremendously in deciding on their next step. . . id="p-20" id="p-20" id="p-20"

[0020] Real Estate: A family located in New York areconsidering moving to San Francisco because the father”s joblocation has changed. They need to find the best neW house inSan Francisco, something that all family members, including the 2 younger daughters and the only son like. They have a list ofcandidate property (homes) in San Francisco and have seen photos of therooms and even short video clips of some of the homes, but theyWant to know more and decide as a family Which home to select.On the other hand, the family as a Whole cannot afford to go toSan Francisco and start looking around and checking out homes.The mother has read about BeMyCam on the Web. She searchesfor dEyes in San Francisco and finds 15 of them that suits hertaste. She contacts them and picks 3 of them and then divides thelist of candidate homes between them. Every aftemoon, thefamily spends 2 hours, one hour for each house. They direct thedEye to move around the house, look into all the rooms and holes,check out the vieW, look at the neighborhood, etc. Within a Week,they have found their dream home on Which all agree and thefather happily accepts the relocation from the company.

Claims (3)

Claims BeMyCam is an online SPECIAL Video service that enables remotely positionedpeople to receive live video streams from any location around the World using anyordinary smartphone With a camera and a person handling the smartphone at thelocation, With the ability to direct the camera person at the scene to capture the desiredimages and/ or Video. The system used is depicted in the figure 1 in page 2. The system is comprised of 3parts:

1. Media Capture Device: a. This is smartphone Which has either a built-in camera and /or a handheldcamera and/ or Remote camera is connected to it. b. A specially designed mobile app is installed on it to enable it to communicateWith the backend. c. Communication is through Cellular netWork.

2. Backend a. Medial Control and Management ApplicationThis application Which resides on the backend server controls the entireprocess, gets the data from the Media Capture Device and disseminates it to theend-users (Media Display Devices). b. Streaming and Media Storage ServersThese servers both store and as Well as stream the video received from theMedia Capture Devices to the end-user stations (Media Display Devices)

3. Media Display Devices a. Tablets/Smartphones Which have our mobile app installed on them. They WillalloW the display of the video as Well as the backWard voice directing (theperson at the media display device directs the person behind the Media CaptureDevice through a voice channel). b. Personal Computers and/or Laptops, With our app installed on them, can beused to display the captured video and the backWard voice directing (the personat the Media Display Device directs the person behind the Media CaptureDevice through a voice channel). c. Smart screens and/or Widescreen, and/or TVs that have access to the internetWith Wire and//or Wireless can also be connected to the system using a broWserconnection.