Handheld video transmission and display

Abstract

A handheld, wireless video receiver that receives compressed video, decompresses the compressed video, displays the decompressed video. The receiver is part of a system comprising methods, medium, and handheld, wireless devices which compress, enhance, encode, transmit, decompress and display digital video images in real time. Real time wireless videoconferences connect multiple handheld video devices. Real time compression is achieved by sub-sampling each frame of a video signal, filtering the pixel values, and encoding. Real time transmission is achieved due to high levels of effective compression. Real time decompression is achieved by decoding and decompressing the encoded data to display high quality images. The receiver can alter various setting including but not limited to the format for the compression, image size, frame rate, brightness and contrast. A zoom control can be used select a portion of interest of video being transmitted or being played back. The receiver may also have a touch sensitive display screen providing controls for video display and mobile telephone operation.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS [0001] This application is a continuation of co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11 / 262,106, filed on Oct. 27, 2005, published Jun. 1, 2006, as U.S. patent application publication 2006 / 0114987, entitled “HANDHELD VIDEO TRANSMISSION AND DISPLAY,” which hereby is incorporated by reference. [0002] U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11 / 262,106 is a continuation in part of co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09 / 467,721, filed on Dec. 20, 1999, and entitled “VARIABLE GENERAL PURPOSE COMPRESSION FOR VIDEO IMAGES (ZLN)”, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,233,619, which hereby is incorporated by reference. [0003] This application and application Ser. No. 09 / 467,721 claim priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119(e) of U.S. provisional application Ser. No. 60 / 113,051, filed on Dec. 21, 1998, and entitled “METHODS OF ZERO LOSS (ZL) COMPRESSION AND ENCODING OF GRAYSCALE IMAGES”, which hereby is incorporated by reference. [0004] My U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

"The present invention is a handheld device with video capture and playback capabilities, including speakers and headphones for audio. The device can be connected to a network for exchanging video files or streaming video. It includes a video camera that can be mounted on an iPod-type device for added video capture capability. The invention also includes a method of compression and decompression of video data that saves storage space and reduces transmission time. The device has a zoom control for controlling the video being transmitted or displayed. The invention also provides a high quality video image without blocking and smearing defects, as well as filtering noise and recording artifacts. The invention also includes a level of encryption to prevent direct viewability of images."

Problems solved by technology

However the transmission of video signals with the full resolution and quality of television is still out of reach.

A number of different approaches have been taken but each has resulted in less than acceptable results.

In the case where the image is generated based on sampled data, such as an ultrasound machine, there is often noise and artificial spikes in the signal.

Florescent or improper lighting may cause a solid background to flicker or appear grainy.

Such noise exists in the real world but may reduce the quality of the perceived image and lower the compression ratio that could be achieved by conventional methods.

These simple approaches by themselves have failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios.

This approach also has failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios.

This approach also has failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios.

These approaches require extensive computer processing and have failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios.

While these dictionary-based algorithms are popular, these approaches require extensive computer processing and have failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios.

However this loss results in certain blocks of the image being compressed such that areas of the image have a blocky appearance and the edges of the 8 by 8 blocks become apparent because they no longer match the colors of their adjacent blocks.

Another disadvantage of JPEG is smearing.

The true edges in an image get blurred due to the lossy compression method.

MPEG suffers from the same blocking and smearing problems as JPEG.

These approaches require extensive computer processing and have failed to achieve the necessary compression ratios without unacceptable loss of image quality and artificially induced distortion.

H.263 compresses in real time but does so by sacrificing image quality resulting in severe blocking and smearing.

These approaches require extensive computer processing and generally cannot be completed in real time.

However, the original iPod did not have a color display, a built-in camera, built-in speakers, built-in microphone or wireless communications.

Initially they had limited data bandwidth.

Hand held devices are limited in size and weight.

These size and weight limitation prevent handheld devices from having the electronic circuitry, processors, and batteries found in laptops and other larger computers.

These limitations have made it impossible to provide full frame, full motion video display or live transmission on handheld devices.

The existing, commercially available hand held devices have not been able to support live or streaming video for a number of reasons.

Uncompressed full-motion, full frame video requires extremely high bandwidth that is not available to handheld portable devices.

While MPEG is effective in desktop computers with broadband connections to the Internet, decoding and displaying MPEG encoded video is very processor intensive.

The processors of existing handheld devices are slower or less powerful than those used in desktop computers.

Further, the higher bandwidth wireless communications interfaces would also place a large strain on the already strained batteries.

Live video transmission and reception would be even more challenging.

For this reason, handheld device have not been able to transmit or receive streaming, or especially, live video.

Images