Method for representing animated menu buttons

ES 2 301 977 T3

DESCRIPTION

Method for rendering animated menu buttons.

Scope of the invention

The present invention relates to a method for adding animated menu buttons to an optical storage medium.

Background

Currently, optical storage media formats can support visual menus, for example, for content management or control functions. The applications of these visual menus consist in the selection of one of the multiple titles found on the disc, in the selection of a chapter belonging to a title and others. From the user's perspective, these menus consist of a series of buttons that appear on the screen. The user can navigate the menu, for example by using the up, down, left and right buttons on their remote control to select a menu button and can activate a menu button by using some kind of “OK” button on the remote control. distance. An indicator, usually a highlighted text or an arrow, can provide information to the user, showing which button is currently selected or activated. A menu button can have the states "normal", "selected" or "activated".

However, the popular DVD menus are quite limited when it comes to additional features, as they only include static visual buttons.

Also, a subtitle specification included in the document “ETS 300 743”: Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB); Subtitling System (DVB-ST) provided by the European Telecommunications Standardization Institute (ETSI) is known for incorporating subtitles into video streams.

Summary of the invention

The present invention can be used to provide additional information to the user operating a menu related to an optical storage medium. Information includes visually and / or verbally animated buttons. Claim 1 describes a method that provides said information.

In claim 9 a storage medium including an animated menu is described.

According to the invention, a menu button displayed on the screen may have a different appearance, depending on its state. The state can be "normal", "selected" or "activated", and for each of these states the button can have a different color or shape. Also, a sound or sequence of sounds can be added to any or all of the menu buttons, depending on the state of the buttons. The sounds can consist, for example, of a click or a melody, or of a vocal sequence. The current invention provides a data structure by which these additional features can be described.

Advantageous embodiments of the invention are shown in the dependent claims, in the following description and in the figure.

Brief description of the figure

An example of embodiment of the invention is described with reference to the attached figure 1, which shows an on-screen menu according to the invention, and the corresponding remote control.

Detailed description of the invention

Figure 1 shows a video screen 1 with a menu including buttons 2, 3 and corresponding text describing the buttons. When a user presses a button 5, 6 of a remote control 4, the state of a button 2, 3 may change, as well as the representation of the button. In Figure 1, a button 2 is selected and thus has a different appearance than the unselected buttons 3. When the user presses, for example, the "right" button 6 on the remote control, another button 3 that is to the right of the currently selected button 2 is selected. When the user presses the “OK” button 5, the selected button is activated and the function associated with the selected button is executed. The selected button 2 according to the invention is animated, for example, it has another color and another shape than an unselected button 3, and its color or shape may change. In particular, the button can also be replaced by a moving symbol, an animated sequence or the like, depending on the state.

A preferred embodiment of the invention is based on the syntax of the semantics of the subtitle specifications included in the document "ETS 300 743: Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB); Subtitling System ”(DVB-ST) provided by the European Telecommunications Standardization Institute

ES 2 301 977 T3 (ETSI). In order to bring improvements to the menus related to optical storage media, the page composition segment defined in DVB-ST is expanded to describe animated menu buttons and to associate a sound or sequence of sounds with a button. The enhanced page layout segment will be referred to herein as "A menu page layout segment."

The present invention, like DVB-ST uses page composition segments to describe the position of one or more rectangular regions of the screen, assuming that a region includes a representation of a button in a certain state, for example, data from pixels or bitmaps. In this way, each image of the button can be addressed by an identifier (ID), or a "region_id [region_id]". In this embodiment of the invention, DVB-ST compatibility is maintained by using an associated segment type ID for the menu page composition segment. The menu page layout segment is defined as described in Table 1.

The "menu page composition segment" according to the invention can also replace the original page composition segment, for example in DVB-ST. A menu page composition segment describes a menu and provides the necessary layout and time information, as well as additional control information.

In an embodiment of the invention, consisting of a simple case with static menus, each button is represented, for example, by three images. A first image represents the button in the "normal" state, a second image represents the button in the "selected" state, and a third image represents the button in the "activated" state. These images can be stored, for example, as bitmap files on the storage medium, and can be used to display the menu.

In another embodiment, which overcomes static menus, the menu page composition segment also allows to describe animated buttons. In this case, the "normal" state and the "selected" state of a button are each represented by a series of images that are displayed, and that can, for example, be cyclically repeated on the screen to achieve the animation effect. It is also possible to define an animation for the “activated” state of a button, but in this case it may be advantageous to show the animation phases only once, because normally the menu will disappear or change after the activation of a button.

For all animations of a menu button, the author of the menu can specify the frame frequency of the animation, defining how long each phase of an animation is displayed for.

Advantageously, the invention also allows the possibility of providing the user with an audible feedback. If a button is in the "selected" or "activated" state, it can be assigned a sound identifier associated with a sound, which can be stored on a storage medium. The associated sound is played when the button enters the respective button state. In one embodiment of the invention, the associated sound is played repeatedly, while the button is in the respective state.

The structure of the menu page composition segment and the semantics of the fields of the menu page composition segment are based on the structure and semantics provided in DVB-ST, Section 7.2.1 “Page composition segment. page]". Additional definitions of semantics are used for an improved menu in accordance with the invention.

Table 1 shows the structure of a menu page composition segment according to the invention. Lines 1 to 8 are identical to the subtitle segment of the DVB-ST standard, allowing the possibility of maintaining backwards compatibility. The following describes the meaning of the fields shown in Table 1. The addressing of the pixels is based on a coordinate system whose origin is defined by the upper left corner of the associated video screen. Pixel directions are magnified from left to right and top to bottom. The dimensions of the associated video are defined as video_width * video_height [video_width * video_height].

ES 2 301 977 T3

TABLE 1

Syntax of a menu page composition segment

FIELD SIZE TYPE

<td> 1</td><td colspan="3">menu ^ page cornposition segment () {</td>

<td> 2</td><td>sync byte</td><td> 8</td><td>bslbf</td>

<td> 3</td><td>segment type</td><td> 8</td><td>bslbf</td>

<td> 4</td><td>page id</td><td> 16</td><td>bslbf</td>

<td> 5</td><td>s egmentlength</td><td> 16</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 6</td><td>page time out</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td>Ί</td><td>page version number</td><td> 4</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td>B</td><td>pagestate</td><td> 2</td><td>bslbf</td>

<td> 9</td><td>animation ...... frame rate code</td><td> 4</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 10</td><td>reserved</td><td> 6</td><td>bslbf</td>

<td> 11</td><td>while (processed length &lt;segment length) {</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 12</td><td>buttonnumber</td><td> 16</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 13</td><td>button horizontal address</td><td> 16</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 14</td><td>button vertical address</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 15</td><td>neig.b.bovr inf o ()</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 16</td><td>upper button number</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 17</td><td>lower button number</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 18</td><td>leftbutton number</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 19</td><td>right button number</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 20</td><td>normal state info ()</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 21</td><td>start region id normal</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 22</td><td>endregion id normal</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 23</td><td>selected state info ()</td><td> 16</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 24</td><td>start region id selected</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 25</td><td>end region id selected</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 26</td><td>action state info ()</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 27</td><td>startregion id activated</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 28</td><td>end region id activated</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 29</td><td>button command info ()</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 30</td><td>sound infoO</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 31</td><td>selectedsound id</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 32</td><td>activated sound id</td><td> 8</td><td>uimsbf</td>

<td> 33</td><td> } ...... .....</td><td></td><td></td>

<td> 34</td><td> ) ......................... ' . .. .....</td><td></td><td> .........</td>

Generally speaking, a segment is a unit of data included in the storage area. The segment_type [segment_type] field defines its type. The menu page composition segment can be identified by setting for example segment_type = 0x18, since this value is not used yet in DVB-ST. The other fields on lines 2 through 8 of Table 1 define the segment data set.

The field animation_frame_rate_code [animation_frame_frequency_code ] specifies the frame frequency of animations in case animated buttons are used. Applies to a variety of regions specified by start_region_id_xxx [identifier_region_start] and end_region_id_xxx [identifier_region_end], referring “xxx” to the state of a button. In the event that the start_region_id__xxx fields and their corresponding end_region_id_xxx are different, they define a variety of regions that must be displayed with this animation frame frequency. For the normal and selected states, the presentation can be repeated cyclically; for the “activated” state, the presentation will be made only once. When any start_region_id_xxx field is identical to the associated end_region_id_xxx field, this designates a static or non-animated button state. Only the

ES 2 301 977 T3 region designated by start_region_id_xxx, and for that button state the animation_frame_rate_code field will have no meaning.

Table 2 shows a sample list of animation_frame_rate_codes [animation_frame_frequency_codes]. An animation can be viewable at a full video frame rate, for example 30 frames per second, which means that with each video frame another phase of the animation is displayed. It may also be sufficient to display only with each of the remaining video frames another phase of the animated button, thereby achieving another effect. In addition, it is possible to define the frame frequency so that its value is relative or absolute. Therefore, the animation_frame_rate_code field values ​​have two different meanings, depending on whether an associated video is present. In this case, the animation_frame_rate_code field provides the frame rate relative to the video video frame rate, and otherwise it provides the absolute frame rate.

TABLE 2

Animation_frame_rate_code example

<td>animation frame rate code</td><td>Relative animation frame rate</td><td>Absolute animation frame rate</td>

<td>0x0</td><td>Reserved</td><td>Reserved</td>

<td>0x1</td><td>Full video frame rate</td><td>30 Hz</td>

<td>0x2</td><td>Vi Frequency of video frame</td><td>15 Hz</td>

<td>0x3</td><td>Frequency of video frame</td><td>8 Hz</td>

<td>0x4</td><td>1/8 Frequency of video frame</td><td>4 Hz</td>

<td>0x5</td><td>1/16 Frequency of video frame</td><td>2 Hz</td>

<td>0x6</td><td>1/32 Frequency of video frame</td><td>1 Hz</td>

<td>0x7 - OXf</td><td>Reserved</td><td>Reserved</td>

The button_number [button_number] field specifies a number that is an internal identifier for a button, and is used in the fields defined below, namely the neighbor_infoO [next_information] field. Additionally, when the button_number field is entered directly through the user interface (UI), the associated button can be activated. Therefore, button_number is unique within the menu. It can be, for example, a two-digit number between 0 and 99.

Some fields used for menu animation according to the invention must be specified separately for each button. They are indicated from line 11 of table 1, when a cycle is started on all the buttons. Each instance of the loop refers to a button. Implicitly, the button described by the first case of the loop included in menu_page_composition_segment () [menu_page_composition_segment] can be considered as "selected" when the menu is entered, and can be considered as "activated" if a page timeout is set for the menu and is activated.

ES 2 301 977 T3

The button_horizontal_address [button_horizontal_address] field specifies the horizontal direction of the button's upper left pixel. The specified horizontal position can be between 0 and video_width-1 [video_width-1]. Similarly, the button_vertical_address field specifies the vertical direction of the button's top left pixel. The specified vertical position can be between 0 and video_height-1 [video_height-1].

The field upper_button_number [up_button_number] specifies the button to select when the user navigates up from the current button. The lower_button_number [down_button_number] field specifies the button to select when the user navigates down from the current button. The left_button_number [left_button_number] field specifies the button to select when the user navigates left from the current button. And the field right_button_number [right_button_number] specifies the button to select when the user navigates right from the current button.

The field start_region_id_normal [region_start_normal_identifier] specifies the ID of the first region to display for a button display in normal state, and the field end_region_id_normal [end_region_identifier_normal] specifies the ID of the last region to display for a button display in the normal state. All regions with an ID between start_region_id_normal and end_region_id_normal, inclusive, exist; if start_region_id_normal is different from end_region_id_normal, this range of regions must be presented cyclically with the animation frame rate defined in animation_frame_rate_code.

The field start_region_id_selected [start_region_identifier_selected] specifies the ID of the first region to be presented for a button presentation in the selected state, and the field end_region_id_selected [end_region_identifier_selected] specifies the ID of the last region to be presented for a presentation button in the selected state. There will be all the regions whose identifiers are between start_region_id_selected and end_region_id_selected; if start_region_id_selected is different from end_region_id_selected, this region range will be presented cyclically with the animation frame rate described by animation_frame_rate_code.

The field start_region_id_activated [region_start_identifier_activated] specifies the ID of the first region to be presented for a button presentation in the activated state, and the field end_region_id_activated [end_region_identifier_activated] specifies the identifier of the last region to be presented for a presentation button in the on state. All regions whose identifiers are between start_region_id_activated and end_region_id_activated will exist; If start_region_id_activated is different from end_region_id_ activated, this region range will be rendered once with the animation frame rate described by animation_frame_rate_code.

The button_command_info () field [information_command_button] serves as a container for the commands associated with this button, which specify the commands to execute when the button is activated.

Finally, the field selected_sound_id [selected_identifier_button] specifies the identifier of the sound to be played when the button goes to the “selected” state, and the activated_sound_id [activated_sound_identifier] field specifies the identifier of the sound to be played when the button goes to the “activated” state.

The invention can be used especially for menus stored on BLU-RAY discs, but also on DVD or other storage media, optical or not, of high capacity.