Unified slider control for modifying multiple image properties

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10936173-B2
Application number	US-201514809126-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jul 24, 2015
Priority date	Mar 6, 2012
Publication date	Mar 2, 2021
Grant date	Mar 2, 2021

Abstract

Some embodiments provide a novel user interface (UI) tool that is a unified slider control, which includes multiple sliders that slide along a region. The region is a straight line in some embodiments, while it is an angular arc in other embodiments. In some embodiments, the unified slider control is used in a media editing application to allow a user to modify several different properties of the image by moving several different sliders along the region. Each slider is associated with a property of the image. A position of the slider in the region corresponds to a value of the property associated with the slider.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a media editing application which when executed by at least one processing unit performs tonal adjustments of an image displayed in the media editing application using a slider track and a plurality of slider icons movably positioned along the slider track, said application comprising sets of instructions for:
detecting a first movement of a slider icon in a first direction along the slider track;
linearly modifying image pixel values of a first set of pixels of the displayed image based on the first movement;
detecting a second movement of the slider icon in a second direction opposite to the first direction along the slider track after detecting the first movement of the slider icon; and
responsive to detecting the second movement of the slider icon in the second direction opposite to the first direction, modifying image pixel values for a second set of pixels of the displayed image based on the second movement after linearly modifying the image pixel values of the first set of pixels, wherein the second set of pixels are modified non-linearly in a different manner than the first set of pixels in response to the second movement of the slider icon.

2. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the first movement of the slider icon expands a tonal range of the image.

3. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the second movement of the slider icon performs a shadow recovery operation that selectively lifts image pixel values of the second set of pixels in a shadow region of the image.

4. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the second set of pixels is within a shadow region of the image.

5. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4 , wherein the shadow region is defined by pixels distributed in the darkest half or darkest one third of the tonal range.

6. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4 , wherein the shadow region is determined based on weighting factors related to an overall darkness or lightness of the image.

7. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the second set of pixels is within a highlight region of the image, wherein the second movement of the slider icon reduces a brightness of the second set of pixels.

8. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a media editing application which when executed by at least one processing unit controls a plurality of sliders on a single slider track for modifying properties of an image, the application comprising sets of instructions for:
receiving a user input to adjust a position of a particular slider associated with a first property of the image on the single slider track;
identifying an adjusted position on the single slider track of the particular slider;
based on the identified adjusted position of the particular slider, determining a plurality of adjusted positions on the single slider track to move a plurality of other sliders of the plurality of sliders associated with other properties of the image different from the first property; and
adjusting the image based on the adjusted positions of the particular slider and the plurality of other sliders,
wherein the adjusted positions of the plurality of other sliders are based on a set of rules for repositioning the plurality of other sliders in response to movement of the particular slider with at least one of the plurality of other sliders being moved in a direction opposite to movement of the particular slider along the single slider track, and
wherein each of the plurality of sliders have full range of motion along the single slider track.

9. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the application further comprises sets of instructions for:
receiving a user input to display a unified slider tool comprising the particular slider, the plurality of other sliders, and the single slider track; and
identifying initial positions of the particular slider and the plurality of other sliders on the single slider track, wherein the unified slider tool is displayed based on the initial positions of the sliders on the single slider track.

10. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 9 , wherein the set of instructions for identifying the initial positions of the plurality of sliders comprises analyzing the properties of the image and determining values for each of the properties of the image represented by the plurality of sliders.

11. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the user input to adjust the position of the particular slider is a directional movement, wherein the application further comprises a set of instructions for converting the directional movement into a positional movement of the particular slider, wherein the set of instructions for identifying the adjusted position of the particular slider is performed based on the positional movement.

12. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 11 , wherein the set of instructions for adjusting the image comprises a set of instructions for linearly modifying the first property of the image based on the directional movement.

13. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 12 , wherein the application further comprises sets of instructions for:
detecting second directional movement of one of the plurality of other sliders in a second opposite direction along the single slider track, and
wherein the set of instructions for adjusting the image comprises a set of instructions for non-linearly modifying a second property of the image based on the second directional movement.

14. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the set of instructions for adjusting the image comprises a set of instructions for using a transform that specifies a mapping of a set of image values of the image to a set of adjusted image values based on the adjusted positions of the particular slider and the plurality of other sliders.

15. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a media editing application which when executed by at least one processing unit performs tonal adjustments of an image displayed in an image display area of the media editing application using a slider track and a plurality of slider icons movably positioned along the slider track, said application comprising sets of instructions for:
displaying the slider track and a plurality of slider icons positioned along the slider track according to an exposed tonal range of the displayed image;
determining an unadvisable portion of the slider track that represents values for the tonal range that are beyond an advisable tonal range that may cause clipping;
detecting a movement of a slider icon along the identified unadvisable portion of the slider track; and
displaying a visual indication along the slider track that indicates that the slider icon is positioned outside of the advisable tonal range upon detecting the movement of the slider icon along the identified unadvisable portion of the slider track,
wherein initial positions of the slider icons on the slider track represent an initial visible tonal range of the displayed image.

16. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the advisable tonal range is a spectrum of image pixel values from a darkest pixel value to a lightest pixel value.

17. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 15 , wherein the image displayed in the image display area appears distorted in response to the slider icon being

Assignees

• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Ubillos Randy
• Johnson Garrett M
• Webb Russell Y
• Cherna Timothy D
• Roberts Samuel M
• Warner Peter

Classifications

• G06F3/04847 Primary

  Interaction techniques to control parameter settings, e.g. interaction with sliders or dials · CPC title

• H04N1/6027 Primary

  Correction or control of colour gradation or colour contrast (H04N1/6058 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F3/04817

  using icons (graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34) · CPC title

• G06F3/04845 Primary

  for image manipulation, e.g. dragging, rotation, expansion or change of colour · CPC title

• G06F3/04842

  Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements (G06F3/0482 takes precedence) · CPC title