Retiming media presentations

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9997196-B2
Application number	US-201113109989-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 17, 2011
Priority date	Feb 16, 2011
Publication date	Jun 12, 2018
Grant date	Jun 12, 2018

Abstract

A novel method for retiming a portion of a media content (e.g., audio data, video data, audio and video data, etc.) in a media-editing application is provided. The media editing application includes a user interface for defining a range in order to select a portion of the media content. The media editing application performs retiming by applying a speed effect to the portion of the media content selected by the defined range. For a faster speed effect, the media editing application retimes the selected portion of the media content by sampling the media content at a faster rate. For a slower speed effect, the media editing application retimes the selected portion of the media content by sampling the content at a slower rate.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of defining a media editing application for creating multimedia presentations, the method comprising:
defining a composite display area for displaying a graphical representation for each media clip in a set of media clips that are parts of a composite presentation;
defining a range selector for selecting a portion of a graphical representation of a media clip that is displayed in the composite display area;
defining a user interface item for presenting at least three selectable predefined retiming operations, wherein each predefined retiming operation performs a different playback speed modification to the media clip;
defining a retiming engine for applying a selected predefined retiming operation to a range of the media clip that corresponds to the portion of the graphical representation selected by the range selector in order to change a playback timing of the range of the media clip according to the playback speed modification of the selected predefined retiming operation; and
defining a playback curve that specifies a relationship between the media clip and a playback timing of the media clip,
wherein the retiming engine adjusts the playback curve according to a spline interpolation,
wherein the spline interpolation is based on one or more keyframes associated with the playback curve, each keyframe associated with a position in the media clip that is determined by the application of the selected predefined retiming operation.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the spline interpolation is based on Monotone Cubic Interpolation.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the spline interpolation maintains monotonicity of the playback curve between two keyframes.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the retiming engine adjusts the playback curve according to one of the plurality of predefined retiming operations.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the playback curve is further associated with a keyframe that marks a particular position in the media clip, wherein adjusting the playback curve comprises defining the particular position of the key frame.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising defining a frame interpolator for creating an interpolated video frame based on a source of the media clip and the playback curve.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the selected portion of the graphical representation of the media clip can be adjusted by a user input.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the changed size of the graphical representation of the media clip indicates a duration of a total playback timing of the media clip.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein a size of the graphical representation of the media clip is changed after applying the selected predefined retiming operation to provide visual feedback of the selected predefined retiming operation.

10. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing a media editing application for creating multimedia presentations, the application comprising a graphical user interface (GUI), the GUI comprising:
a composite display area for displaying a graphical representation for each media clip in a set of media clips that are parts of a composite presentation;
a range selector for selecting a portion of a graphical representation of a media clip that is displayed in the composite display area;
a user interface item for presenting at least three selectable predefined retiming operations, wherein each predefined retiming operation performs a different playback speed modification to the media clip; and
a retiming engine for applying a selected predefined retiming operation to a range of the media clip that corresponds to the portion of the graphical representation selected by the range selector in order to change a playback timing of the range of the media clip according to the playback speed modification of the selected predefined retiming operation,
wherein the retiming engine defines a playback curve that specifies a relationship between the media clip and a playback timing of the media clip,
wherein the retiming engine adjusts the playback curve according to a spline interpolation based on one or more keyframes associated with the playback curve, each keyframe associated with a position in the media clip that is determined by the application of the selected predefined retiming operation.

11. The GUI of claim 10 , wherein the graphical representation of a media clip further comprises a speed indicator for indicating a speed for playing back the range of the media clip.

12. The GUI of claim 11 , wherein the speed indicator comprises a plurality of sections, each section of the speed indicator corresponds to a section of the media clip that plays at a different speed.

13. The GUI of claim 11 , wherein the speed indicator is partitioned into a plurality of sections according to a playback speed modification of a predefined retiming operation performed by the retiming engine.

14. The GUI of claim 10 , wherein the graphical representation of a media clip comprises a plurality of sections that represents different ranges of the media clip that play back at different speeds.

15. The GUI of claim 14 , wherein the graphical representation of the media clip further comprises a plurality of thumbnail images that are sampled from the media clip at regular intervals of playback time.

16. The GUI of claim 14 , wherein one section of the graphical representation of the media clip comprises a handle for adjusting the playback speed of the corresponding range of the media clip.

17. The GUI of claim 16 , wherein said adjusting of the playback speed of the corresponding range of the media clip comprises using the handle to change the length of the section of the graphical representation of the media clip.

18. The GUI of claim 14 , wherein one section of the graphical representation of the media clip comprises a handle for adjusting a partitioning between the section and an adjacent section.

19. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing a computer program for execution by one or more processing units, the computer program comprising sets of instructions for:
defining a composite display area for displaying a graphical representation for each media clip in a set of media clips that are parts of a composite presentation;
receiving a selection of a portion of a graphical representation of a media clip that is displayed in the composite display area;
receiving a selection of a predefined retiming operation of at least three predefined retiming operations that each perform a different playback speed modification to the media clip;
determining a range of the media clip that corresponds to the selected portion of the graphical representation of the media clip;
modifying a playback timing of the range of the media clip in accordance with the playback speed modification of the selected predefined retiming operation;
defining a playback curve that specifies a relationship between the media clip and the playback timing; and
adjusting the playback curve according to a spline interpolation based on one or more keyframes associated with the playback curve, each keyframe associated with a position in the media clip that is determined by the selected predefined retiming operation.

20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 19 , wherein the retiming operation further comprises changing a timing of a range of an audio clip that corresponds to the selected portion of the graphical representation of the media clip according to the playback curve, wherein

Assignees

• Wang Xiaohuan C
• Agnoli Giovanni
• Chen David N
• Sundaram Vijay
• Meaney Brian
• Stern Mike
• Schneider Paul T
• Graves Eric J
• Ubillos Randy
• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Wang Xiaohuan C
• Agnoli Giovanni
• Chen David N
• Sundaram Vijay
• Meaney Brian
• Stern Mike
• Schneider Paul T
• Graves Eric J
• Ubillos Randy

Classifications

• G11B27/007

  reproducing continuously a part of the information, i.e. repeating · CPC title

• G06F17/30781

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F3/0484

  for the control of specific functions or operations, e.g. selecting or manipulating an object, an image or a displayed text element, setting a parameter value or selecting a range · CPC title

• G11B27/005 Primary

  Reproducing at a different information rate from the information rate of recording (for television signals H04N5/783) · CPC title

• G11B27/34

  Indicating arrangements  {(indicating means incorporated in magazine or cassette G11B23/046 and G11B23/0875; indicating measured values in general G01D)} · CPC title