Thomson Patent Describes Idea for Smoothing Transition to New TV Standards

Two German inventors, working for Thomson in France, have come up with a new idea for smoothing the transition to new TV technologies, such as with the migration to 4K from 2K. A U.S. patent application published Thursday at the Patent and Trademark Office, based on an August 2014 international filing from Thomson Licensing, describes methods that effectively give the viewer local control of editing tools similar to those used by broadcasters to pan and zoom in on especially interesting parts of a wide high-resolution view. With the introduction of new TV standards comes the availability of newly increased “spatial and/or temporal resolution,” says the application, which names Malte Borsum and Axel Kochale as the inventors. But viewers who watch TV on an existing set that’s not upgraded for the new standards obviously “cannot take any advantage of the improved technology,” it says. “Usually, the full image is downscaled.” The application envisions a new 4K set-top with one output for viewers who own a 4K TV, and extra outputs for 2K sets or mobile devices. These extra outputs can either down-convert the 4K image to 2K, or offer crop, pan and zoom options, it says. The set-top then expands selected parts of the 4K image to fill the 2K TV or mobile screen with full HD resolution, it says. Image expansion can be programmed, user-controlled or governed by metadata that the broadcaster sends over the air or the internet, it says. Zooming may be auto-centered along horizon lines or contoured to fit the shape of a soccer field, and manually manipulated by the user, it says. If a broadcaster sends metadata, the set-top can be taught to remember previous settings and self-adjusts the image at prescribed scene cuts, it says. The metadata can be buried in the digital stream or embedded in the picture as brief flashes of QR code. Though the idea is mainly aimed at smoothing migration from old to new TV standards, says Thomson, it can also be more widely used to give all viewers interactive control of what they see on screen.