Media Stream Synchronization via Time Packet Signatures
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Solution Overview
Problem
Media streams often become desynchronized during transmission due to differences in source devices, network paths, and processing, leading to issues like lip-sync errors, as they travel via different routes and are processed by various intermediate devices, necessitating a method to determine transmission times and relative synchronization errors.
Innovation Solution
A system comprising a source processor and a destination processor that generate and transmit time packets with signature data, allowing for the determination of transmission times and relative synchronization errors across media streams, using Precision Time Protocol (PTP) and characteristic features like average luma values or signal amplitudes, enabling synchronization correction.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If media streams are transmitted through a network via different paths and processed by different intermediate devices, then the coverage and flexibility of media distribution is improved, but synchronization accuracy deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The system employs feedback mechanisms where the destination processor sends timing information back to the source processor. This feedback loop enables continuous measurement and correction of transmission delays, allowing the system to maintain synchronization accuracy despite streams traveling through different network paths and intermediate devices.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces intermediary timing packets and signature data that act as mediators between source and destination processors. These intermediaries carry timing information and characteristic features that enable synchronization without requiring direct coordination between all components in the distributed media transmission path.
2Reliability
If separate elementary essence transmission systems are used for each media stream, then stream independence and reliability are improved, but system complexity and synchronization difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the synchronization function across multiple independent media streams by embedding common timing information and signature data in each stream's packets. This allows separate elementary essence transmission systems to maintain independence while being coordinated through shared timing references, reducing overall system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The timing packets and signature data serve multiple functions simultaneously: they provide timing synchronization, identify characteristic features of each stream, and enable delay measurement. This multi-functionality reduces the need for separate synchronization mechanisms for each independent stream.
Data Source
AI summary
A system and method are provided for determining delay of a plurality of media streams. The system and method involve generating, at a source processor, a series of source time packets; transmitting, at the source processor, through a network, the series of source time packets as a source packet stream; generating, at a destination processor, a series of destination time packets; receiving, at the destination processor, through the network, the source packet stream; determining, at the destination processor, a transmission time for the source packet stream based on the source time data and the destination time data; and determining, at the destination processor, a relative synchronization error based on the source signature data and the destination signature data. Each source time packet includes source time data and source signature data. Each destination time packet includes destination time data and destination signature data.