Oh, Patents! Digimarc® barcodes (3)

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

Digimarc® barcodes offer an AR (Augmented Reality) shopping experience. As a reminder, in AR the user brings together the real world and the virtual world in real-time interaction, which ultimately imposes new properties on physical objects (private and/or public), and thus deepens (augmenting and/or amplifying) the real world experience. So, for example, when reading the Digimarc® barcode of supermarket products, the user is able to bring to the shelf products vast amounts of data stored in databases about the product, and how to use it. The Digimarc® barcode is a bit like QR Codes, which multiply the amount of coded information about a product, including the possibility of connecting you to the Internet, only the Digimarc® barcode is also invisible, or at least hardly perceptible to the naked eye.

The invisibility of this invention invokes the 700-year-old steganographic (occultist) idea of hiding text within texts, which Digimarc® inventors now call the payload of hidden data concealed in an image. Recited in almost 2000 patents, Digimarc® processes map the invisible with a host of mathematical transform theories, applied to computer science.

The two latest Digimarc® patent applications US20180047126 and US20180047127, both titled Signal encoding for difficult environments and published on Feb. 15, 2018, disclose the selection of inks for the design of a package, and how to encode them with payload information, so that this information may be remotely decoded using principles based on spectral reflectance.

The abstract for US 20180047127 is included below :

This disclosure relates to advanced image signal processing technology including encoded signals and digital watermarking. We disclose methods, systems and apparatus for selecting which ink(s) should be selected to carry an encoded signal for a given machine-vision wavelength for a retail package or other printed design. We also disclose retail product packages and other printed objects, and methods to generate such, including a sparse mark in a first ink and an overprinted ink flood in a second ink. The first ink and the second ink are related through tack and spectral reflectance difference. Of course, other methods, packages, objects, systems and apparatus are described in this disclosure.

Reference
Digimarc®
https://www.digimarc.com/  

Oh, patents! Digimarc® barcodes (1)

Copyright©Françoise Herrmann

You probably take the self-checkout lane at the supermarket, and scan the barcodes on your products yourself. You probably also miss the barcode information a few times, swiping your product at different angles, until it pings, and actually displays on the cash register.  So you know what a barcode looks like, and where to find it. Right?

Now, imagine all your favorite products, without a visible barcode, that you can now scan at any angle, and from anywhere on the packaging. It will take you much less time to check out, since you will never miss a scan, and there will be more space on the packaging for artwork or un-interrupted design. Right?  

Yes, that is exactly what Digimarc® barcodes allow you to do. What you see is no longer what you get, because the product barcode is now copied, and imperceptibly encoded into the design of the package, actually everywhere on the packaging, using a digital watermarking  invention.

The image below shows you exactly what you see, and what any barcode scanner sees, when the products is digimarc-ed.

If you think that all this invisible information is something amazing, or a bit far out... in AR (Augmented Reality), then watch the video included below… because the Digimarc® , developed by the Oregon-based public company Digimarc Corporation, is The Barcode of Everything®.

Using Digimarc® patented watermark technology, everything can be watermarked with data that is invisible to the naked eye, and yet perfectly readable, even audible, and scannable with just a mobile device equipped with the free Digimarc® Discovery app. Everything with a surface, such as print, images and vidoes can be digimarked, not only with product information, but with connected information, like QR Codes, and even interactive information using NFC (Near Field Communication) to tell you about the product's current state.

Indeed, no end to how this digital watermarking technology can be used (for inventory, security, identification, authentication), or what gets watermarked. This is a whole new level of communication in AR (Augmented Reality) !

References

Digimarc®

www.digimarc.com

2014 EPO Patent Award nominations! The QR code

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

The ubiquitous optical QR code is a contender for the European Patent Office  2014 awards, to be held in Berlin on June 17, 2014! What’s QR code? QR (Quick Response) code is the second generation of barcodes!

So…there are barcodes and there are square QR (Quick response) codes! And QR codes are definitely raising the bar of barcodes! They process 350 times more information and decode information 20 times faster!

Your smart phone camera can also scan them, and they supply a world of information far and beyond the price that is scanned from a barcode, since you can use them to access websites. QR codes are two dimensional codes whereas all barcodes as one dimensional. The two dimensional QR code means that information is stored in rows and columns, whereas one dimensional barcodes means that information is stored according to the width of the bars and spaces between them, and there are only 20 number symbols in a barcode. However, decoding of the 350 times more information stored in the rows and columns of two dimensional codes was initially very time-consuming. So, now you will  surely notice that two dimensional QR codes also contain a unique positioning code pattern located on three corners and forming a right angle on the square code, containing information for locating and processing the information stored in the two dimensional code area -- 20 times faster.

QR codes were developed in 1994 within the context of production and logistics as a method designed to improve the tracking of automotive parts in Japan. The inventors, Masahiro Hara, Motoaki Watabe, Tadao Nojiri, Takayuki Nagaya and Yuji Uchiyama have since then devised an even more information-packed code called the iQR code, designed specifically for industrial applications.

Below you will find the abstract of the contending patent EP 0672994 titled Method and apparatus for reading an optically two-dimensional code and figure drawings from the patent:

A two-dimensional code 1 consists of three positioning symbols 2, a data region 3, timing cells 4 and an apex detecting cell 5. The shape of the whole code 1 is a square having the same number of vertical and lateral cells. A scanning line passing through the center of each positioning symbols 2 always gives a constant frequency component ratio dark : light : dark : light : dark = 1 : 1 : 3 : 1 : 1, irrespective of the scanning direction. For this reason, even if a rotational angle of the two-dimensional code is not certain, the specific frequency component ratio of each positioning symbol 2 can be easily detected by executing only one scanning operation in a predetermined direction. Hence, the coordinates of the center of each positioning symbols 2 can be easily found. Thus, the position of the two-dimensional code 1 is quickly identified. [Abstract EP 0672994]

-----

The EPO has invited everyone to vote! The interesting set of  rules which  make your votes count as a contribution to The Child Vision Project are  explained in a previous post on May 11, 2014…. So… remember to cast a vote! You can vote as many times as you like! And each vote is worth .25 cts Euro!