A compressed video database structured for active browsing and search

We describe a unique system called ViBE (video browsing environment) for browsing and searching large databases of video sequences. The system first computes the DC sequence for a given MPEG sequence. It then detects and identifies shot boundaries by using the generalized trace. A hierarchical tree structure is constructed for shot comparison and keyframe extraction. In addition to low level image features, the system also uses pseudo semantic features to characterize the frames. Finally, the results are presented to the user in an active browsing environment which we call a similarity pyramid. The users can also prune and reorganize the environment using relevance feedback methods