Method and apparatus for enabling interactive dynamic movies

摘要

A method and apparatus provides immediate audience interaction and participation with a movie while the movie is being shown to the audience, either in a public theater or at home. Theatre patrons are provided the option of responding to prompts on their handheld communication/computing devices to vote on upcoming pre-staged scene selections, thereby enabling majority voting audience participation to control a movie flow.

主权项

1. An apparatus for enabling a movie viewer to interact with a movie being displayed by a display device comprising:
a storage to store an interactive movie including one or more interaction points, each interaction point being associated with at least two alternative movie segments, each alternative movie segment of said at least two alternative movie segments for a given interaction point: (i) having an identical number of frames as all other ones of said at least two alternative movie segments for the given interaction point; (ii) an equal run time as all other ones of said at least two alternative movie segments for the given interaction point; and (iii) being assigned a code uniquely identifying said each alternative movie segment of said at least two alternative movie segments for the given interaction point, and said storage to store each alternative movie segment of said at least two alternative movie segments in association with said code for said each alternative movie segment; a processor to couple to said storage and to cause said storage to output either of said at least two alternative movie segments to the display device; a computer readable media including a software application downloadable to a mobile computing device to enable a user of the mobile computing device to register with the processor using the mobile computing device and to receive a prompt from said processor on the mobile computing device and to respond to said prompt using the mobile computing device; a synchronized content clock to receive run time data from the digital display device and run time data from the storage and in combination with the processor to insert one or more movie segments dynamically at exactly a right time so there is no latency or delay in a story flow in the interactive movie being displayed; said processor to: send an interactive message prompt prior to said each interaction point to request one or more registered users to vote on which one of said at least two alternative movie segments should be included in the movie being displayed; receive one or more votes from said one or more registered users regarding said interactive message prompt; tally all received votes from said one or more registered users regarding said interactive prompt; and cause said storage to output one of said at least two alternative movie segments based on said tally to said display device; wherein one of said at least two alternative movie segments is designated a default movie segment, which is selected if no user inputs are received and processed in time.