Group and conversational framing for speaker tracking in a video conference system

An apparatus comprising:

• a network interface unit that enables communication over a network;
• and
• a processor coupled to the network interface unit, the processor configured to:
• detect a plurality of participants within a field of view of a video conference endpoint;
• detect a first participant of the plurality of participants of the video conference endpoint as an active speaker;
• determine if the first participant is facing a second participant of the plurality of participants by determining from an output of a video camera of the video conference endpoint if a head of the first participant is rotated a number of degrees from the video camera of the video conference endpoint;
• determine if the second participant is facing the first participant based on the output of the video camera of the video conference endpoint;
• calculate a proximity between the first participant and the second participant;
• and
• alter a framing of the video output of the video camera of the video conference endpoint to frame the first participant and the second participant when the proximity between the first participant and the second participant is within a predetermined threshold.

A non-transitory processor readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:

• detect a plurality of participants within a field of view of a video conference endpoint;
• detect a first participant of the plurality of participants of the video conference endpoint as an active speaker;
• determine if the first participant is facing a second participant of the plurality of participants by determining from an output of a video camera of the video conference endpoint if a head of the first participant is rotated a number of degrees from the video camera of the video conference endpoint;
• determine if the second participant is facing the first participant based on the output of the video camera of the video conference endpoint;
• calculate a proximity between the first participant and the second participant;
• and
• alter a framing of the video output of the video camera of the video conference endpoint to frame the first participant and the second participant when the proximity between the first participant and the second participant is within a predetermined threshold.