Iterative video teaching aid with recordable commentary and indexing

A real time diagnostic and teaching aid including:

• a. means for displaying full motion images;
• b. means for selecting subframe images from displayed full motion images in real time via gestures of a diagnostician and means for recording a subframe selection;
• c. means for recording and linking concurrent commentary of the diagnostician to selected subframe images in real time;
• d. means for recording a sequence of subframe selection and linked commentary to create a teaching session;
• e. means for indexing the session by at least one of the commentaries and subframe images;
• f. means for play back of the session;
• and
• g. means for adding additional commentary into the session.

A diagnostic aid or teaching system comprising a computer having:

• a. a video layer for the display and quantization of a series of images;
• b. an interpretation layer, time synchronized to, and running concurrently with, the video layer, and having a gesture recorder for identifying and recording selected portions of images in the video layer;
• c. the interpretation layer further including a comment recorder which records and displays concurrent comments and associates the concurrent comments with the gestures;
• d. synchronization means for synchronizing the video layer and the interpretation layer;
• e. the interpretation layer overlaid on the video layer so as to be displayed and run concurrently and in synchronization therewith;
• and
• f. an index manager for indexing of the comments or the select portions, or both, within a database;
• and
• g. whereby a diagnostic or teaching session can be created comprising playback of the series of images concurrently with image portions selected by gestures and the comments associated with the gestures.

A method of producing a teaching session with in-motion video comprising:

• a. displaying frames or inserted frames of full motion image data;
• b. selecting and recording subframe portions of the image data;
• c. appending comments to the selected subframe portions of the image data;
• steps “a”, “b”, and “c” making a session;
• d. recording the session;
• and
• e. indexing the session.

A diagnostic and teaching aid method including the steps of:

• a. displaying a sequence of images;
• b. selecting a portion of one image of the sequence of images via gestures of a diagnostician;
• c. recording a commentary of the diagnostician concerning the image portion selection;
• d. linking a recorded commentary concerning an image portion selection to an image portion selection;
• e. recording a sequence of a plurality of image portion selections to create a teaching session;
• f. indexing at least one of the commentary and selected image portions so as to make the teaching session retrievable through an index;
• and
• g. playing back the sequence of images while displaying the plurality of image portion selections and commentary concerning the image portion selections, the play back including the sequence of image portion selection.