Printed media with machine readable markings
View Patent ↗A printed media, such as a card bears a visible light image, such as a picture or photograph, for viewing by a human. A machine readable array of infra-red dots is located over the visible light image. In a preferred embodiment the infra-red dots encode sound recording data associated with the visible light image. Solomon-Reed encoding and checkerboard modulation of the dots is employed to ensure reliable retrieval of the sound recording.
1. A printed media comprising:
a photographic medium;
a visible light ink printed on said medium, the visible light ink representing an image for viewing by a human; and
infra-red ink printed over said visible light ink, said infra-red defining a machine readable array of markings invisible to the human eye, the markings encoding data.
2. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the machine readable array of invisible markings encode sound recording data.
3. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the machine readable array of invisible markings are arranged for playback by a device including a linear print media transport assembly.
4. A printed media according to claim 3 , wherein the infra-red markings included dots modulated with a regular pattern to assist the playback device during playback of the printed media.
5. A printed media according to claim 1 , further including boundary markings indicating limits of the machine readable array of invisible markings.
6. A printed media according to claim 4 , wherein the regular pattern comprises a checkerboard pattern.
7. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the infra-red ink markings are formed of an ink with minimal response in a wavelength range of 400-700 mm.
8. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the infra-red ink markings are formed of an ink with maximal response in the wavelength range 700-1200 mm.
9. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the machine readable array of invisible markings encodes data according to Reed-Solomon coding.
10. A printed media according to claim 1 , wherein the data comprises a sound recording that relates to the visible light image.