METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR INTEGRATING USER GENERATED MEDIA ITEMS WITH EXTERNALLY GENERATED MEDIA ITEMS

1 . A method comprising:

obtaining one or more user-generated media items captured by a user during one or more events;

obtaining a plurality of externally generated media items, wherein at least one of the media items was captured independently of the one or more events;

analyzing the user-generated media items, to extract visual data of the user-generated media items;

automatically selecting a subset of the externally generated media items, based on a visual relationship between visual data of the selected externally generated media items and the visual data of the user-generated media items; and

automatically producing a media sequence comprising portions of the user-generated media items and portions of the selected externally generated media items.

2 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the externally generated media items are generated automatically by automatic visual analysis.

3 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the selecting of the subset of the externally generated media items, is further based on predefined video editing criteria.

4 . The method according to claim 3 , wherein at least one of the video editing criteria is continuity of the produced media sequence.

5 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the visual relationship corresponds to a similarity in a topic of the externally generated media items and the user generated media items.

6 . The method according to claim 3 , wherein a placement of the media portions in the produced media sequence is determined based on the video editing criteria.

7 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein a placement of media portions in the produced media sequence is determined based on an analysis of an added soundtrack to the sequence.

8 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein a placement of media portions in the produced media sequence is determined based on an automatic analysis of an added soundtrack to the sequence.

9 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the visual relationship is determined based on appearance of specific objects in both user-generated media items and externally generated media items.

10 . The method according to claim 1 , further comprising indexing the plurality of externally generated media items with at least one of: context, location, and topic, and wherein the selecting of the subset of externally generated media items is carried out based on the indexing.

11 . The method according to claim 6 , wherein the automatically selecting and placement are carried out simultaneously by feeding the user-generated media items and the externally generated media items to a decision function.

12 . The method according to claim 11 , wherein the decision function takes into account visual similarities between the media items.

13 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the portions of the selected externally generated media items include at least one time segment of a video footage.

14 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the producing further includes adding a soundtrack to the media sequence based on relevance to the selected media items.

15 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the producing further includes generating transitions between a plurality of media items in the sequence, wherein the transitions are determined based on visual data associated with the selected externally generated media items.

16 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the produced media sequence is not synchronized in time with the one or more user-generated media items.

17 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the one or more user-generated media items are captured by two or more users during the at least one event.

18 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein at least some of the user-generated media is already edited.

19 . A method comprising:

obtaining one or more user-generated media items;

obtaining a plurality of externally generated media items;

obtaining a user selection of a video editing-style;

automatically selecting a subset of the externally generated media items, based on the user selection of video editing-style; and

automatically producing a media sequence comprising portions of the one or more user-generated media item and portions of the selected externally generated media items, wherein the producing is carried out using the selected video editing-style.

20 . The method according to claim 19 , further comprising attaching at least one video editing-style with a first list of content attributes; and

further comprising attaching at least one subset of the externally generated media items with a second list of content attributes; and

wherein the selecting a subset of the externally generated media items is done by matching the first and second lists of content attributes.

21 . The method according to claim 20 , wherein at least one of the content attributes corresponds to at least one of: topic, object, emotion, and location.

22 . A system comprising:

A computer processor configured to obtain one or more user-generated media items captured by a user during one or more events and obtain a plurality of externally generated media items, wherein at least one of the media items was captured independently of the one or more events;

an analyzing module configured to analyze the one or more user-generated media items, to extract visual data of the user-generated media items;

a selection module configured to automatically select a subset of the externally generated media items, based on a visual relationship between the visual data of the selected externally generated media items and the visual data of the user-generated media items; and

a production module configured to automatically produce a media sequence comprising portions of the user-generated media items and portions of the selected externally generated media items,

wherein the modules are executed by said computer processor.

23 . A system comprising:

a computer processor configured to obtain: one or more user-generated media items, a plurality of externally generated media items, and a user selection of a video editing-style;

a selection module configured to automatically select a subset of the externally generated media items, based on the selection of video editing-style; and

a production module configured to automatically produce a media sequence comprising portions of the one or more user-generated media item and portions of the selected externally generated media items, carried out using the selected video editing-style,

wherein the modules are executed by said computer processor.