Personalized screencaps for trickplay slider

1. A method comprising:

receiving, while a media asset is being generated for display, a preview scrubbing request from a user to move a virtual slider of a progress bar associated with the media asset;

identifying a scene from the media asset that contains a play position indicated by the virtual slider;

analyzing the scene to identify a frame that best matches user profile data of the user and importance data for the scene, wherein the importance data indicates the importance of frames of the scene to an overall plot of the media asset; and

generating for display the identified frame overlaid over the displayed media asset,

wherein the preview scrubbing request moves the virtual slider without changing a play position of the displayed media asset.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the request from the user to move the slider of the progress bar associated with the media asset is a scrubbing request, and wherein the scrubbing request changes a play position of the displayed media asset.

3. The method of claim 2 , further comprising in response to a request to play the media asset from the play position indicated by the slider, generating for display the media asset from the beginning of the scene.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the displaying the identified frame overlaid over the displayed media asset comprises:

generating a screencap of the identified frame, wherein the screencap has a lower resolution than the identified frame; and

generating for display the generated screencap overlaid over the displayed media asset at the play position indicated by the slider.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the analyzing the scene to identify the frame comprises:

decoding each of a plurality of frames in the scene, wherein the plurality of frames in the scene comprises at least one I-frame and at least one P-frame;

comparing each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user and the importance data for the scene; and

selecting, based on a result of the comparing, one of the decoded plurality of frames as the identified frame.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the comparing each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user and the importance data for the scene comprises:

performing image analysis to each of the decoded plurality of frames to identify at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames;

assigning an importance score to each of the decoded plurality of frames based on a result of comparing the identified at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames to the importance data for the scene;

assigning a user preference score to each of the decoded plurality of frames based on a result of comparing the identified at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user; and

selecting one of the decoded plurality of frames as the identified frame based on the assigned importance score and the assigned user preference score.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the importance data for the scene comprises metadata stored in association with the media asset, and

wherein the user profile data of the user comprises an actor of interest to the user.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the identified scene is a first scene and the identified frame is a first frame, and

wherein the method further comprises:

identifying a second scene from the media asset that does not contain the play position indicated by the slider;

analyzing the second scene to identify a second frame that best matches user profile data of the user and importance data for the scene; and

generating for display, while the first frame is being displayed, the identified second frame overlaid over the displayed media asset.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising selecting the identified frame as an identifier for the media asset.

10. A system comprising:

a memory storing instructions; and

control circuitry configured to execute the instructions stored in the memory to:

receive, while a media asset is being generated for display, a preview scrubbing request from a user to move a virtual slider of a progress bar associated with the media asset;

identify a scene from the media asset that contains a play position indicated by the virtual slider;

analyze the scene to identify a frame that best matches user profile data of the user and importance data for the scene, wherein the importance data indicates the importance of frames of the scene to an overall plot of the media asset; and

generate for display the identified frame overlaid over the displayed media asset,

wherein the preview scrubbing request moves the virtual slider without changing a play position of the displayed media asset.

11. The system of claim 10 , wherein the request from the user to move the slider of the progress bar associated with the media asset is a scrubbing request, and wherein the scrubbing request changes a play position of the displayed media asset.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein the control circuitry is further configured, in response to a request to play the media asset from the play position indicated by the slider, generate for display the media asset from the beginning of the scene.

13. The system of claim 10 , wherein the control circuitry is further configured, when displaying the identified frame overlaid over the displayed media asset, to:

generate a screencap of the identified frame, wherein the screencap has a lower resolution than the identified frame; and

generate for display the generated screencap overlaid over the displayed media asset at the play position indicated by the slider.

14. The system of claim 10 , wherein the control circuitry is further configured, when analyzing the scene to identify the frame, to:

decode each of a plurality of frames in the scene, wherein the plurality of frames in the scene comprises at least one I-frame and at least one P-frame;

compare each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user and the importance data for the scene; and

select, based on a result of the comparing, one of the decoded plurality of frames as the identified frame.

15. The system of claim 14 , wherein the control circuitry is further configured, when comparing each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user and the importance data for the scene, to:

perform image analysis to each of the decoded plurality of frames to identify at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames;

assign an importance score to each of the decoded plurality of frames based on a result of comparing the identified at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames to the importance data for the scene;

assign a user preference score to each of the decoded plurality of frames based on a result of comparing the identified at least one element in each of the decoded plurality of frames to the user profile data of the user; and

select one of the decoded plurality of frames as the identified frame based on the assigned importance score and the assigned user preference score.

16. The system of claim 10 , wherein the importance data for the scene comprises metadata stored in association with the media asset, and

wherein the user profile data of the user comprises an actor of interest to the user.

17. The system of claim 10 , wherein the identified scene is a first scene and the identified frame is a first frame, and

wherein the control circuitry is further configured to:

identify a second scene from the media asset that does not contain the play position indicated by the slider;

analyze the second scene to identify a second frame that best matches user profile data of the user and importance data for the scene; and

generate for display, while the first frame is being displayed, the identified second frame overlaid over the displayed media asset.

18. The system of claim 10 , wherein the control circuitry is further configured to select the identified frame as an identifier for the media asset.