System and method for automatically generating albums

1. An image processing system for automatically generating albums comprising:

a first server computer, the first server computer includes a processor, a network interface coupled to the processor and adaptively coupled to a database, and a server software application operating on the processor;

the server software application adapted to:

over the network interface, retrieve a first set of images from a client computer or a second server computer;

retrieve metadata and a first set of tags from each image in the first set of images;

perform scene understanding on each image in the first set of images to recognize a scene type;

perform facial recognition on the each image in the first set of images to recognize a facial expression;

generate a second set of tags for each image in the first set of images based, at least in part, on results of the scene understanding and the facial recognition;

store the first set of tags and the second set of tags in the database;

determine a set of search parameters;

based on the set of search parameters, retrieve a second set of images from the database;

generate an album from the second set of images; and

store the album into the database.

2. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the server software application is further adapted to normalize the first set of tags.

3. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the server software application is further adapted to:

retrieve a third set of tags for at least one image in the set of images from a second client computer over the network interface; and

store the third set of tags into the database.

4. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein:

the metadata includes a set of GPS coordinates; and

the server software application is further adapted to:

send the set of GPS coordinates to a map service server for mapping the set of GPS coordinates to a location name; and

receive the location name from the map service server, wherein the location name is specified in a location tag within the second set of tags for the corresponding image.

5. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the second set of tags further comprises a timing tag.

6. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the server software application is further adapted to display a subset of the first set of images on a map based on GeoTags of the set of images.

7. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the set of search parameters comprises data for use in searching the first set of tags and the second set of tags stored in the database, and wherein the set of search parameters is received from a third client computer.

8. The image processing system of claim 1 wherein the set of search parameters comprises data for use in searching the first set of tags and the second set of tags stored in the database, and wherein the set of search parameters is automatically generated by the first server computer.

9. A method for automatically generating albums, the method operating within a server computer and comprising:

retrieving a first set of images via a network interface of the server computer;

retrieving metadata and a first set of tags from each image in the first set of images;

performing scene understanding on each image in the first set of images to recognize a scene type;

performing facial recognition on each image in the first set of images to recognize a facial expression;

generating a second set of tags for each image in the first set of images based, at least in part, on results of the scene understanding and the facial recognition;

storing the first set of tags and the second set of tags into a database;

determining a set of search parameters;

based on the set of search parameters, retrieving a second set of images from the database;

generating an album from the second set of images; and

storing the album into the database.

10. The method of claim 9 further comprising normalizing the first set of tags.

11. The method of claim 9 further comprising:

retrieving a third set of tags for at least one image in the set of image from a client computer over the network interface; and

storing the third set of tags into the database.

12. The method of claim 9 further comprising:

sending a set of GPS coordinates to a map service server for mapping the set of GPS coordinates to a location name, wherein the metadata includes the set of GPS coordinates; and

receiving the location name from the map service server, wherein the location name is specified in a location tag within the second set of tags for the corresponding image.

13. The method of claim 9 wherein the second set of tags further comprises a timing tag.

14. The method of claim 9 further comprising displaying a subset of the first set of images on a map based on GeoTags of the set of images.

15. The method of claim 9 wherein the set of search parameters comprises data for use in searching the first set of tags and the second set of tags stored in the database, and wherein the set of search parameters is received from a client computer.

16. The method of claim 9 wherein the set of search parameters comprises data for use in searching the first set of tags and the second set of tags stored in the database, and wherein the set of search parameters is automatically generated by the first server computer.

17. An apparatus, comprising:

a processor;

a network interface coupled to the processor and communicatively coupled to a database; and

a storage device storing a software application which, when executed on the processor, causes the apparatus to:

obtain a set of images by way of the network interface;

extract a first set of tags from images in the set of images;

perform scene understanding on images in the set of images;

perform facial recognition on images in the set of images;

generate a second set of tags for images in the set of images, the second set of tags comprising tags generated based upon results of the scene understanding and the facial recognition;

cause the first set of tags and the second set of tags to be stored in the database;

cause a search to be made of the first set of tags and the second set of tags; and

generate an album from images in the set of images identified by the search.

18. The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein the software application is further configured to normalize the first set of tags extracted from the images in the set of images.

19. The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein an image creation time is utilized during the performance of the scene understanding on the images in the set of images.

20. The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein the software application is further configured to generate a timing tag for the images in the set of images and to store the timing tag in the database.