Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture to perform speed-enhanced playback of recorded media are disclosed. Example apparatus to playback media disclosed herein comprise at least one memory, machine-readable instructions, and processor circuitry to execute the machine-readable instructions to parse an audio frame included in the media to determine a number of skip bytes included in the audio frame, compare the number of skip bytes to a threshold, associate the audio frame with a plurality of candidate frames identified in the media when the number of skip bytes satisfies the threshold, and calculate a speed-enhanced playback rate for the media based on the plurality of candidate frames identified in the media.

A system capable of speech gap modulation is configured to: receive at least one composite speech portion, which comprises at least one speech portion and at least one dynamic-gap portion, wherein the speech portion(s) comprising at least one variable-value speech portion, wherein the dynamic-gap portion(s) associated with a pause in speech; receive at least one synchronization point, wherein synchronization point(s) is associating a point in time in the composite speech portion(s) and a point in time in other media portion(s); and modulate dynamic-gap portion(s), based at least partially on the at variable-value speech portion(s), and on the point(s), thereby generating at least one modulated composite speech portion. This facilitates improved synchronization of the modulated composite speech portion(s) and the other media portion(s) at the synchronization point(s), when combining the other media portion(s) and the audio-format modulated composite speech portion(s) into a synchronized multimedia output.

A system capable of speech gap modulation is configured to: receive at least one composite speech portion, which comprises at least one speech portion and at least one dynamic-gap portion, wherein the speech portion(s) comprising at least one variable-value speech portion, wherein the dynamic-gap portion(s) associated with a pause in speech; receive at least one synchronization point, wherein synchronization point(s) is associating a point in time in the composite speech portion(s) and a point in time in other media portion(s); and modulate dynamic-gap portion(s), based at least partially on the at variable-value speech portion(s), and on the point(s), thereby generating at least one modulated composite speech portion. This facilitates improved synchronization of the modulated composite speech portion(s) and the other media portion(s) at the synchronization point(s), when combining the other media portion(s) and the audio-format modulated composite speech portion(s) into a synchronized multimedia output.

Captured vocals may be automatically transformed using advanced digital signal processing techniques that provide captivating applications, and even purpose-built devices, in which mere novice user-musicians may generate, audibly render and share musical performances. In some cases, the automated transformations allow spoken vocals to be segmented, arranged, temporally aligned with a target rhythm, meter or accompanying backing tracks and pitch corrected in accord with a score or note sequence. Speech-to-song music applications are one such example. In some cases, spoken vocals may be transformed in accord with musical genres such as rap using automated segmentation and temporal alignment techniques, often without pitch correction. Such applications, which may employ different signal processing and different automated transformations, may nonetheless be understood as speech-to-rap variations on the theme.

Captured vocals may be automatically transformed using advanced digital signal processing techniques that provide captivating applications, and even purpose-built devices, in which mere novice user-musicians may generate, audibly render and share musical performances. In some cases, the automated transformations allow spoken vocals to be segmented, arranged, temporally aligned with a target rhythm, meter or accompanying backing tracks and pitch corrected in accord with a score or note sequence. Speech-to-song music applications are one such example. In some cases, spoken vocals may be transformed in accord with musical genres such as rap using automated segmentation and temporal alignment techniques, often without pitch correction. Such applications, which may employ different signal processing and different automated transformations, may nonetheless be understood as speech-to-rap variations on the theme.

Audio video synchronization and alignment or alignment of audio to some other external clock are rendered more effective or easier by treating fragment grid and frame grid as independent values, but, nevertheless, for each fragment the frame grid is aligned to the respective fragment's beginning. A compression effectiveness lost may be kept low when appropriately selecting the fragment size. On the other hand, the alignment of the frame grid with respect to the fragments' beginnings allows for an easy and fragment-synchronized way of handling the fragments in connection with, for example, parallel audio video streaming, bitrate adaptive streaming or the like.

An audio processing system (100) accepts an audio bitstream having one of a plurality of predefined audio frame rates. The system comprises a front-end component (110), which receives a variable number of quantized spectral components, corresponding to one audio frame in any of the predefined audio frame rates, and performs an inverse quantization according to predetermined, frequency-dependent quantization levels. The front-end component may be agnostic of the audio frame rate. The audio processing system further comprises a frequency-domain processing stage (120) and a sample rate converter (130), which provide a reconstructed audio signal sampled at a target sampling frequency independent of the audio frame rate. By its frame-rate adaptability, the system can be configured to operate frame-synchronously in parallel with a video processing system that accepts plural video frame rates.

An audio processing system (100) accepts an audio bitstream having one of a plurality of predefined audio frame rates. The system comprises a front-end component (110), which receives a variable number of quantized spectral components, corresponding to one audio frame in any of the predefined audio frame rates, and performs an inverse quantization according to predetermined, frequency-dependent quantization levels. The front-end component may be agnostic of the audio frame rate. The audio processing system further comprises a frequency-domain processing stage (120) and a sample rate converter (130), which provide a reconstructed audio signal sampled at a target sampling frequency independent of the audio frame rate. By its frame-rate adaptability, the system can be configured to operate frame-synchronously in parallel with a video processing system that accepts plural video frame rates.

A distributed systems and methods for generating composite media including receiving a media context that defines media that is to be generated, the media context including: a definition of a sequence of media segment specifications and, an identification of a set of remote devices. For each media segment specification, a reference segment may be generated and transmitted to at least one remote device. A media segment may be received from each of the remote device, the media segment having been recorded by a camera. Verified media sequences may replace the corresponding reference segment. The media segments may be aggregated and an updated sequence of media segments may be defined. An instance of the media context that includes a subset of the updated sequence of media segments may then be generated.

Methods, apparatus, systems and articles of manufacture are disclosed for audio watermarking and, more particularly, methods and apparatus to inspect characteristics of multichannel audio. An example apparatus disclosed herein includes an audio demultiplexer to obtain a first audio subchannel and a second audio subchannel of a multichannel audio signal and a watermark detector to detect watermarks in the first audio subchannel and watermarks in the second audio subchannel. The example apparatus further includes a channel characteristic inspector to compare a number of watermarks detected in the first audio subchannel and a number of watermarks detected in the second audio subchannel to determine whether the first and second audio subchannels were watermarked in accordance with a watermark encoder configuration and a result alerter to distribute an alert in response to a determination that the first and second audio subchannels were not watermarked in accordance with the watermark encoder configuration.