Patent Issued for Automated inspection system and method (USPTO 11546507): United Services Automobile Association

2023 JAN 25 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Bartee, Matthew Ray (Mesa, AZ, US), Camarena, Scott Michael (Phoenix, AZ, US), Daly, Scott Evan (San Antonio, TX, US), Davis, Logan Thomas (Bozeman, MT, US), Gerber, Geoffrey Lee (Phoenix, AZ, US), Kelley, Martie Ann Gutshall (Buckeye, AZ, US), Ridley, Harold Joy (Chandler, AZ, US), Vanica, Danielle Elise Marie (Phoenix, AZ, US), filed on August 31, 2021, was published online on January 3, 2023.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11546507 is United Services Automobile Association (San Antonio, Texas, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Documenting the state of a rental property, such as an apartment, prior to moving in can be a time-consuming and frustrating experience for tenants and landlords. Video documentation of the state of the apartment prior to move-in can be a way to establish near indisputable proof of the condition of the apartment. However, leaving this process to the tenant themselves, without assistance, presents several drawbacks, especially in the event of special provisions in the lease related to specific features of the rental property, such as appliances; outbuildings; or personal property belonging to the landlord stored on the property. Video footage captured by the tenant may not be sufficiently clear to establish the condition of the apartment; important features of the rental property may be left out of the footage; and such footage then needs to be stored in a way that is accessible to the tenant potentially many years after it was taken. Later, the tenant and landlord may waste time reviewing all of the footage just to find documentation of one particular feature of the property. Similar drawbacks apply to other means of documenting the state of a rental property, such as photos and audio descriptions, and, additionally, to documenting the state of other items that can be rented, such as cars, heavy equipment, hotel rooms, etc.

“There is a need in the art for a system and method that addresses the shortcomings discussed above.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “In one aspect, a computer implemented method includes steps of receiving text of a lease for a rental property from a computing device, automatically analyzing the text, via a lease processing module, and identifying a lease feature described in the lease, and generating an instruction for a user to capture video of the rental property that includes the lease feature. The method also includes steps of sending the instruction to a guidance module of the computing device, receiving video of the rental property from the computing device, automatically analyzing a portion of the video, via an image processing module of the application, and identifying a video feature corresponding to the portion of the video. The method also includes steps of determining if the video feature matches the lease feature, and associating, in memory, the lease feature with the portion of the video when the video feature matches the lease feature.

“In another aspect, a method implemented by an application running on a mobile computing device includes steps of receiving text of a lease for a rental property, receiving a set of lease features identified in the text of the lease, guiding a user, via a guidance module, through the rental property, prompting the user, via the guidance module, to capture video for each lease feature in the set of lease features, and receiving video of the rental property. The method also includes steps of receiving a set of video features identified in the video, comparing the set of lease features and the set of video features to determine if there is at least one video feature in the set of video features corresponding to each lease feature in the set of lease features, and instructing the user, via the guidance module, to continue capturing video until the application has received at least one video feature for each lease feature in the set of lease features.

“In another aspect, a computing system includes a device processor and a non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that are executable by the device processor. The computing system also includes an application including a guidance module configured to guide a user on an inspection of a rental property, an image processing module configured to receive video and identify a set of video features, an audio processing module configured to receive audio and identify a set of audio features, and a lease processing module configured to receive text from a lease and identify a set of lease features. The application is further configured to determine that each video feature in the set of video features is matched to at least one audio feature in the set of audio features or to at least one lease feature in the set of lease features.

“Other systems, methods, features, and advantages of the disclosure will be, or will become, apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art upon examination of the following figures and detailed description. It is intended that all such additional systems, methods, features, and advantages be included within this description and this summary, be within the scope of the disclosure, and be protected by the following claims.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A computer implemented method, comprising the steps of: receiving text of a lease for a rental property from a computing device; automatically analyzing the text, via a lease processing module, and identifying a lease feature from a set of lease features derived from the lease using natural language processing to analyze the text of the lease to identify features of the rental property to be documented; generating an instruction for a user to capture video of the rental property that includes the lease feature; sending the instruction to a guidance module of the computing device; receiving the video of the rental property from the computing device; automatically analyzing a portion of the video, via an image processing module of an application, to identify a video feature, corresponding to the portion of the video, that matches the lease feature; and associating the lease feature with the portion of the video, by tagging the portion of the video as being associated with the lease feature; receiving audio associated with the video of the rental property; automatically analyzing a portion of the audio, via an audio processing module of the application, to identify an audio feature, corresponding to the portion of the audio, that matches the video feature; associating the audio feature with the portion of the video, by tagging the portion of the video as being associated with the audio feature; storing tags for the tagged portion of the video in association with the lease feature and the audio feature for subsequent retrieval; and discarding an unused portion of the video of the rental property for which there is no lease feature corresponding to the unused portion of the video of the rental property and no audio feature corresponding to the unused portion of the video of the rental property.

“2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further includes steps of: instructing the user, via the guidance module, to continue capturing video until the application has confirmed that it has received at least one video feature for the lease feature by confirming that an identity of the lease feature matches an identity of at least one video feature, as identified using machine vision.

“3. The method according to claim 1, further comprising: receiving a keyword from the user; retrieving a retrieved portion of the video associated with the keyword using the tags; and providing the retrieved portion of the video to the user.

“4. The method according to claim 3, further comprising: retrieving a retrieved portion of the audio associated with the keyword and the portion of the video using the tags; and providing the retrieved portion of the audio to the user along with the retrieved portion of the video.

“5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the video is segmented into portions of video based on contextual information related to changes in the video and the audio is segmented into portions of audio based on contextual information related to changes in the audio.

“6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the video is segmented into portions of video and the audio is segmented into portions of audio and the portions of audio are in one-to-one correspondence with the portions of video.

“7. The method according to claim 3, further comprising: retrieving a retrieved portion of the lease associated with the keyword using the tags; and providing the retrieved portion of the lease to the user.

“8. A method implemented by an application running on a mobile computing device, comprising the steps of: receiving text of a lease for a rental property; receiving a set of lease features identified in the text of the lease using natural language processing to analyze the text of the lease to identify features of the rental property to be documented; guiding a user, via a guidance module, through the rental property; prompting the user, via the guidance module, to capture video for each lease feature in the set of lease features; receiving video of the rental property; receiving a set of video features automatically identified in the video using machine vision; comparing the set of lease features and the set of video features to determine if there is at least one video feature in the set of video features corresponding to each lease feature in the set of lease features; instructing the user, via the guidance module, to continue capturing video until the application has confirmed that it has received at least one video feature for each lease feature in the set of lease features by confirming that an identity of each lease feature matches an identity of at least one video feature, as identified using machine vision; determining, for each video feature, a matching lease feature from the set of lease features; associating each determined matching lease feature with a matching portion of the video by tagging a portion of the video corresponding to the video feature matching the lease feature; receiving captured audio associated with the video of the rental property and receiving a set of audio features identified in the captured audio; determining, for each video feature, a matching audio feature from the set of audio features identified in the captured audio; associating each determined matching audio feature with a matching portion of the video by tagging a portion of the video corresponding to the video feature matching the audio feature; storing tags for each tagged portion of the video in association with the matching lease feature and the matching audio feature for subsequent retrieval; receiving a keyword from the user; retrieving a retrieved portion of the video associated with the keyword using the tags; and providing the retrieved portion of the video to the user.

“9. The method according to claim 8, the method further comprising steps of passing the text of the lease to a document processing module, and receiving the set of lease features from the document processing module.

“10. The method according to claim 8, the method further comprising steps of passing the captured video to an image processing module, and receiving the set of video features from the image processing module.

“11. The method according to claim 8, the method further comprising steps of retrieving a retrieved portion of the audio associated with the keyword using the tags and providing the retrieved portion of the audio to the user along with the retrieved portion of the video.

“12. The method according to claim 8, the method further comprising steps of passing the captured audio to an audio processing module, and receiving the set of audio features from the audio processing module.

“13. A computing system, comprising: a device processor; a non-transitory computer readable medium storing instructions that are executable by the device processor; an application further comprising: a guidance module configured to guide a user on an inspection of a rental property; an image processing module configured to receive video and identify a set of video features corresponding to portions of video produced by segmenting the video; an audio processing module configured to receive audio and identify a set of audio features corresponding to portions of audio produced by segmenting the audio; a lease processing module configured to receive text from a lease and identify a set of lease features using natural language processing to analyze the text of the lease to identify features of the rental property to be documented; wherein the application is further configured to: determine, for each video feature, a matching lease feature; associate each determined matching lease feature with a matching portion of the video by tagging a portion of the video corresponding to the video feature matching the lease feature; determine, for each video feature, a matching audio feature; associate each determined matching audio feature with a matching portion of the video by tagging a portion of the video corresponding to the video feature matching the audio feature; store tags for each tagged portion of the video in association with the matching lease feature and the matching audio feature for subsequent retrieval; receive a keyword from the user; retrieve a retrieved portion of the video associated with the keyword using the tags; and provide the retrieved portion of the video to the user.

“14. The computing system according to claim 13, wherein the application is configured to: retrieve a retrieved portion of the audio associated with the keyword using the tags; and provide the retrieved portion of the audio to the user along with the retrieved portion of the video.

“15. The computing system according to claim 13, wherein the application is configured to: retrieve a retrieved portion of the lease associated with the keyword using the tags; and provide the retrieved portion of the lease to the user.

“16. The computing system according to claim 13, wherein the application is configured to discard an unused portion of the video of the rental property for which there is no lease feature corresponding to the unused portion of the video of the rental property and no audio feature corresponding to the unused portion of the video of the rental property.

“17. The computing system according to claim 13, wherein the application is configured to instruct the user, via the guidance module, to continue capturing video until the application has confirmed that it has received at least one video feature for each lease feature in the set of lease features by confirming that an identity of each lease feature matches an identity of at least one identified video feature, as identified using machine vision.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

For additional information on this patent, see: Bartee, Matthew Ray. Automated inspection system and method. U.S. Patent Number 11546507, filed August 31, 2021, and published online on January 3, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11546507)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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