Patent ID: 7317835
Filing Date: 2008-01-08
Classification: G06K

Abstract:
1. An image processing method for detecting a direction of an image including a character area, inputted into a computer, said method comprising: a binary image generation step of generating a binary image of said input image; a tile image generation step of generating a tile image that comprises a plurality of tiles, wherein a value of each tile in the tile image is generated based on a predetermined size area in said binary image; a character area extraction step of extracting an area in said binary image, corresponding to an area in a circumscribed rectangle surrounding connected pixels having the same value in said tile image, as a character area; a determination step of determining whether or not said character area is an inverted image based on the binary image of said image; an inversion processing step of inverting black and white components of said binary image if it is determined at said determination step that said character area is an inverted image; and a direction detection step of recognizing a direction of characters included in said character area of the binary image inverted in said inversion processing step, and thereby detecting the direction of said image.