Patent ID: 6400853
Filing Date: 2002-06-04
Classification: G06F,Y10S

Abstract:
An image retrieval apparatus comprising:a storage adapted to store a label string which represents a two dimensional label matrix in correspondence with an image; a specifying unit, adapted to specify an image; an acquiring unit, adapted to acquire the label matrix of the specified image from said storage; and a retrieval unit adapted to perform image retrieval on the basis of the label matrix stored in said storage, said retrieval unit including: a first matching unit adapted to compare a label string extracted from the label matrix of the specified image in units of rows with a label string extracted from the label matrix of an image to be compared in units of rows by dynamic programming matching to obtain a row array indicating to which row of the image to be compared each row of the specified image is similar; and a second matching unit adapted to obtain, by dynamic programming matching, a similarity between a row array of the image to be compared and the row array obtained by said first matching unit.