Patent Publication Number: US-2011074965-A1

Title: Video processing system and method

Description:
BACKGROUND 
     1. Technical Field 
     The present disclosure relates to a video processing system and a video processing method. 
     2. Description of Related Art 
     Image resolution describes the detail an image holds. Higher resolution means more image detail. In digital camera field, a digital camera shoots a scene with maximum resolution, and an image the digital camera can obtain often has a fixed size. In that way, when users need an image with a larger size, the resolution of the image has to be reduced or the maximum resolution of the digital camera must be increased. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  is a schematic block diagram of an exemplary embodiment of a video processing system. 
         FIG. 2  is a schematic diagram of images captured by the video processing system in  FIG. 1 . 
         FIG. 3  is a flowchart of an embodiment of a video processing method. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
     Referring to  FIG. 1 , an exemplary embodiment of a video processing system  1  includes a plurality of cameras  10  and a video card  20 . The video processing system  1  is operable to shoot a scene to obtain an image. The image has high resolution and a large size. 
     Each camera  10  is a time-of-flight (TOF) camera. The TOF camera is a camera system that creates distance data between an object to be shoot and the TOF camera. The plurality of cameras  10  forms an array camera system. In the array camera system, the plurality of cameras  10  is arranged in circularity, or on a curved surface. The array camera system shoots the scene from multi-angles at a same time to obtain composite images. 
     Referring to  FIG. 2 , the plurality of cameras  10  includes nine cameras  10 . The nine cameras  10  shoot a first region A to a ninth region I of a scene  100 , respectively. In another embodiment, the plurality of cameras  10  can include more or less cameras  10 . The plurality of cameras  10  can be arranged in other shapes. When the video processing system  1  starts to work, the nine cameras  10  are turned on at the same time. The nine cameras  10  capture images of the nine regions A-I from different angles to obtain nine images  101 - 109  at the same time. The nine images  101 - 109  are transmitted to the video card  20 . 
     The video card  20  may be installed in a computer system  2 . When the nine images  101 - 109  are transmitted to the video card  20 , the video card  20  combines the nine images  101 - 109  to obtain a full image of the scene  100 . It can be understood that the video card  20  uses well known video processing technology to combine the nine images  101 - 109  to obtain the full image. 
     Suppose that each camera  10  shoots the scene  100  with maximum resolution of the camera  10 , such as 1024 pixels×768 pixels, the maximum size of the image the camera  10  can obtain is 10 inches×10 inches with the maximum resolution of 1024 pixels×768 pixels. With the video processing system  1 , because the full image is combined by the nine images  101 - 109 , a size of the full image is 30 inches×30 inches. Resolution of the full image is equal to the maximum resolution of the camera  10 . In other words, the resolution of the full image is 1024 pixels×768 pixels. By contraries, if users want to obtain an image with a size of 30 inches×30 inches using only one camera  10 , the resolution of the image is lower than the image using the video processing system  1 . In other words, the resolution of the image obtained by only one camera  10  is lower than 1024 pixels×768 pixels. 
     Referring to  FIG. 3 , an exemplary embodiment of a video processing method includes the following steps. 
     In step S 1 , the plurality of cameras  10  shoot different regions of the scene  100  at the same time to obtain nine images  101 - 109  corresponding to nine regions A-I of the scene  100 . In the embodiment, each image includes distance data between the scene  100  and the camera  10 . 
     In step S 2 , the nine images  101 - 109  corresponding to the different regions A-I of the scene  100  are transmitted to the video card  20 . 
     In step S 3 , the video card  20  combines the nine images  101 - 109  to obtain the full image of the scene  100 . The full image of the scene  100  includes distance data between the scene  100  and each camera  10 . The full image of the scene  100  has a larger size, 30 inches×30 inches, than that of each of the plurality of images  101 - 109 , and the same resolution, 1024 pixels×768 pixels, with that of each of the plurality of images  101 - 109 . 
     The foregoing description of the exemplary embodiments of the disclosure has been presented only for the purposes of illustration and description and is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the disclosure to the precise forms disclosed. Many modifications and variations are possible in light of the above everything. The embodiments were chosen and described in order to explain the principles of the disclosure and their practical application so as to enable others of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the disclosure and various embodiments and with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated. Alternative embodiments will become apparent to those of ordinary skills in the art to which the present disclosure pertains without departing from its spirit and scope. Accordingly, the scope of the present disclosure is defined by the appended claims rather than the foregoing description and the exemplary embodiments described therein.