Source: http://www.google.com/patents/US7903875?ie=ISO-8859-1&dq=7,054,745
Timestamp: 2014-07-13 05:14:51
Document Index: 225889139

Matched Legal Cases: ['art 5', 'art 4', 'art 5', 'art 6', 'art 7', 'art 7', 'art 41', 'art 41', 'art 51', 'art 41', 'art 51']

Patent US7903875 - Character recognition processing device, character recognition processing ... - Google PatentsSearch Images Maps Play YouTube News Gmail Drive More »Sign in<nobr>Advanced Patent Search</nobr>PatentsIt is an object of the present invention to improve a rate of recognition and recognition speed, reduce a degree of a specification required for a device forming a photographing device or a system and lower consumed electric power and a cost. In a character recognition processing method according to...http://www.google.com/patents/US7903875?utm_source=gb-gplus-sharePatent US7903875 - Character recognition processing device, character recognition processing method, and mobile terminal deviceAdvanced Patent SearchPublication numberUS7903875 B2Publication typeGrantApplication numberUS 10/523,877PCT numberPCT/JP2003/009483Publication dateMar 8, 2011Filing dateJul 25, 2003Priority dateAug 7, 2002Also published asCN1675652A, CN100338619C, DE60330484D1, EP1553517A1, EP1553517A4, EP1553517B1, US20060177135, WO2004015619A1Publication number10523877, 523877, PCT/2003/9483, PCT/JP/2003/009483, PCT/JP/2003/09483, PCT/JP/3/009483, PCT/JP/3/09483, PCT/JP2003/009483, PCT/JP2003/09483, PCT/JP2003009483, PCT/JP200309483, PCT/JP3/009483, PCT/JP3/09483, PCT/JP3009483, PCT/JP309483, US 7903875 B2, US 7903875B2, US-B2-7903875, US7903875 B2, US7903875B2InventorsYukihiro Fujita, Kouji Sawamura, Katsuyuki ItoOriginal AssigneePanasonic CorporationExport CitationBiBTeX, EndNote, RefManPatent Citations (22), Non-Patent Citations (2), Classifications (9), Legal Events (2) External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, EspacenetCharacter recognition processing device, character recognition processing method, and mobile terminal deviceUS 7903875 B2Abstract It is an object of the present invention to improve a rate of recognition and recognition speed, reduce a degree of a specification required for a device forming a photographing device or a system and lower consumed electric power and a cost. In a character recognition processing method according to the present invention, a character image as an object whose character is to be recognized is displayed on a display (12) together with a cursor of a character frame for recognizing a character. While the cursor is set to a character string as an object to be recognized, the character image is photographed by a photographing part (9). In an image fetching part (3), the image data of the photographed character image is fetched. In a layout analyzing part (5), the fetched image data of the character image and cursor position information from a cursor control part (4) corresponding to the character image are received. The image data is collated with the cursor position information to analyze the arrangement of the lines or characters of the character string as the object to be recognized. Then, in a character cutting part (6), the character is cut on the basis of the analyzed result. The character is recognized relative to the character image by a character recognizing part (7) to convert the image data to character data.
TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a character recognition processing device, a character recognition processing method and a portable terminal device that are preferably used for a portable terminal device such as a portable telephone, a portable information terminal or the like.
BACKGROUND ART As a usual character recognizing method and a usual character recognizing device, a character recognizing method and a character recognizing device that are disclosed in, for instance, JP-A-2001-60250 (Patent document 1) and JP-A-2000-76378 (Patent document 2) have been known.
DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION A character recognition processing device according to the present invention comprises an image fetching unit for fetching the image data of a character image as an object to be recognized that is photographed for recognizing a character; a cursor information output unit for outputting cursor position information showing the position of a character frame for recognizing the character coordinated with the character image; a layout analyzing unit for collating the cursor position information with the fetched image data of the character image to analyze the arrangement of the character; a character cutting unit for extracting the character image on the basis of the analyzed result of the layout analyzing unit; and a character recognizing unit for recognizing the extracted character image as the character and converting the character image to character information.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the structure of a portable terminal device having a character recognition processing device according to a first embodiment of the present invention;
BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Now, referring to the drawings, embodiments of the present invention will be described below.
First Embodiment FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the structure of a portable terminal device having a character recognition processing device according to a first embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, a structural example that the character recognition processing device 2 is mounted on the portable terminal device 1 is described.
Second Embodiment Now, an operation of a character recognition processing device according to a second embodiment of the present invention will be described by referring to FIGS. 3 and 4. FIGS. 3 and 4 are explanatory views of an operation during a character recognizing process according to the second embodiment. FIG. 3 shows a state that a character string as an object to be recognized is photographed. FIG. 4 shows a manner of the character recognizing process relative to the character string as the object to be recognized that is divided into a plurality of parts. Since the structure of the character recognition processing device is the same as that of the first embodiment, FIG. 1 is applied thereto.
Further, in the layout analyzing part 5, cursor position information is received from a cursor control part 4 to collate the cursor position information with the image data of the character image. In this case, characters may not be possibly respectively accommodated in the character frame of the cursor with respect to the character images of each frame used for analyzing a layout. Accordingly, the cursor position information can be used without a problem to analyze arrangement information relative to a �line�. However, the cursor position information may not be used for analyzing the arrangement information for each character. In this case, the cursor position information may be shifted to the moving direction of the continuous still image to analyze the arrangement information of each character. As described above, in the layout analyzing part 5, even when the character string 23 as the object to be recognized is long, the arrangement information of the character string 23 as the object to be recognized can be precisely analyzed by employing the cursor position information. In this embodiment, the arrangement information of the lines can be precisely analyzed.
Then, in a character cutting part 6, the image data is cut for a character unit. In a character recognizing part 7, the extracted image data for a character unit is converted to character data to recognize a character. In this case, as the recognized result of the character, �ABCDEFGHIJKL� is obtained in the frame (1). In the frame (2), �FGHIJKLMNOP� is obtained. In the frame (3), �JKLMNOPQRSTU� is obtained. In the frame (4), �OPQRSTUVW� is obtained. In the character recognizing part 7, the recognized results of the characters respectively for the frames are synthesized so that �ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVW� is obtained as a final recognized result of the characters.
Third Embodiment Now, one example of a structure and an operation when a character recognition processing device is mounted on a portable telephone as a third embodiment will be described below.
When the OCR function of the portable telephone is activated, a main menu screen 71 corresponding to an initial screen is displayed. FIG. 11 shows one example of the main menu screen 71. On this main menu 71, the list of the registered contents of the plurality of character data is displayed. In this embodiment, a plurality (for instance, 20) of character data of character strings to be recognized can be registered. Here, when the user selects a column of a �non-registered� to focus it (shown by oblique lines in the drawing) by a highlight display or the like and presses a �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, the photographing part 41 is activated to photograph the image of a new character string as an object to be recognized to become a waiting state for photographing by a camera. Thus, a preview display screen 72 is displayed. When a focused position is moved to switch an object to be selected, a cross key assigned to the outer peripheral part of the function key PF1 is operated.
FIG. 12(A) shows one example of the preview display screen 72. On the preview display screen 72, a character image 81 as an object to be recognized that is photographed by the photographing part 41 is displayed. On the character image 81, a character frame 82 for recognizing a character showing a character recognizing area is superimposed and displayed. When the user views the character image 81 and adjusts a photographing range so that the character string as the object to be recognized is accommodated in the character frame 82 for recognizing the character and presses down a �photographing� button assigned to the function key PF1, the character image 81 is photographed. Further, a series of character recognizing processes described in the first embodiment such as the analysis of the layout of the character string as the object to be recognized, cutting of the character, the recognition of the character or the like are carried out by the character recognizing part 51.
Further, when the user presses down a �function� button assigned to the function key PF3 in the preview display screen 72 shown in FIG. 12(A), a mode shifts to a function setting mode of the photographing part 41 to display a camera function setting screen 73. FIG. 12(B) shows one example of the camera function setting screen 73. In the camera function setting screen 73, any of a recognizing mode, a brightness adjustment and a photo-light (photographing light) can be selected as a target to be set. Here, when the user selects a column of the �recognizing mode� to focus it and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, a recognizing mode setting screen 74 is displayed.
FIG. 12(C) shows one example of the recognizing mode setting screen 74. In the recognizing mode setting screen 74, when any of an automatic mode, a URL mode, a mail address mode and a telephone number mode is selected as the recognizing mode, a character recognizing process specified by the selected mode is carried out for all the character strings of the photographed character image. When a free mode is selected, the character is recognized relative to an arbitrary character string as an object and all the character strings that can be recognized are outputted as recognized character data. When the automatic mode is selected, the character recognizing part 51 automatically decides a suitable recognizing mode depending on the contents of the character image 81 from among the four modes to recognize the character under the suitable recognizing mode. Here, when the user selects the recognizing mode to focus it and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, the screen returns to the preview display screen 72. In the above-described operation, the character recognizing process specified by the selected mode is carried out for all the character strings of the photographed character image. However, when any of the automatic mode, the URL mode, the mail address mode and the telephone number mode is selected, only the character string corresponding to the URL or the like may be outputted as the recognized character data.
(2) Mail Address When there is a character including �@�
(3) URL When there is a character starting from �http://� or �https://�
In the main menu screen 71, when the user selects a column of a registered character string to focus it and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, the recognized character display screen 75 is displayed to display the character data of the character strings recognized and stored in the past.
In the recognized character display screen 75, when the user presses down the �function� button assigned to the function key PF3, a function menu display screen 76 is displayed. FIG. 13(B) shows one example of the function menu display screen 76. In the function menu display screen 76, any of connecting, editing, copying, storing, newly registering in a telephone directory, additionally registering in a telephone directory and registering a book mark can be selected.
When a long character string that cannot be photographed once is continuously photographed to connect recognized results together to one, a function of �connecting� is selected in the function menu display screen 76. When the user selects a column of �connecting� to focus it and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, the preview display screen 72 is displayed again so that the character string can be photographed. Then, when the photographing and character recognizing processes of the character string as the object to be recognized are completed subsequently to the previous time, the preview display screen is switched to the recognized character display screen 75. Then, the character string recognized at this time is additionally displayed. In recognizing the character, the character may be recognized for a plurality of images or after the plurality of images are connected together to one image, the character may be recognized.
In the function menu display screen 76, when the user selects each function except �connecting� and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, a function screen 77 corresponding to each function is displayed so that each function can be performed. When �editing� is selected, a text editor is activated to display an editing screen. The user can correct an erroneously recognized character in the editing screen. When �copying� is selected, a copying function is called to display a copying range selecting screen. Thus, the user can copy the character data a range of which is designated and use the copied character data in other character input screen. When �storing� is selected, a storing process of the character data of the recognized character string is carried out. When the storing process is completed, a storing operation completion informing screen such as �stored� is displayed. Thus, the recognized character string obtained by the character recognizing process at this time is stored in the column of the �non-registered� selected in the main menu screen 71.
Further, when �newly registering in a telephone directory� or �additionally registering in a telephone directory� is selected, a telephone directory registering screen is displayed so that the user can register the recognized character strings such as the telephone number, the mail address, a name, or the like in desired columns of the telephone directory. When �registering a book mark� is selected, a book mark registering screen is displayed so that the user can register the recognized character string such as the URL as a book mark.
In the recognized character display screen 75, when the user selects the character string of any of the telephone number, the mail address and the URL, and presses down the �select� button assigned to the function key PF1, a using screen 78 corresponding to the type of each of the character strings is displayed. When the telephone number is selected, as shown in FIG. 13(C), an audio transmitting screen 78 a is displayed as the using screen. In the audio transmitting screen 78 a, an audio transmission to the telephone number whose character is recognized can be carried out by a simple operation. When the URL is selected, as shown in FIG. 13(D), an internet connecting screen 78 b is displayed as the using screen. Thus, an internet connection by the URL whose character is recognized can be carried out by a simple operation. When the mail address is selected, as shown in FIG. 13(E), a mail preparing screen 78 c is displayed as the using screen. Thus, the preparation of an electronic mail to the mail address whose character is recognized can be carried out by a simple operation.
INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY As described above, according to the present invention, a character recognition processing device and a character recognition processing method can be provided which can improve a rate of recognition and a recognition speed, can reduce the degree of a specification required for a device forming a photographing device or a system and can decrease consumed electric power and a cost.
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