Patent ID: 7307763

Claim:
An image processing method comprising the steps of: successively acquiring image data of images of a plurality of frames; changing a timing with which determination of an image processing condition is started in accordance with contents of the images carried by the acquired image data; determining the image processing condition for each image data of the images of said plurality of frames; and performing image processing in accordance with the thus determined image processing condition to output data for output purposes, wherein the determination of the image processing condition of the image data of each of the images of said plurality of frames is started in at least one of four cases: a first case where gray pixels are extracted from the acquired or selected image data of each of the images of the frames for accumulation and the accumulated gray pixels exceed a predetermined number; a second case where predetermined pixels in the image data of each of the images of the frames accumulated with respect to a density axis have a density range exceeding a predetermined width; a third case where predetermined pixels in the image data of each of the images of the frames accumulated with respect to a color distribution axis have a color distribution exceeding a predetermined width; and case where an end of a continuous scene is confirmed as a a fourth result of a scene analysis of the image data of each of the images of the frames.