Patent ID: 8577147

Claim:
A character recognition apparatus comprising: extraction unit extracting a dotted line candidate from image data of a form; feature collection unit collecting a thickness, length, interval of a dotted line of a plurality of extracted dotted line candidates as feature information; estimation unit estimating a dotted line candidate spot in a character box being a recognition target based on the feature information of a dotted line candidate in a same character box being the recognition target or in another character box; elimination unit eliminating the dotted line candidate extracted by the extraction unit and the dotted line candidate estimated by the estimation unit from the image data; and character recognition unit performing recognition of a character in image data from which the dotted line candidate has been eliminated by the elimination unit, wherein the estimation unit estimates a dotted line candidate spot and a type of a dotted line candidate in the character box being the recognition target, using the feature information of a dotted line candidate in the same character box being the recognition target or in another character box and information indicating an interval between a dotted line candidate in the character box being the recognition target and a dotted line candidate in a same character box as the character box being the recognition target or in another character box.