Patent ID: 6876468

Claim:
An image processing apparatus, wherein: a first processing circuit and a second processing circuit are connected in m bits, the first processing circuit comprising: image area separation means for discriminating whether a target image is a character or a photograph on the basis of input image data of red, green, and blue; color conversion means for converting the input image data of red, green, and blue into color signals of cyan, magenta, and yellow, respectively; space filter means for executing filtering process on the color signals of cyan, magenta, and yellow, which are converted by the color conversion means, on the basis of discrimination signals discriminated by the image area separation means; and information addition means for outputting an m-bit signal of each color, which is filter-processed by the space filter means, and an n-bit discrimination signal, which is discriminated by the image area separation means, as m-bit information, to the second processing circuit, and the second processing circuit comprising: information extraction means for extracting both the m-bit signal of each color and the n-bit discrimination signal from m-bit information output by the information addition means; black-coloring means for generating a black color signal from the color signals of cyan, magenta, and yellow, which are extracted by the information extracting means, on the basis of the discrimination signal, which is extracted by the information extraction means, and for outputting the color signals of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black; γ correction means for correcting tone characteristics of the color signals of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black, which are output from the black-coloring means, on the basis of the discrimination signal extracted by from the information extraction means; and tone processing means for tone-processing the color signals of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black, which are corrected by the γ correction means, on the basis of the discrimination signal extracted by the information extraction means.