Patent ID: 7221796

Claim:
A character input device for inputting a character by extracting and recognizing a character from an image of a document photographed by a photographing device, comprising: character extraction means for extracting an image of a character portion from the image photographed by said photographing device; character recognition means for recognizing a character from the image of said character portion and for making into character recognition data a character recognition result and reliability indicative of sureness of recognition; recognition data synthesizing means for detecting and connecting overlap portions in said character recognition data obtained from a plurality of images of a same document, as well as selecting character recognition data whose said reliability is high with respect to the overlap portions to synthesize a plurality of said character recognition data into one said character recognition data; and recognition data storage means for storing said synthesized character recognition data, wherein said recognition data synthesizing means detects, with respect to said character recognition data obtained from the plurality of images of the same document, an overlap portion between said character recognition data obtained from a latest image and said character recognition data obtained from a former image which is stored in said recognition data storage means, and wherein when said reliability of said character recognition data obtained from said latest image is higher, rewrites said character recognition data obtained from the former image in said recognition data storage means.