Image analysis – Image transformation or preprocessing
Reexamination Certificate
2000-11-28
2003-12-09
Tran, Phuoc (Department: 2621)
Image analysis
Image transformation or preprocessing
C382S294000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06661931
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the art of processing image data representing an image taken by an image-taking device, and particularly to the art of processing a plurality of batches of image data respectively representing a plurality of images which are taken by one or plural image-taking devices from an object a whole image of which cannot be taken at once by the one image-taking device or each of the plural image-taking devices.
2. Discussion of Related Art
There is known an electric-component (EC) mounting apparatus which includes a suction nozzle for holding an EC, and an image-taking device for taking an image of the EC held by the nozzle and thereby inspecting a condition of the EC. The image-taking device may be a CCD (charge-coupled-device) camera including a matrix of CCDs for taking a whole image of the EC. Necessary information can be obtained from the taken image of the EC.
However, when a commonly or widely used CCD camera including a limited number of CCDs or having a limited number of pixels takes, at once, a whole image of a large-size EC having a complex shape, each of the CCDs must take a pixel image of an excessively large portion of the EC, which leads to lowering the degree of resolution of the taken image. Thus, it is difficult to recognize accurately one or more fine portions of the EC, such as its lead wires.
Hence, a camera including a single array of CCDs, i.e., a “line” sensor (hereinafter, referred to as the line-sensor camera) has been used in place of the CCD camera. The line-sensor camera is allowed to have a greater number of CCDs or pixels per unit length, than the CCD camera including the matrix of CCDs. Thus, each of the CCDs of the line-sensor camera has only to take a pixel image of a smaller portion of the large-size EC, which leads to improving the degree of resolution of the taken image. However, the line-sensor camera itself is expensive, and additionally needs a special high-performance light source, which leads to increasing the overall cost of the EC mounting apparatus which employs the line-sensor camera. Moreover, the line-sensor camera needs a longer time to take the whole image of the EC.
In this background, there has been proposed another method using the CCD camera. In this method, as shown in
FIG. 14
, respective images of a plurality of portions or parts (i.e., four corners)
202
of a large-size EC
200
as an object are sequentially taken by a single CCD camera, or are simultaneously taken by a plurality of (i.e., four) CCD cameras, and a plurality of batches of part-image data representing the respective images of the plurality of parts
202
of the EC
200
are obtained. First position data representing respective positions of the four parts
202
in the EC
202
are obtained from the batches of part-image data, and second position data representing a position of the large-size EC
202
as a whole are obtained from the first position data.
However, in the above method in which the plurality of batches of part-image data are obtained by one or more CCD cameras, a whole or complete image of the large-size EC
200
is not taken. Therefore, the prior method cannot inspect the EC
200
as a whole.
It may be possible to obtain a whole image of the large-size EC
200
by first taking, with one or more CCD cameras, a plurality of part images from a plurality of parts of the EC
200
and then connecting the taken part images to each other while taking into account respective relative positions of the CCD camera or cameras relative to the EC at respective times when the part images are taken. In fact, however, an image-taking device (e.g., a CCD camera) has a distortion of a lens (e.g., a distortion of a matrix of CCDs) and accordingly an image taken by the image-taking device may have distortions in its peripheral portions, in particular. In addition, physical relative positions of the image-taking device or devices relative to the EC
200
may contain some positional errors from reference or prescribed relative positions. If the part images taken from the EC
200
are connected to each other without taking into account the lens distortion or the positional errors, then it would be difficult to reproduce an accurate, whole image of the EC
200
because of the distortion and the errors.
Though the above discussion relates to the art of taking and processing images of ECs, the above problems may occur to not only the ECs but also other sorts of objects (e.g., connectors).
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides an image processing method, an image processing system, and a modifying-data producing method which have one or more of the following technical features that are described below in respective paragraphs given parenthesized sequential numbers (1) to (21). Any technical feature that includes another technical feature shall do so by referring, at the beginning, to the parenthesized sequential number given to the latter feature. However, the following technical features and the appropriate combinations thereof are just examples to which the present invention is by no means limited. In addition, in the case where one technical feature recites a plurality of items, it is not essentially required that all of those items be simultaneously employed. That is, it is possible to select and employ only a portion (one, two, . . . , but not all) of those items.
(1) According to a first feature of the present invention, there is provided a method of processing a plurality of batches of object-part-image data representing a plurality of object-part images which are taken by at least one image-taking device from a plurality of parts of an object, respectively, and thereby obtaining at least one optical characteristic value of the object, the object-part images imaging the parts of the object such that at least one first object-part image images at least one first part and at least one second object-part image images at least one second part adjacent to the at least one first part in the object and includes at least one overlapping portion imaging a portion of the at least one first part, each of the plurality of batches of object-part-image data comprising a plurality of optical characteristic values respectively associated with a plurality of physical positions, and thereby defining a corresponding one of a plurality of physical screens, the method comprising the steps of designating at least one virtual position on a virtual screen corresponding to the parts of the object, modifying, based on predetermined modifying data, the at least one virtual position on the virtual screen, and thereby determining at least one physical position corresponding to the at least one virtual position, on one of the physical screens, and obtaining at least one optical characteristic value associated with the at least one physical position on the one physical screen, as at least one optical characteristic value associated with the at least one virtual position on the virtual screen and as the at least one optical characteristic value of the object. At least one first part of the object may belong to a first column of a matrix of parts of the object, and at least one second part of the object may belong to a second column of the matrix that is adjacent to the first column in the matrix.
In the present image processing method, a plurality of object-part images are taken from a plurality of parts of an object, and a condition of the object as a whole may be obtained based on a plurality of batches of object-part images representing the taken object-part images, and the modifying data. A virtual position, designated on a virtual screen, where an optical characteristic value of the object is to be obtained, is modified to a physical position corresponding to the virtual position, on an appropriate one of a plurality of physical screens. Even if each of the physical screens may have a distortion and/or there may be a relative-positional error between the object-part images, the modifying data
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