Image analysis – Image transformation or preprocessing – Combining image portions
Reexamination Certificate
1998-09-30
2002-07-23
Boudreau, Leo (Department: 2621)
Image analysis
Image transformation or preprocessing
Combining image portions
C382S294000, C382S293000, C382S287000, C345S630000, C345S629000, C348S606000, C348S584000, C358S540000, C358S450000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06424752
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image synthesis apparatus and an image synthesis method for synthesizing a plurality of images, obtained by an electronic camera, that have at least some overlapping segments.
2. Related Background Art
Conventionally, a well known image synthesis apparatus of this type generates a panoramic image by synthesizing a plurality of images that partially overlap each other.
FIG. 1
is a diagram illustrating a plurality of images that are partially overlapped. Some areas of images
301
,
302
and
303
are overlapped.
FIG. 2
is a diagram showing synthesis processing for the images in FIG.
1
. An image
401
is obtained by synthesizing images
301
and
302
.
Conventionally, to provide a panoramic image, a synthesized image is generated as is shown in
FIG. 2
, and the succeeding image is sequentially added to this image to perform image synthesizing. Therefore, to synthesize the synthesized image
401
and image
303
, an overlapping area
401
a
in the synthesized image
401
, for which rotation or a magnification rate is converted, is aligned with an overlapping area
303
a
in image
303
.
However, since compared with an original image, deterioration of a synthesized image for which conversion, such as rotation, has been performed occurs because of changes in the shape of an object or of the transformation of coordinates, and a positioning error may occur that affects the alignment of the image with the next image and prevents a desired panoramic image from being generated.
Since this problem becomes more significant as the number of images to be synthesized is increased, only a very limited number of images can be synthesized when the conventional method is used.
In addition, since synthesized image data must continue to be stored in a memory so that synthesized images can be sequentially generated, a large memory capacity is required.
There is one well known conventional image synthesis method for synthesizing a plurality of images that are obtained by photographing segments of one part of a subject and then generating a panoramic or elaborate image, whereby when synthesizing the images rotation, correction of magnification rates and coordinate translation are performed for each of the images, and the joints of adjacent images are matched.
This image synthesis method will be specifically described while referring to
FIGS. 3
to
7
.
FIGS. 3
to
7
are diagrams for explaining the image synthesis processing performed when using the conventional image synthesis method.
As is shown in
FIG. 3
, to synthesize three images A, B and C, first, image A and image B are synthesized to obtain a synthesized image Sa, which is then synthesized with image C to obtain a synthesized image Sb, the final result of the synthesis of images A, B and C. In other words, images A, B and C are connected one by one in order to obtain a single synthesized image.
Furthermore, to synthesize images A and B, first, as is shown in
FIG. 4
, images A, B and C are displayed in the arranged order. Then, as is shown in
FIG. 5
, images A and B are synthesized and the synthesized image Sa is displayed. The overlapping portions of images A and B are so displayed that the portions of the two images at the overlap can be identified. As is shown in
FIG. 6
, image C is thereafter synthesized with the obtained image Sa and the synthesized image Sb is displayed. Similarly, the portions of images B and C that overlap are so displayed that the two images at the overlapping portion are separately discernible.
And in addition, when as is shown in
FIG. 7
images A, B and C overlap each other, an overlapping portion
2201
of the three images is so displayed that again the portions of images A, B and C that overlap can be separately discerned.
According to the above conventional method, however, since images are synthesized in order when repeating the process employed for linking the images, a synthesized image obtained during at each processing step must be stored in memory, and thus, until such time as a final synthesized image is acquired, a large memory capacity is required.
In addition, when the synthesis result (synthesized image Sa) obtained for images A and B does not provide a satisfactory image when synthesization of the three images has finally been completed synthesized (synthesized image Sb), the synthesis process for images A and B must be repeated. And then, since the newly obtained synthesized image will differ from the previously obtained synthesized image Sa, image C must be synthesized with the newly synthesized image Sa. Thus, a great amount of labor is required when the processing is repeated to obtain a desired synthesized image.
Furthermore, as is described above, when images A, B and C overlap each other, the overlapping portion
2201
of the three images is so displayed that the portions of images A, B and C at the overlap are separately discernible. Therefore, it is hard to accurately evaluate a portion at which three or more images overlap, and it is difficult to determine whether a desired synthesis result can be obtained.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is, therefore, one objective of the present invention to provide an image synthesis apparatus and an image synthesis method for resolving the above described problems.
It is another objective of the present invention to provide an image synthesis apparatus and an image synthesis method for precisely performing the positioning of images, even when there are many images to be synthesized.
To achieve the above objectives, according to one aspect of the present invention, an image synthesis apparatus, for synthesizing a plurality of images in order to generate a synthesized image, comprises:
a storage unit for selecting from a plurality of images, as an image synthesis unit, two or more images, and for storing image information for the selected images;
a coordinate transformation parameter generation unit for employing the image information stored in the storage unit to generate coordinate transformation parameters that are used to establish a positional relationship for the selected images before the selected images are synthesized to obtain a single image;
an image synthesis information generation unit for changing the coordinate transformation parameters, which are generated by the coordinate transformation parameter generation unit, by using as a reference the position of an arbitrary image of the plurality of images, and for furnishing the resultant coordinate transformation parameters as image synthesis information; and
an image synthesis processing unit for synthesizing the plurality of images in accordance with the image synthesis information generated by the image synthesis information generation unit.
It is an additional objective of the present invention to provide an image synthesis apparatus and an image synthesis method for determining the characteristic of a synthesized image by employing as a reference the characteristic of an arbitrary image selected from a plurality of images to be synthesized.
To achieve this additional objective, according to another aspect of the present invention, an image synthesis apparatus, for synthesizing a plurality of images to generate a synthesized image, comprises:
a storage unit for selecting from a plurality of images, as an image synthesis unit, two or more images and for storing image information for the selected images;
an adjustment information generation unit for employing the image information stored in the storage unit to adjust the characteristics of the selected images before synthesizing the selected images and obtaining a single image;
an image synthesis information generation unit for changing the adjustment information, which is generated by the adjustment information generation unit, by using as a reference the characteristic of an arbitrary image selected from the plurality of images, and for providing the resultant adjustment information as image synthesis information; and
an image synthesis pr
Hatori Kenji
Katayama Tatsushi
Takiguchi Hideo
Yano Kotaro
Boudreau Leo
Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
Fitzpatrick ,Cella, Harper & Scinto
Kassa Yosef
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