Pulse or digital communications – Bandwidth reduction or expansion – Television or motion video signal
Reexamination Certificate
1998-07-17
2002-04-23
Kelley, Chris (Department: 2613)
Pulse or digital communications
Bandwidth reduction or expansion
Television or motion video signal
Reexamination Certificate
active
06377626
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This application claims the priority of Japanese Patent Application No. H9-226959 filed on Jul. 18, 1997, which is incorporated herein by reference.
The present invention relates to a motion data preparation system (so-called motion capture system) for detecting a motion locus of a color marker formed on a subject and preparing motion data of the subject based on the detection information.
In recent years, in the field of the movies using animation and the virtual reality, or the movies using computer graphics (CG), techniques for realizing more real motions of animation by inputting actual man's motion data to synthesized animation characters have been becoming widespread. In this case, the so-called motion capture system in which motions performed by a man equipped with many sensors from head to foot are captured by camera and motion data are prepared by analyzing the captured motions of the sensors on a dynamic image is used. Applying such data to characters prepared by CG or the like makes it possible to represent, with real motions, even a scene that, for example, an actually non-existing monster and men grapple with each other.
Data input in such a motion capture system is implemented by, for example, a process of three-dimensionally measuring spatial positions and twist directions with a mounted magnetic sensor. More specifically, while a receivers (sensor) containing an orthogonal coil is attached to a moving body, an AC current is passed through an orthogonal coil set on the transmitter, where in a magnetic field thereby generated, the body is put into motion. Then, an induced current occurs to the receiver, so that data such as positions and angles of two-dimensional or three-dimensional coordinates by measuring the induced current.
Further, as another method, there is a technique in which a reflecting type target (marker) mounted to a moving body, the moving body is photographed by a plurality of cameras so that the motions of the marker are captured as an image. This technique may be exercised in a method that positional coordinates on the screen are obtained by using as the marker a light-emitting diode that blinks in synchronization with an image signal, or in another method that with the use of a marker that emits light by a special illumination, positional coordinates of the light-emitting body are obtained by image analysis. However, the former method has problems that the motion of the body is limited by the signal cable connecting to the light-emitting diode or that it is difficult to apply this method to small, lightweight bodies. The latter method, on the other hand, is unable to discriminate a plurality of markers from one another, so that additional input operations to a computer would be required, as a disadvantage.
Thus, in order to solve these and other problems, there has been proposed a motion capture system having a constitution that with individual targets attached to a body in the form of color marks, these targets are shot by a video camera while information signals as to color and configuration of the markers are extracted to a video board, where for example centroidal positions are determined based on the extracted information signals, thus allowing two-dimensional or three-dimensional motions of the measurement-object site to be known (see, for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publications H4-93704 and H6-50983).
For image analysis using computers an analysis method using the three elements of red (R), green (G) and blue (B) that are the three primary colors, where their intensities are utilized, is in common use. This method, however, has a difficulty in analysis because the color is represented in three-dimensional space, as well as a problem that errors in data extraction accuracy may occur under influences of changes in illumination because luminance is included as a factor. Further, in a motion capture system that handles color images, because the amount of information on color image data is incommensurably larger than that of gray scale images, memory of quite high capacity and CPU of high speed would be required so that the system would result in increased scale and higher price. Thus, it problematic to introduce this motion capture system. In particular, in an attempt to introduce a monitoring system that uses a plurality of monitor cameras for color images, the required amount of memory would be enormous so that the system's problems of complexity and high price would be more noticeable, resulting in a bottleneck for widespread use of the system.
An object of the present invention is therefore to provide a motion data preparation system which is enabled, for recognition of color markers provided on a subject body by shooting the color markers with color cameras, to detect the color markers without being affected by the surrounding brightness and thereby acquire stable motion data, and which can execute high-speed, accurate processing by reducing the amount of information on color image data.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In order to achieve the above object, in a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a motion data preparation system comprising:
one or a plurality of color cameras for shooting motions of a subject in a state that color markers are attached to the subject or that part of the subject is determined as a color marker;
color-integrated image data generating means for, through a decoding process of color image signals based on image outputs from the color cameras, integrating and consolidating color information included in each of the image signals into a specific number of color groups, and thereby generating image data (hereinafter, referred to as color-integrated image data) having data pieces smaller in number than the color image signals;
marker specified-color extracting means for extracting data of pixels having a color previously specified as a color of the color marker (hereinafter, referred to as marker specified color) with respect to the generated color-integrated image data; and
marker-position-data calculating and outputting means for calculating a color marker position of the shot subject based on the extracted marker specified-color pixel data and outputting, as motion data of the subject, marker position data obtained as a result of the calculation.
With this systems image information about color markers on the subject can be dramatically reduced in amount by integrating and consolidating enormous color information of, for example, RGB image signals into a specified number of color groups. Thus, the whole system can be simplified in construction.
The above system may comprise information separating means for, through a process of decoding the color image signal, separating the color image signal into luminance information, which is information on luminance, and chromatic information, which is information on chromatic components. In this cage, the color-integrated image data generating means may be so arranged as to generate the color-integrated image data by integrating and consolidating mainly the separated (or separated and corrected) chromatic information into a specified number of color groups. As a result, the system construction less affected by variations in quantity of light can be realized in addition to the aforementioned simplified system construction.
Also, the system may further comprise image signal digital converting means for converting the color image signal into digital form, and image data generating means for generating image data of the subject by fetching the digitally converted color image signal in specified time intervals. In this case, the information separating means separates chromatic information of pixels of the image data into luminance information comprising a single component, and chromatic information comprising two components of a first chromatic component and a second chromatic component, and the color-integrated image data generating means comprises a color-integration look-up table memory which has stored a correspo
Artwings Co., Ltd.
Kelley Chris
Snider Ronald R.
Snider & Associates
Vo Tung
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