JPH05268509A - Remote controller for television camera - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To attain simultaneous start and simultaneous end of each function such as panning and tilt with simple time setting operation depending on a relation with a shortest moving time in the case of movement of the pickup position of the camera from a current position to an object position. CONSTITUTION:The controller is provided with drive means 6-9 driving each function of a television camera 1, a shot storage means 12 storing position information of each function at a specific pickup position, a shortest time calculation means 13 calculating a shortest time required for simultaneous finish of each function from a current position to an object position, a moving time setting means 14 setting a moving time from a current position to an object position, a display means 15 displaying a time including the relation of quantity between a setting value of the moving time and the shortest time, and a speed arithmetic means 16 operating the moving speed so that each function is finished simultaneously in the moving time.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a remote control device for a television camera, in which each function such as pan and tilt in the television camera is operated by remote control.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in order to obtain weather information, images from above, etc., TV cameras supported by pan heads are installed at various places such as outdoors and on the ceiling, and the shooting position by this TV camera is The pan drive means provided on the platform and the pan and tilt operations by the tilt drive means, and the zoom and focus operations of the TV camera are provided to be remotely controllable.
There is known a remote control device for a television camera which is operated by an operator from a remote position.

Further, when performing remote control of the television camera, the operating states of respective functions such as pan, tilt, zoom, and focus at a specific photographing position (shot) are set and stored in advance, and from the current photographing position. For example, there is a technology that controls the movement of each function to end at the same time when automatically changing to the memory shooting position.
It is known as seen in Japanese Patent Publication No. 58-6163.

In the above prior art, when changing from an arbitrary shooting position to a preset stored shooting position, the operator sets a moving time in order to start and stop the movement of each function at the same time. A driving signal is output to each driving means at a moving speed calculated in accordance with the instructed moving time to perform control. At that time, the movement is not always completed at the instructed time, and for a function having a large movement amount such as pan or tilt, the movement may not be completed within the instructed time even at the maximum movement speed, at this time, In the above prior art example, the designated time is automatically increased and updated and corrected so that the movement of each function ends at the same time.

[0005]

However, as described above, the moving speed of each function at the time of changing the photographing position is automatically determined by the operator setting the transition time and comparing it with the shortest possible transition time. The control that is performed by correction has the following problems.

(1) When the instruction time for the amount of movement from the current position to the registered position is short, the movement of each function does not end at the same time, so the operator is not notified and the transition time is changed contrary to his intention. It will be done and it will not be the desired time.

(2) Originally, the request regarding the movement of the photographing position is as follows. Firstly, when it is desired to complete the shift in the shortest possible time by requiring only the image at the photographing position where the shift is completed. In some cases, it is necessary to take a moving image and want to complete the moving at an appropriate speed. In the former case, the instruction is to minimize the moving time, but the shortest moving time is unknown. However, it may not be possible to easily set it, or it may reach the maximum speed depending on the amount of movement and cause noise problems.In addition, even in the latter time setting, the relationship with the shortest movement time is unknown and the optimum speed is obtained. Similarly, the operation of instructing the moving time becomes complicated.

In view of the above circumstances, the present invention has an object to provide a remote control device for a television camera in which the transition time can be set by a simple instruction operation in relation to the shortest movement time when the photographing position is moved. It is what

[0009]

In order to achieve the above object, a remote control device for a television camera according to the present invention has a zoom lens 3 on a pan 4 and a television camera 1 as shown in the basic configuration of FIG. The pan base 4 is provided with a pan drive means 6 for panning by the turning movement of the TV camera 1 and a tilt drive means 7 for tilting by vertical tilt, and a zoom is also provided. The lens 3 is provided with a zoom drive unit 8 for zooming and a focus drive unit 9 for focusing, and further, a drive control unit 11 outputs a control signal to the drive units 6 to 9 for each of these functions. The stop position and the drive speed are controlled.

On the other hand, a shot storage means 12 for storing the position information of each function at a specific photographing position is installed in advance, and the shortest time calculation for receiving the position information of the target position stored in this shot storage means 12 is performed. The means 13 calculates the shortest time required for each function to start and end at the same time from the moving amount and the maximum moving speed of each function in the transition from the current position to the target position.

Further, a transition time setting means 14 which is operated by an operator and sets a transition time from the current position to the target position is installed, and the current photographing position is determined based on the signals from the shot storage means 12 and the transition time setting means 14. The control amount by the drive control means 11 is set so that the operation speeds of the drive means 6-9 are the same when the movement ends of the drive means 6-9 when moving from the target position to the target position. is there.

That is, the signals from the shortest time calculating means 13 and the transition time setting means 14 are input to the display means 15, and this display means 15 includes the magnitude relationship between the set value by the transition time setting means 14 and the shortest time. Time display is performed, for example, the set value by the transition time setting means 14 is provided so as not to be set and displayed below the shortest time by the shortest time calculating means 13, and the set value by the transition time setting means 14 is the shortest time. If it is smaller, an error display (color-coded display) is performed to display the set time including the relationship between the two, and the transition time setting means 14 is based on this display.
The transition time is reset by.

The data of the transition time set by the transition time setting means 14 is output to the speed calculation means 16, and the speed calculation means 16 sets the transition time of each function so that the transition of each function ends at the same time. Set the moving speed by calculation. Then, the speed signal from the speed calculation means 16 and the target position information from the shot storage means 12 are output to the drive control means 11, which drives the pan, tilt, zoom, focus from the current position to the target position. In order to perform each of the above operations, the drive signals are output so that the operation of each of the driving means 6 to 9 is started at the same time, each of them is moved at a predetermined speed, and stopped at the target position at the same time.

The above functions are described in the above 4
Not limited to the kind, for example, a height function for moving the television camera up and down can be considered, and the function as a control target is increased or decreased as necessary.

[0015]

In the remote control device for a television camera as described above, the television camera can be remotely controlled to change the photographing position by operating the driving means of each function such as pan and tilt, and the image at the predetermined photographing position can be remotely controlled. In order to obtain, the position information of each function at the shooting position is registered in the shot storage means. Then, at the time of shifting from the current shooting position to the target position stored in the shot storage means, each function is simultaneously started from the moving amount from the current position to the target position and the maximum moving speed by the shortest time calculating means. The shortest time required to finish at the same time is calculated, and the shortest time and the set value by the transition time setting means are displayed on the display means including the magnitude relationship between the two, and the transition is performed while checking the relationship with the shortest time. Adjust the time set value, calculate the moving speed of each function based on the transition time so that the change ends at the same time when each function reaches the target position while moving the image at the desired speed, A signal based on each of the calculated moving speeds is output to each driving means to control the movement to the target position.

[0016]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 2 shows the overall configuration of the remote control device for the television camera of this embodiment.

The television camera 1 comprises a camera body 2 and a zoom lens 3, and the camera body 2 is supported by a pan 4 which can pan in the turning direction and tilt in the vertical tilting direction. The platform 4 is installed on a fixed portion by a tripod 5 or the like. The pan and tilt operations of the platform 4 are provided so that they can be driven by servo motors 42 and 43 (FIG. 3) described later. Similarly, zoom and focus operations in the zoom lens 3 of the television camera 1 are provided so as to be driven by servo motors 44 and 45 (FIG. 3) described later.

Then, those pan, tilt, zoom,
The focus operation is configured such that remote control can be performed based on an operation of the controller 10 by an operator.
The platform 4 of the TV camera 1 and the controller 10 may be connected by a communication means such as a cable 21 (analog signal), and a telephone line or the like may be used as the communication means.

Explaining the operation members of the controller 10, a focus knob 22, a zoom switch 23, and a joystick 24 are provided for performing normal zoom, focus, pan, and tilt operations of the television camera 1. The focus knob 22 is a rotary operation member, and rotation of the focus knob 22 operates the rotary encoder 39 (FIG. 3) to bring the focus knob 22 into close proximity.
It is used to adjust the far focus. Further, the zoom switch 23 is a seesaw type, and the swing thereof is used to operate the potentiometer 35 (FIG. 3) to perform wide-angle / telephoto zoom adjustment. The joystick 24 is a rod-shaped operation member that can be tilted left and right and up and down. The joystick 24 tilts left and right to operate the pan potentiometer 36 (FIG. 3) to adjust left and right pans, and tilts up and down to tilt. The potentiometer 37 (Fig. 3) for operation is operated to adjust the tilt up and down. The zoom switch 23
And joystick 24 potentiometers 35 to 37
Is provided in a structure that returns to the neutral position when the operation of the operation member is released.

A large number of shot switches 25 and writing memo switches 26 are arranged above the controller 10. The shot switch 25 and the memo switch 26 are provided as an on / off push button type. The shot switch 25 is turned on when the memo switch 26 is pressed once and is in the writing mode,
The position information of the pan, tilt, zoom, and focus at that time, that is, the data of the shooting position is recorded at a predetermined address, and when it is turned on in the write mode, the position information recorded at the predetermined address is not recorded. Is read out, and functions as the above-mentioned shot storage means 12.

Further, a time adjusting knob 27 is installed, and the time adjusting knob 27 is configured as a rotary encoder,
The setting and adjustment of the moving time for moving from the current position to the target shooting position is performed, and the setting contents are fetched when the shot switch 25 is turned on in the non-writing mode. In addition, the controller 10 includes a time display unit 28
Are arranged. The time display unit 28 displays the transition time from the current position to the target position,
The shortest transition time is displayed when the shot switch 25 is operated, and the final transition time is set by changing the time display with the time adjustment knob 27. Further, the execution switch 29 is provided, and is operated when the movement to the target position is started at the time displayed on the time display unit 28.

Next, FIG. 3 shows a schematic configuration of the controller. The controller 10 has a built-in CPU 30 for arithmetic processing, a RAM 31 (battery backup), and a ROM.
32 is connected by the data bus 33, and the signals (voltage) of the potentiometers 35 to 37 operated by the zoom switch 23 and the joystick 24 are input through the A / D converter 34, and similarly, the I / O port The signal of the rotary encoder 39 operated by the focus knob 22, the signal of the shot switch 25, the memo switch 26, and the signal of the rotary encoder 40 operated by the time adjustment knob 27 are input via 38, and the time display section 28 ( LED or LC
D) is connected.

Further, the CPU 30 has a D / A converter 41.
A control signal, specifically, a position signal is output to the pan drive unit 6 and the tilt drive unit 7 of the platform 4, and the zoom drive unit 8 and the focus drive unit 9 of the zoom lens 3 via the. Servo motors 42 to 45 are installed in the respective driving means 6 to 9 to operate respective driving members to perform pan, tilt, zoom and focus operations, and their respective operating positions are for position detection. Detected by potentiometers 46-49. Then, the position command signal from the D / A converter 41 and the position detection signals from the position detection potentiometers 46 to 49 are input to the position servo amplifiers 51 to 54, and the servo motors 42 to 45 are arranged so that they match each other. Is configured to perform the drive control of.

The remote control of the photographing position of the television camera 1 by the arithmetic processing of the CPU 30 will be described with reference to the flowcharts of FIGS. 4 and 5. In FIG. 4, after the control starts when the power is turned on, initialization is performed in step S1 and the on / off state of the memo switch 26 is read (S2). Then, in step S3, it is determined whether or not the memo switch 26 is turned on. If the determination is NO, the process proceeds to step S5 as it is, while if the determination is YES and the memo switch 26 is turned on. After setting the writing mode in step S4, the process proceeds to step S5.

In step S5, the on / off state of the shot switch 25 is read, and in step S6 it is determined whether or not the shot switch 25 has been turned on. When the shot switch 25 is in the OFF state and NO is determined, the operation states of the joystick 24, the focus knob 22, and the zoom switch 23 are fetched from the signals of the potentiometers 35 to 37 and the rotary encoder 39 in step S7, and the operation amounts thereof are changed. The position data of the function is converted and added to the current position (S8), and the updated current position signal is output to the position servo amplifiers 51 to 54 of the driving means 6 to 9 via the D / A converter 41 (S).
9) If the position detection signals from the position detection potentiometers 46 to 49 are deviated, the servo motors 42 to 45 are driven so as to match the position of the input signal, and the pan and tilt drive is performed by operating the joystick 24. , And focus and zoom driving by operating the focus knob 22 and the zoom switch 23 are performed according to the respective manual operation amounts.

On the other hand, if the determination in step S6 is YES and one of the shot switches 25 is turned on, whether or not the writing mode is set in step S10, that is, whether the memo switch 26 is turned on. If it is in the writing mode, the current position of the pan, tilt, zoom and focus (position detection potentiometer) is set to the address of the memory corresponding to the number of the shot switch 25 turned on in step S11.
After writing the position information input to the D / A converter 41 based on the signals of 46 to 49, the write mode is released (S12).

Subsequently, if the determination in step S10 is NO and only the shot switch 25 is turned on without being in the write mode, the process proceeds to step S13 in FIG. 5 and corresponds to the number of the shot switch 25 which is turned on. Memory (R
Pan, tilt written in the address of AM31),
Read the information of the desired position of zoom and focus Am
At the same time, the information of the current position of each function is fetched and substituted into An in step S14. Then, the respective movement amount obtained by subtracting the current position An from the target position Am of each function is the maximum transition speed of each function.
The minimum movement time tp to tf required for each transition is calculated by dividing by Vp to Vf (S15), and the minimum movement time tp to tf is compared with each other in step S16 to extract the longest movement time. , Set this longest moving time to the shortest moving time to when starting and stopping each function at the same time.

Then, in step S17, the moving time t is displayed on the time display section 28. In the first stage, the shortest moving time to is displayed. Then, in step S18, it is determined whether the shift may be executed by the setting of the moving time displayed on the time display unit 28, that is, whether the execution switch 29 has been turned on. Proceeds to step S21. On the other hand, in the case of adjusting to another movement time instead of the movement in the shortest movement time to, it is possible to change the time of the time display unit 28 by operating the time adjustment knob 27 in step S19. , Set a new travel time. In step S20, it is determined whether or not the time t set by the time adjustment knob 27 is equal to or more than the shortest moving time to, and if YES, the process returns to step S17 to display the changed moving time t. Although it is displayed on 28, the setting display for the time shorter than the shortest movement time to is invalid according to the NO judgment.

In the case of executing the movement time t set as described above, first, in step S21, the movement amount Am-An of each function is divided by the movement time t to calculate each unit time movement amount. And their current position An
To the new current position An. Then, in step S22, the unit time t is synchronized with the update timer.
= 1 (for example, several msec to several tens msec), and when the unit time has elapsed, the process proceeds to step S23 to output the updated current position signal to the D / A converter 41, and each drive means 6 based on this signal. The position signals are input to the position servo amplifiers 51 to 54 of 9 to 9 to drive the servo motors 42 to 45 by comparison with the position detection signals. The moving time t is subtracted in step S24, and the moving time t is calculated in step S25. Is determined to be 0, and the above step S21 is performed until the time is up.
The processing from S24 to S24 is repeated to update the current position to drive the servomotors 42 to 45 so that the servomotors 42 to 45 are simultaneously stopped at the photographing positions corresponding to the shot switch 25 registered in advance.

According to the above-described embodiment, when moving the image from the current position to the target position, first, when the operator operates the shot switch 25 corresponding to the target position, the current position is changed with respect to the target position. The shortest movement time required for each function to start and stop at the same time from the position is displayed on the time display unit 28, and the actual movement time can be set by the time adjustment knob 27 only to a value larger than this shortest movement time. That is, the setting of a value smaller than the shortest movement time is prevented, and each function ends the movement at the same time. Further, in the above-mentioned embodiment, since the execution switch 29 is separately provided, it is possible to avoid the occurrence of an erroneous operation, as compared with the case where the movement is started by the operation of the shot switch 25.

In the above embodiment, the time display section
The display setting of the travel time shorter than the shortest travel time is prevented in 28 to avoid the setting to the travel time shorter than the shortest travel time, but this is the time shorter than the shortest travel time by the time adjustment knob 27. To enable setting display to
If this set value is smaller than the shortest moving time, an error display, a color-coded display, or the like may be used to show the result of the comparison of the two. In that case, the movement of the function having the largest movement amount is not completed within the set time in the movement in the movement time shorter than the shortest movement time, and the function is delayed to perform the remaining movement.

[0032]

According to the present invention as described above, the shortest time required for simultaneously starting and ending simultaneously each function from the current position to the target position is calculated by the shortest time calculating means, and the transition time is calculated. By providing the transition time setting means for adjusting and setting and displaying the time including the magnitude relation between the set value of the transition time and the shortest time on the display means, the transition speed is changed against the intention of the operator. The travel time can be set while checking the relationship with the shortest travel time, and the travel time can be set easily and the desired speed can be set, the number of rehearsals can be reduced and the operability can be improved. Is something that can be done.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a basic configuration diagram for clearly showing the configuration of a remote control device for a television camera of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an overall configuration diagram of a remote control device for a television camera showing a specific example.

FIG. 3 is a circuit diagram showing a schematic configuration of a controller.

FIG. 4 and FIG. 5 are flowcharts of main parts for explaining processing of the controller.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 TV camera 3 zoom lens 4 pan head 6 pan drive means 7 tilt drive means 8 zoom drive means 9 focus drive means 10 controller 11 drive control means 12 shot storage means 13 minimum time calculation means 14 transition time setting means 15 display means 16 speed Calculation means 25 Shot switch 27 Time adjustment knob 28 Time display

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A shot storage means for preliminarily storing position information of each function at a specific shooting position is provided with a separate drive means for driving each function such as pan and tilt of a television camera. A remote control device for a television camera, wherein the drive control means controls the operation of each of the drive means so that the functions are simultaneously started from the current shooting position to the target position recorded in the storage means and simultaneously ended. Receiving the position information of the target position stored in the shot storage means, the minimum amount of time required for each function to start and end at the same time from the moving amount and the maximum moving speed of each function in the transition from the current position to the target position. The shortest time calculation means to calculate and the transition time setting hand to set the transition time from the current position to the target position When receives the signal of the transition time setting means and the shortest time calculation means,
Display means for displaying a time including the magnitude relation between the set value by the transition time setting means and the shortest time, and a transition time signal by the transition time setting means, so that the transition of each function is completed at the same time. And a speed calculation means for calculating and setting the moving speed of each function, and the speed signal by the speed calculation means and the target position information by the shot storage means are input to the drive control means, and the drive control means A remote control device for a television camera, which outputs a control signal for moving the driving means of the function at each speed.