JPS61198872A - Picture input device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To obtain a picture information input device with low cost and to attain partial read of a picture at a high speed with simple constitution by using a synchronous interface for high speed. CONSTITUTION:The data is transferred in a speed of picture reading by an image pickup device by using an interface circuit 16 comprising the high speed synchronous interface, a line buffer memory 30, a packing memory 32, and a memory control circuit 34 are omitted and a picture data is outputted sequentially to the interface circuit 16 synchronously with a picture element clock. Based on a setting output from a read range setting circuit 14, a control signal (line enable signal LE, a page enable signal PE) representing the read range of an original is outputted by a function. A main scanning counter 200 is a counter to count number of picture elements of main scanning lines and a subscanning counter 210 is a counter to count number of main scanning lines, that is, number of picture elements in the subscanning direction.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Technical Field The present invention relates to an image information input device that can publicly read an image drawn on a manuscript, and in particular to a facsimile,
The present invention relates to an image information input device suitable for use as an input section of various processing systems such as a word processor, a motherboard computer, a digital copying machine, and an image file system.

BACKGROUND ART Conventionally, the following two methods have been mainly adopted as an input device having a function of partially reading an image by specifying an area. In other words, one is to provide a data packing circuit that reorganizes the read image data into data of only the necessary parts, and 7'? in this circuit. This method outputs the necessary portion of data from the working memory to the outside via an asynchronous interface such as Takeo R8232C or Centronics Halal interface. The other method is to temporarily store all the image read data in a page memory, and sequentially read out only the read data of a designated area from the page memory.

The conventional device described above requires an additional circuit to realize the partial reading function (1), which makes the device configuration complicated.

In addition, when outputting multi-value (halftone) image data, 1
In order to express halftones by allocating a large number of focus points such as 16 bits or 64 bits to pixels, conventional devices using the above method require larger memory capacity, which makes it impossible to avoid increasing the cost of the device. The problem was that there was no.

Purpose The present invention aims to eliminate the drawbacks of the prior art and provide an image information input device that can partially read an image drawn on a document with a simple configuration. .

Structure In order to achieve the above object, the present invention includes an imaging means for imaging a document image to form raster scanning image data, and an output for driving the imaging means, receiving image data from the imaging means, and outputting it together with a synchronization signal. The image information input device has a setting means for setting a desired first range in the main scanning direction and a desired second range in the sub-scanning direction of the document image, The control means responds to the setting means and controls the first output in accordance with the output of the image data.
and a signal indicating the second range.

The configuration of the present invention will be described below based on examples. First, prior to describing the embodiment, an example of the configuration of a conventional device will be described with reference to FIG. As shown in the figure, the conventional image information input device has a one-dimensional image information input device arranged in a straight line in a direction (main scanning direction) H perpendicular to the moving direction (sub-scanning direction) An imaging device 10 configured with a CCD imaging device or the like, a signal processing circuit 12 that drives the imaging device 10 with a clock to form raster scan image data representing an original image, and a signal processing circuit 12 that generates image information necessary for an image drawn on the original. A reading range setting circuit 14 that sets a reading range, a line buffer memory 30 that stores several lines of image data sent from the signal processing circuit 12, and an image data stored in the line buffer 30 that corresponds to the reading range. Based on the setting output from the reading range setting circuit 14, the backing memory 32 stores the necessary data.
A memory control circuit 34 receives the image data sent from the -'4 clocking memory 32 and sequentially sends this data to the system connected to the input device connected to the signal line 38. An interface circuit 36 consisting of an asynchronous interface such as a parallel interface or an R8232C serial interface, a step motor 18 that feeds the document in the sub-scanning direction, and a reading range setting circuit 14
The sub-scanning control circuit 20 drives and controls the step motor 18 based on the setting output from the sub-scanning control circuit 20.

In the above configuration, the image drawn on the document transferred by the step motor 18 is captured by the imaging device 1°,
The image signal is taken into the signal processing circuit 12, which performs digital arithmetic processing to create image data.

Furthermore, this image data is stored and accumulated in the line buffer memory 30, and necessary data is transferred from the line buffer memory 30 to the backing memory 32 in response to control signals from the memory control circuit 34. and backing memory 3
The image data sent from 2 to the interface circuit 3
6, the data is sequentially sent to the connected system.

An image information input device with such a configuration requires a line buffer memory, a backing memory, a memory control circuit, etc., and the control of each memory is complicated.
These additional circuits account for a considerable proportion of the cost of the input device, making it difficult to reduce the cost.

On the other hand, as mentioned above, there is a method in which the image information input device has a storage memory and reads out the necessary data, and 1-! There is also an input device that sends all of the data for a period of time to a connected system, and partially reads the data at the connected system.

However, the former method significantly increases the cost of the input device, and the latter method imposes a large burden on the connected system, which limits the types of systems that can be used by connecting such an input device.

Next, the configuration of an embodiment of the image information input device according to the present invention is shown in FIG. The main difference in configuration between this embodiment and the conventional device shown in FIG. 4 is that the interface circuit 36 is composed of a high-speed synchronous interface (for example, R8422) instead of the interface circuit 36 composed of an asynchronous interface. 16 is used.

As a result, data can be transferred at the speed of image reading by the imaging device 10, the line buffer memory 30, the nodding memory 32, and the memory control circuit 34 are omitted, and the image data can be transferred to the interface circuit 16 from pixel to pixel. A control signal (line enable signal LE) can be output sequentially in synchronization with a clock, and indicates the reading range of the original based on the setting output from the reading range setting circuit 14.
, page enable signal PE).

FIG. 2 shows an example of the configuration of the interface circuit 16 that generates the line enable signal LE and page enable signal PE indicating the reading range of the document. In the figure, a main scanning counter 200 is a counter that counts the number of pixels of a main scanning line, and a sub-scanning counter 210 is a counter that counts the number of pixels of a main scanning line.
That is, it is a counter that counts the number of pixels in the sub-scanning direction (original moving direction).

The counting output of the main scanning counter 200 is compared with the setting output indicating the main scanning start position (XS) and the main scanning end position (XE) outputted from the reading range setting circuit 14 by yc resolution comparators 202 and 204. . By inputting these comparison outputs to the set terminal S and reset terminal R of the SR flip-flop 206, a line enable signal LE indicating the reading range of the original in the main scanning direction is obtained from the output terminal Q of the flip-flop f206.

Similarly, the counting output of the sub-scanning counter 210 is the sub-scanning start position (ys) and the sub-scanning end position (yg) which are output from the reading range setting circuit 14 by the converters 212 and 214.
is compared with the configuration output that indicates. A page enable signal PE indicating the reading range of the original in the sub-scanning direction is obtained from the terminal Q of the SR flip-flop 216 to which these comparison outputs are input.

The operation of each part of the circuit shown in FIG. 1 will be explained with reference to the timing chart shown in FIG.

First, when the read enable signal RE (Fig. 3 (to)) is input to the interface circuit 16 from the connected system to which the personal power device is connected by the signal line 4o,
The interface circuit 16 supplies a control signal to the sub-scanning control circuit 20 to drive the step motor 18. As a result, the original 50 is transferred in the sub-scanning direction V, and the image capturing device 10
The image information of the document 50 scanned by is image data VTDEO.
The signals are sequentially output to the signal line 4° together with the clock CLK. When the document 50 reaches the sub-scanning start position (ys), the count value of the sub-scanning counter 210 matches the set value YS, and as a result, the 7 rip 70 lub 216 is selected and the page enable signal PE rises.

In the main scanning of each scanning line, the line enable signals I and E become significant only during the period tj corresponding to the set reading range in the main scanning direction H out of the output period ti of image data of one scanning line (raster). Become.

That is, when the main scanning of the document 50 reaches the start position XS, the count value of the main scanning counter 200 matches the set value XS, and thereby the flip-flop 206 is set.
Line enable signal LE rises. Similarly, when the end position XE is reached, the count value of the main scanning counter 200 matches the set value XE, which causes the flip-flop 2
06 is reset, and the line enable signal LE falls.

In this way, the image information of the original 50 is sequentially scanned, and when the sub-scanning reaches the end position YIIE, the sub-scanning counter 210
The count value matches the set value YE, thereby resetting the flip 70 knob 206 and causing the line enable signal LE to fall.

In this way, the line enable signal LE and the page enable signal PE are outputted from the interface circuit 16 to the system to which the personal power device is connected (FIGS. 3(-, CB), (C)).

By transmitting the image data reading range to the connected system using the line enable signal LE and page enable signal PE, the connected system can enable the input buffer memory for capturing image data. By connecting so that the line enable signal LE is input to the terminal, only the data within the partial reading area 100 set by the input device can be captured by the connected system.

In this way, in this embodiment, a synchronous interface suitable for high speed is used to output image data VIDEO at high speed and sequentially together with the pixel clock CLK, and the reading range of the image data is specified by the line enable signal LF. With this configuration, an image information input device having a simple configuration and a high-speed partial reading function can be obtained.

In addition, the figures drawn on the manuscript shown in Figure 5 (N) are also shown in Figure 5 (B).
), the line enable signal LE is output from the reading range setting circuit 14 to the comparators 202 and 204 so as to shift the timing for each main scanning line as shown in FIG. This can be achieved by changing the setting data.

Similarly, operations such as image reduction can be easily realized by controlling the line enable signal LE.

Furthermore, when the image information input device according to this embodiment is connected to a data compression device, it operates without problems.

In general, the time required for data compression differs between parts of a document with a large amount of information and parts with a small amount of information, so the time interval for reading data into the data compression device takes an irregular value within one page. In this embodiment, when the data compression device to which the input device is connected cannot accept data due to overflow, the read enable signal RE from the compression device is caused to fall, so that the input device side can handle this. It is sufficient to detect this and stop the operation of the input device.

In addition, in the image information input device according to the present embodiment, designation of the reading range of image data and designation of modes such as various image transformations may be performed by, for example, providing a signal line for mode setting in the interface circuit 16, or Alternatively, the settings may be made using the operation panel of the input device.

Furthermore, the image data output from the interface circuit 16 may be transmitted as binary or binary multivalue data through a single transmission line, or image data representing halftones may be transmitted in parallel through multiple transmission lines. Transmit in multi-pit format,
R,G.

The data may be transmitted for each B color.

Effects As explained above, in the present invention, by using a high-speed synchronous interface, a memory such as a sill line buffer memory and a memory control circuit are not required, and furthermore, the image data reading range can be controlled by using the interface circuit. Since the image information can be designated by a signal, it is possible to realize a low-cost image information input device that has a simple configuration, can perform partial image reading at high speed, and is inexpensive.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an embodiment of an image information input device according to the present invention; FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration example of a portion of the interface circuit in FIG. 1 related to the present invention; The figure is a timing chart for explaining the operation of the image information input device shown in FIG. 1, FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a configuration example of a conventional image information input device, and FIG. 5 is a figure drawn on a manuscript. FIG. 6 is a waveform diagram showing the timing of the line enable signal in each main scanning line during the image modification operation. Explanation of symbols of main parts 10...Imaging device 12...Signal processing circuit 14...Reading range setting circuit 16...Interface circuit 200...Main scanning counter 202, 204, 212, 214... Con/Mother Rator 206.216...SR Frigg Flock! 210...
・Sub-scanning counter Figure 2

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] An imaging device that captures an original image to form raster scanning image data; and an output device that drives the imaging device, receives the image data from the imaging device, and outputs the image data along with a synchronization signal. An image information input device comprising: a desired first range of the document image in the main scanning direction;
and a setting means for setting a desired second range in the sub-scanning direction, and the control means responds to the setting means and generates signals indicating the first and second ranges in accordance with the output of the image data. An image information input device characterized by outputting.