EP0661674A1 - Verfahren und Gerät, mittels eines digitalen Halbtonbildes zum Verkaufszeitpunkt eine Bestätigung vorzunehmen - Google Patents

Verfahren und Gerät, mittels eines digitalen Halbtonbildes zum Verkaufszeitpunkt eine Bestätigung vorzunehmen Download PDF

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Publication number
EP0661674A1
EP0661674A1 EP94203645A EP94203645A EP0661674A1 EP 0661674 A1 EP0661674 A1 EP 0661674A1 EP 94203645 A EP94203645 A EP 94203645A EP 94203645 A EP94203645 A EP 94203645A EP 0661674 A1 EP0661674 A1 EP 0661674A1
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EP
European Patent Office
Prior art keywords
image
signals
printer
processing unit
display
Prior art date
Legal status (The legal status is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the status listed.)
Withdrawn
Application number
EP94203645A
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English (en)
French (fr)
Inventor
Lawrence A. C/O Eastman Kodak Company Ray
Richard N. C/O Eastman Kodak Company Ellson
Current Assignee (The listed assignees may be inaccurate. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of the list.)
Eastman Kodak Co
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Eastman Kodak Co
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Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Eastman Kodak Co filed Critical Eastman Kodak Co
Publication of EP0661674A1 publication Critical patent/EP0661674A1/de
Withdrawn legal-status Critical Current

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    • G—PHYSICS
    • G07—CHECKING-DEVICES
    • G07C—TIME OR ATTENDANCE REGISTERS; REGISTERING OR INDICATING THE WORKING OF MACHINES; GENERATING RANDOM NUMBERS; VOTING OR LOTTERY APPARATUS; ARRANGEMENTS, SYSTEMS OR APPARATUS FOR CHECKING NOT PROVIDED FOR ELSEWHERE
    • G07C9/00—Individual registration on entry or exit
    • G07C9/20—Individual registration on entry or exit involving the use of a pass
    • G07C9/22—Individual registration on entry or exit involving the use of a pass in combination with an identity check of the pass holder
    • G07C9/25—Individual registration on entry or exit involving the use of a pass in combination with an identity check of the pass holder using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voice recognition
    • G07C9/253—Individual registration on entry or exit involving the use of a pass in combination with an identity check of the pass holder using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voice recognition visually

Definitions

  • One approach to improve the security in the use of transaction cards is to have images of cardholders contained in an image data base and when a transaction occurs the database retrieves the image and sends it to the appropriate location for visual display (see Luther G. Simjian, "Verification System using Coded Identifying and Storage Means," U.S. Patent No. 3,569,619, issued March 9, 1971).
  • This approach presents two major logistical problems. The first is to retrieve the digital image from a database which has millions of image records within acceptable time constraints. The second obstacle is the transmission over existing communications lines and with standard transmission rates. Since a merchant wishes to complete the transaction as quickly as possible, any time delays are undesirable.
  • Half-toning of images is done throughout the graphic arts field. In very simplistic terms, the gray levels are implemented by modulating the area of a dot which is printed, more of the dot is filled in for higher density levels. The underlying idea is that the human visual system will integrate the amount of area filled and the perception of multiple density levels is achieved. Since a regular array is used there is a high likelihood that the spatial frequencies of the image to "beat" with the half-toning array to generate an objectionable modulation known as a Moiré pattern. The typical means to reduce the Moiré pattern is to rotate the dot array until the pattern is minimized or becomes unnoticeable.
  • Digital printers such as laser printers, ink-jet, or dot-matrix printers, and display units, such as selected liquid crystal display units, are more constrained than traditional graphic arts methods. Dot area can not be modulated, but instead a full dot is printed or is empty. Also, the angle of the dot array is fixed to a rectilinear grid which is oriented in a simple horizontal-vertical alignment.
  • digital half-toning A number of approaches to this problem have been formulated. Common methods are commonly referred to as error diffusion and dithering (see Digital Half-toning, by Ulichney, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass., pp.
  • blue-noise masking Another method known as blue-noise masking (see Sullivan and Ray, U.S. Patent 5,214,517, May 25, 1993) produces an aggregate of dither patterns to overcome many of the limitations of digital printing. These methods differ in implementation based upon requirements of particular embodiments. In particular, error diffusion is an adaptive method which requires moderately sophisticated data processing. Blue-noise masking is a simple process when implemented, and is well suited to devices with very limited memory and processing capability.
  • Point-of-sale terminals with automatic receipt printers typically use a dot-matrix printer. These printers are preferable as they are very inexpensive, and these printers are able to print multiple copies with a single pass.
  • the methods of the current invention are suitable for other digital printing methods, such as ink-jet or laser printing. These printers typically have very limited image printing capability and have a small number of dots per inch, on the order of 100 dots per inch. To use printing devices which are inexpensive and with limited resolution there needs to be a printing system which best utilizes the characteristics of the human visual system.
  • Image information as stored can be considered simply as data. As such the information can be used in conjunction with a card administration agency to perform a multiple-validation arrangement. Details of this approach are contained in patent application (see Lawrence A. Ray and Richard N. Ellson, "Method and Apparatus for Credit Card Verification," U.S. Patent Application cited above.) This invention explains how to make extremely remote the likelihood a fraudulent image passing the card administration agency validation as well as the visual validation performed at the point of sale.
  • an image is reconstructed from the data on a transaction card or other device with limited storage capability.
  • the signal set of the reconstructed image is converted to a format which will provide a halftone display on the available printer.
  • Several techniques for achieving a halftone are described in detail.
  • the present invention is described in terms of printers, any device which produces a bi-level output signals including dot-matrix printers, laser printers, liquid crystal displays can advantageously use the techniques herein described.
  • the availability of the halftone images advantageously permits a recognizable image to be provided at a transaction site with relatively inexpensive apparatus.
  • Figure 2 illustrates the process in generating a half-tone image from the data stored on a transaction card.
  • Figure 3 is an example of a facial image generated as a result of the data stored on a transaction card with a low density storage medium.
  • the image information is retrieved from the credit card and decompressed, it is to be processed and printed onto a standard receipt.
  • Other information that is contained on the card can also be printed. Examples of such additional information is the cardholder's name, expiration date and perhaps a facsimile of the cardholder's signature.
  • Converting the continuous tone image into a digital halftone can be done in a variety of methods, such as center-growing dot, error diffusion, dithering, or "blue-noise" methods.
  • the invention is not limited to a particular method of digital half-toning, as the choice for implementation will be made depending upon processing power of the point-of-sale device, memory restrictions, speed and acceptable image quality. If the output printer has a reasonable degree of dot placement accuracy and the output dot is well behaved then blue-noise methods offer are a good choice for system simplicity and image quality. However, other system combinations make schemes such as simulated center-growing dots more attractive.
  • the purpose of this invention is to describe the use of a receipt printer to output images that are encoded on transaction cards, or transmitted to the transaction site from some central location.
  • Simulated center-growing dots is a digital analog to traditional halftoning methods from graphic arts. This analog is accomplished by combining pixel locations and the group of pixels becomes a dot.
  • One embodiment is to combine a 4 x 4 region of pixels. This grid acts as a halftone dot and as more of the pixels within the dot are printed the dot becomes progressively dense.
  • the obvious problem with this method is that the spatial resolution is reduced by a factor of four.
  • the advantage is printing stability when the system has significant levels of uncontrolled variation, sometimes referred to as noise. For instance, many receipt printers are impact printers and the ink-paper combination permits the dots to spread beyond the pixel boundaries. In some cases a checkerboard pattern appears completely filled from ink-bleeding.
  • a pattern is a two-dimensional array which implicitly determines whether a dot is to be written or left blank.
  • An example of such a pattern is an (n x m)-array, e.g., 32 x 32, where elements of the array are in one of two states, print or leave blank.
  • This table naturally implements the desired correlation across gray-levels.
  • the memory required to store the data base is quite small, e.g., a 32 x 32 pattern data base the memory requirement is 1,024 bytes of computer memory.
  • the algorithm to access and use the data base is extremely simple and can be done without resorting to storing and processing of the incoming pixel values. This method is preferred for devices such as point-of-sale terminals.
  • a halftoning font can be constructed for the simulated center growing dot.
  • An embodiment is for a character cell to be an 8 x 8 grid.
  • Four simulated center growing dots could be developed within the character cell.
  • a 256 character font could be used to perform digital halftoning.
  • Other similar schemes could also be devised.
  • Such a font could be included as an alternative character set included within the firmware of the printer, or could be downloaded from an external device.
  • a printer which does not have an "all pins addressable" capability may store a halftone font as a character set.
  • Some receipt printers attain the all-pins-addressable capability.
  • An example of such a device is the PcOS Receipt Printer from Ithaca Peripherals Inc.
  • This printer emulates an IBM Proprinter through a printer driver.
  • Printer drivers such as that for the IBM Proprinter changes the aspect ratio which has the effect that squares become rectangles.
  • the reciprocal simulated center growing dot pattern can be output.
  • the printer aspect ratio is 6:5.
  • Clearly a cell printed as 6 x 5 cell would recover the proper aspect ratio.
  • the dot since it may be desirable to keep the simulated dot size small another option is for the dot to be a 4 x 5 cell. In addition to the maintenance of small dots, many receipts have a limited width and smaller simulated dots allow for more dot cells to be printed.
  • the output from the digital halftone algorithm is a stream a bits which are used to determine whether a pin will print a dot. This type of printing is different than the printing of a character set. A bitstream is processed.
  • printers In order for printers to determine whether the data is character or image information is often done by sending control signals to the printer controller indicating whether the data is character data or graphics data. In the case of the digital halftones a signal must be sent which indicates the information is for an image and to switch to the "graphics mode.” At this point it is necessary for the printer to have a feature known as all pins addressable.
  • the image information While the preferred method is for the image information to be solely on the card, there are other methods which have the image information reside in a central data base which is queried by the point-of-sale terminal using information extracted from the card, or a hybrid method where some of the image information is on the card and the remainder is in a central data base.
  • the advantage of these methods is that the storage capacity of the card no longer is a major obstacle.
  • the system is not as responsive and some of the security features of the method are reduced in effectiveness.
  • a halftone image from data stored on a transaction card is shown.
  • the transaction card 10 having data stored in the form of a pattern of physical variations (for example, fluctuations in the orientation of magnetic domains on a strip of magnetic material), is applied to a card reader 11.
  • Card reader 11 converts the patterns of physical properties on the transaction card to digital signals.
  • the signals are then applied to processing unit 12.
  • processing unit 12 the digital signals are used to reconstruct (and decompress) the image that was compressed and stored in the limited space available on the transaction card.
  • a matrix (pixel) image having a standard configuration, is divided into sections and each section has a library of preestablished images. Each preestablished image is associated with a number.
  • Each section of the matrix image is compared with an associated set of library images, and the number of the library image closest to the matrix image is selected. All of the section numbers selected in this manner are stored, a predetermined order, as a physical pattern on the transaction card. Thus, the data required to represent an image by this encoding or compression technique is reduced.
  • the image numbers along with the order in which the numbers are stored on the transaction card is used to reconstruct the original matrix image using the library images associated with each number. As will be clear, the restored image is only an approximation of the original image.
  • This data compression/decompression technique is described in more detail in the U.S. Patent Application Serial No.
  • the reconstruction of the image is performed by the processing unit 12 in response to the signals from the card reader 11. After reconstruction of the image by the processing unit 12, signals are applied to printer/display unit 13.
  • the printer/display unit 13 includes the driver circuits to provide a display, either in hardcopy or on a display device, of the reconstructed halftone image 15.
  • step 1 the data on the storage portion of the transaction card is converted from a pattern of physical properties to digital logic signals.
  • the digital signals from the card reader are converted (i.e., decompressed) to provide a matrix image display in step 202.
  • the digital signals from the transaction card are numbers which designate a selected image portion from a set of image portions.
  • step 203 the signal set describing the reconstructed image is transformed into activation signals for signals for displaying the reconstructed image either on a display screen and/or in a hardcopy format.
  • the transformation of the signals is specific to the printer/display unit and is performed using any of the techniques for providing a halftone image.
  • FIG. 3 an image 32 compressed and stored on a transaction card 10 and reconstructed in the manner described above is shown.
  • the image 32 is part of a receipt 30, the receipt 30 also including printed matter 31.
  • FIG. 4 an example of a character set and a center-growing grayscale font set is illustrated.
  • the apparatus can provide a hard copy record of the transaction for dispute resolution.
  • the ISO standards can be maintained while increasing the ability of the system to minimize fraud with respect to the transaction card.
  • the invention has been described with reference to transaction card with magnetic storage strips thereon, it is apparent that the invention is easily adapted to other devices that have different storage media associated therewith or storage media with increased capacity.
  • the transaction card can have the data stored thereon in an optical storage medium.
  • the invention has been described with particular reference to printers.
  • the techniques disclosed herein are also applicable to halftone displays such as liquid crystal displays.
EP94203645A 1993-12-28 1994-12-15 Verfahren und Gerät, mittels eines digitalen Halbtonbildes zum Verkaufszeitpunkt eine Bestätigung vorzunehmen Withdrawn EP0661674A1 (de)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
US17409793A 1993-12-28 1993-12-28
US174097 1993-12-28

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EP0661674A1 true EP0661674A1 (de) 1995-07-05

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EP (1) EP0661674A1 (de)
JP (1) JPH07236058A (de)

Cited By (3)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
EP0259957A2 (de) * 1986-07-15 1988-03-16 Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Textverarbeitungsgerät
EP0696128A3 (de) * 1994-07-29 1996-03-27 Eastman Kodak Co Vorrichtung und Verfahren zur Betrachtung eines Halbtonbildes
US6603568B1 (en) * 2000-05-19 2003-08-05 Pitney Bowes Inc. System and method for issuing electronic tickets

Families Citing this family (2)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
JP4590735B2 (ja) * 2001-01-05 2010-12-01 セイコーエプソン株式会社 ロゴデータの作成方法、その方法を記録した記録媒体、及び、ロゴデータ作成装置
EP1764232B1 (de) * 2005-09-14 2009-09-02 Müller Martini Holding AG Verfahren und Vorrichtung zur Herstellung von digital gedruckten Zeitungen

Citations (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE2356741A1 (de) * 1972-11-16 1974-06-06 Dainippon Printing Co Ltd Verfahren zur reproduktion eines originalbildes
GB2173970A (en) * 1985-03-25 1986-10-22 Matsushita Electric Works Ltd Individuality discriminating system
EP0247788A2 (de) * 1986-05-27 1987-12-02 National Business Systems Inc. Bildspeicherungs- und Bildwiedergewinnungssystem für verschiedene Datenträger mit beschränkter Speicherung
US5027401A (en) * 1990-07-03 1991-06-25 Soltesz John A System for the secure storage and transmission of data

Patent Citations (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
DE2356741A1 (de) * 1972-11-16 1974-06-06 Dainippon Printing Co Ltd Verfahren zur reproduktion eines originalbildes
GB2173970A (en) * 1985-03-25 1986-10-22 Matsushita Electric Works Ltd Individuality discriminating system
EP0247788A2 (de) * 1986-05-27 1987-12-02 National Business Systems Inc. Bildspeicherungs- und Bildwiedergewinnungssystem für verschiedene Datenträger mit beschränkter Speicherung
US5027401A (en) * 1990-07-03 1991-06-25 Soltesz John A System for the secure storage and transmission of data

Cited By (4)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
EP0259957A2 (de) * 1986-07-15 1988-03-16 Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Textverarbeitungsgerät
EP0259957A3 (en) * 1986-07-15 1989-06-21 Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Text processing device
EP0696128A3 (de) * 1994-07-29 1996-03-27 Eastman Kodak Co Vorrichtung und Verfahren zur Betrachtung eines Halbtonbildes
US6603568B1 (en) * 2000-05-19 2003-08-05 Pitney Bowes Inc. System and method for issuing electronic tickets

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