EP2816541A1

EP2816541A1 - Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking

Info

Publication number: EP2816541A1
Application number: EP13748478.8A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Fermin Sanchez Rodriguez
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2012-02-14
Filing date: 2013-02-11
Publication date: 2014-12-24
Also published as: ES2423104B1; EP2816541A4; EA201491370A1; ES2423104A1; WO2013121065A1

Abstract

The invention relates to a method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking two or more sheets (1, 2) preferably some of which are transparent, imprinting areas of each sheet with sequences of points and/or full or empty sections, stacking said sheets such that in the space which surrounds the image, points and/or full sections of one sheet are stacked with the inverses of the other sheet, while points and/or full or unfilled sections are stacked in the image. The method can be used in viewfinders, mobile phones and computers with physical or virtual sheets. The points and/or the sections full of the cards are produced in different complementary colors in a subtractive color surface area such that once stacked they yield black. Also, they can be totally black at least in part of the sheets. If all of the sheets are virtual, said sheets are stacked on an electronic screen, and the colors used would be in the additive range, in order to yield white.

Description

The present invention refers to a method for forming images or inscriptions by an operation of stacking. Particularly the stacking of two or more conformed elements, preferably, in the way of sheets or surfaces, that bring new essential features and significant advantages over the known in the actual state of the technic.
In a specific way, the invention advocates a process in which the elements that are involved,conformed in the way of sheets or flat surfaces or low curvature, concavity, convexity and similars of any type, these are previously graven, printed, perforated, or in the way that an image is proyected or something like that so the two of them separated doesn't mean any specific image, but by stacking each other, one above the other, the parts marked in each of the sheets complement the parts marked in the other one, getting the result of an image previously determined.
These images or inscriptions can change depending the way of doing the stacking. The sheets can be also virtual such as the same that appear in a computer, mobile telephone device or in a television that can be in a plasma system, LCD, LED or whatever else that is able to reproduce images on its surface.
Images are formed by combining colors whose stacking gives the result of black or something similar to black, and keeping in mind that the disposition of black surfaces that can be opaque, this is when is combined with screens that emit light, will be executed according to the next conversion:

To achieve conversion, the first step is to transform CMYK to CMY, and after to RGB.

The scope of the invention is within those branches of industry and commerce in which it becomes necessary the recognition of an image, as can be, in particular, the field of promotional sales, security codes, skill and dexterity games or gambling and similars. Also can be apply to send confidential keys such as those used in financial transactions and in general to hide messages of any type so the message can be only uncovered for his receiver.

PAST AND SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Is known the fact that in some fields of technique it is necessary for carry out the formation and / or the recognition of an image, which can be, at the same time, associated to an concrete predetermined situation. For example, is known the fact that in promotional determined systems exist a printed image in a determined support, for example a sheet of cardboard, and covered with a determined pulverulent agglutinate, so when that surface area is scraped with any cutting tool, the 10 mentioned film of aggluttinate product is removed and appears the printed image. This system has been known for years and in this one the user is not involved, only has to scrape the surface, also providing a unique opportunity consisting of the previously printed image.
Then, it will be desirable to have a system in which image won't be already printed, not the partial way and also not complete, on the surface in question, so that it will be necessary to have it by stacking at least two or more complementary parts, preferably flat sheets with the dimensional characteristics deemed relevant, which separately don't represent any image. Thereby, regardless of the purpose for which the invention is intended in practice, provides the possibility to different persons who have the sheets of formation images must participate each other, checking by stacking the sheets until each carrier find the another carrier of the complementary part of the image. For image recognition, we don't need perfection in his form although we follow the Gestaltista technic.

Following Gestalt psychology

Mind establish, through certain laws, the elements that arrives to it via the sensory channels (perception) or the memory (thoughts, intelligence and resolution of problems). By our experience of the environment, this configuration has a primary character because of the elements that are contained, and the sum of these last could not take us, therefore, to the understanding of mental functioning. This approach is illustrated with the axiom "the whole is the sum of its parts", with which it has been most commonly identified this psychological school.
One of the fundamental values of Gestalt's stream is called law Prágnanz (pregnance), that affirm the tendency of perceptual experience to adopt the simplest possible forms. Other laws enunciated would be:

Principle of Similarity- our mind join the similar elements in a entity. The similarity depends of the form, size, color and other visual aspects of the elements. For example:

Two examples: in the first drawing, we interpret a triangle instead of three angles and in the second one an arrow instead of a line and an angle.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In photography and graphic arts is used materials in thin films, so besides knowing the reflection coefficients and absorption of such materials (inks generally), is also important to know their degree of ability to intercept or pass light through it. Clearly this ability is related to the coefficients mentioned, but in this case it is common to use directly values of opacity and transparency.

Opaque colour

Transparent colour

Opacity

In photography is defined as the inverse of the fraction of light that pass through or is reflected by a particular color. When it refers to a printing ink or a painting describes its ability to cover the colour that is applied on it.
In general opacity is a deseable property in the paintings, althought paints and inks are not perfectly opaque. We all know that sometimes it is necessary give several films when you want to cover a dark old painting with a lighter color.

Transparency

It refers to the ability of some inks to allow the passage of part of the incident light, that is reflected from a substrate. The resulting colour is the side of light that is reflected (pigment colour) besides the colour of substrate. This property is opposite to the opacity, so that a pigment totally opaque has transparency 0 and another totally transparent has opacity 0. Opacity and transparency are properties of paints and real inks, but can be simulated in the colours that are used in computing and in general in screens of TV and mobile devices as telephones, PDAs and similars.
For this are defined colours that, besides its basic components (RGB), have a certain degree of transparency that is included in the called alpha cannel, so when is represented in a window that has a previous colour, the colours that are defined as transparent suffer an alteration depending of the background colour, by this way it gets the effect of trasparency/opacity more or less pronounced.

While the other 8 bits are used for the called alpha channel

The alpha channel

Some graphic systems, specially true colour formats of 32 bits, use 8 bits for each of the traditional components; red, green and blue, while the other 8 bits are used for the called alpha channel, that indicates the transparency of each element of the matrix-image.
This information of "transparency" is actually a mask or a conversion table that indicates wich is the colour result when there is pixel stacking at the same point. Through this technic it gets transparency effects, so you can see it through the image above having in this one several degrees of transparency.
When the application (for example browser) shows in the screen an image that contains transparent elements, will replace the transparent content with the background of the document, either be this one an image or a solid colour. This is useful for web design, as it allows to insert an image "mixing it" with another that is suitable for the background of the page, or with a colour that is used for this purpose. So, the use of transparent images also allows to design graphics either seen with any background colour or combining them for make a new colour.
The invention proposes a method for forming images with the characteristics mentioned above as desirable and wich is susceptible of being developed with great simplicity, ease, and very economically. From here, it will be assumed that the method use advantageously printed sheets, although as it was said at the beginning, it can be perfectly applicable with other type of marks or even with perforations or a combination of both. To carry out the method, it is necessary to develop, with preference, upon the useful sheets as mechanism of support, a determined marks, printed, generally formed by lines or a group of black dots or with a determined colour (filled) or with other figures, that is set according to a precalculated sequence, alternating with other unfilled (and therefore of the colour of the support), Also arranged orderly according to the same sequence and depending of the image that want to obtain, the other support, that is the second sheet, must be necessarily transparent or translucent, and will contain an area of equivalent dimension to those of the first sheet, marked according to the first sequence, with successions ordered of black filled dots or the complementary colour that comes from the same position of the previous sheet and others without fill, or the same colour of the previous sheet but set in a complementary way with the first sheet depending of the image that want to obtain, so that when is stacking in a precise way one upon the other, the black filled dots of a surface will be stacking to the spaces without fill of the other surface, except in the areas that are for create the image. By this way, the surface that surround the image will appear filled, so can be approximately uniform, while in the areas of the image the dots will overlap or figures filled of the two sheets and the dots or figures without fill of both sheets. So, the areas of the deseable image do not appear all filled as it happens in the area that do not belongs to the image, but appears filled with black dots that alternate with others without fill. Then, it can form images, inscriptions, anagrams or similars.
With preference, at least one of the sheets will be transparent. This greatly helps to appreciate the image once is formed. In any case, this fact should not be understood as limitative, but merely as being illustrative.
Moreover, must be understood that the support material is not critical at all, it may consist cardboard, paper, plastic or any other, even can be virtual sheets that can be stacking through a computer or by the mobile phone or any electronic device that has an screen that appears images like the screens of TV, eBook readers, PDAs and screen machines arcade games, of ability or skill, gambling or similars.
As can be understood, the possibilities of combination of some sheets with other ones to form images are ilimitated. Moreover, depending on its purpose of application, the best way to carry out the method expected to exist multiple sheets from wich each pair that is searching only can be formed with two previously established, althought this fact should not be understood as limitative, just because the invention could be developed in a way that one support could serve for combining in a suitable way with more than one of the remaining sheets and offer, therefore, the possibility to form several different images depending of the found pair.
Besides combining prints through complementary colour (those that mixing each other gives black colour to human sight) we can do that one or both of the sheets printed with translucent pigments upon transparent substrates give the result of a determined image when is overlap with a pre established color, and other different image when is overlap with other colour also pre established. This is achieved by the combination in the overlap of complementary colours which total gives the result of the black colour to human sight.

ADVANTAGES

The advantages of this invention comes from the descriptive memory, therefore we list below the most popular merely as enunciated character but not limitative:

Guide public to a stand in a fair, shopping center or in a commercial area.
Award a purchase or the presence in a event.
Give a gift check or a discount to make future purchases.
Cause public to be present in fairs, events, launchs, shows.
It can be distribute by mailbox, mailing, hand delivery, movie tickets, packaging of insertion product in catalogs or press.
Guide the consumer to the point where the promoter company wants to. So that gets surprised because of the novelty, original and easy to use of the product.
Gets the loyalty of the consumer.
Constitute the fastest and most effective tool for creating and updating databases.
Can be reuse just by changing the decoder.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Other advantages and characteristics of the invention will be explained from the following description thereof, with reference to the attached drawings, in which like examples and without any limititive character so, it is represented a prefered form to do this. In such drawings:

The 1 Figure shows a schematic sight of an example of one of the necessary supports to form an image.
The 2 Figure represents a schematic sight that similar to the previous one, but of another support that in theory will be complementary with that one, for forming an image.
The 3 Figure illustrate a schematic representation that is different of the 2 but also complementary with the 1 to obtain a inscription.
The 4 Figure is a detail of a white and black background of the total of two complementary sheets and his result.
The 5 Figure is an schematic illustration as the previous one with details made with complementary colours.
The 6 Figure is an extension of the details of the 5 figure in complementary colours a y b.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERED FORM TO DO IT

To carry out the detailed description of the prefered form of the invention, will make reference to the figures of drawings, in which has been schematized necessary means for put in practice the method to form images preconized by this invention. So, in 1 and 2 figures shows two areas (1,2) in which wants to simulate paths surfaces destinated to form an image by stacking. Both of the mentioned areas are represented by the form of squares, but it will be understood that this is only a way to represent and does not absolutely affect to make these ones, because in practice it can adopt any geometric form that wants to get, besides the appropiate size for each specific application.
Moreover, the inside of each area appears marked with multiple lines that cross each other obliquely parallel to both diameters. This form of representation has been chosen only because some reasons as the simplicity of drawing and only has the purpose to illustrate the invention. The practical realization will contain, how it was said before, with preference, sequences of full and empty points, just because that is a print that gives more possibilities when it has to form images, although of course, and as the experts in the subject will understand, another representations are possible.
Keeping on with the description of the invention, and looking at both marked surfaces (1,2), corresponding each one to a separate sheet, can be understood how it is possible to fill the spaces not covered by stacking a sheet, for example the surface (1), upon another sheet, for example the surface (2), or also match each filled area with white area. To do this you just have to design properly the plot that should cover each of the surfaces. The image to form is not contained, specifically, in any of the sheets, so it can be only appreciatted when overlap a marked area, for example the area (2), upon the other one marked, for example area (1).
The next step to form an image consist in the mentioned stacking of sheets, so that the surface (1), for example, is positioned on the surface (2). When is properly fit, by the most precise way, a surface upon another one, the desired image is obtained. This is illustrated in the 3 Figure, and as can be seen, appears in this case an image (5) in a centered position but its formation could be provided in any position, clearly distinguishable from leftover space (4) because this last is much more dark. As it was tall above, the reason of this difference in tone is because in the space that surrounds the image (5) exist, an overlap of dots (or sections of any other type) filled of one surface on the ones that are empty of the other surface, while in the area of formation of the image (5) exist an overlap of dots (or sections) filled and empty of both surfaces, so the image (5) is observed with the same tone as the section of both areas (1 and 2) of base, and so very different from the rest of the surface.
As it was said before, the section (1,2) of the separated sheets shown in 1 and 2 figures, it is represented by a plurality of diagonal lines to have more simplicity. Special attention deserves the expanded detail (3), in which you can observe an example of real realization of the section distributed in both mentioned areas (1,2). You will see in the expanded detail that this example of real realization has been obtained by dots and small segments distributed according with the sequence mentioned above, forming separated varied areas and with different sizes. As can be understood, the possibilities of combine this type of basic elements, are really unlimited, where comes from a large variety of unitary or even multiple images that could be formed in each case.
It is not considered necessary to make more extended the contained of the description because an expert of this subject can understand its scope and the advantages that comes from the invention, and also how to develop and put into practice the purpose of it.
However, must be understood that the invention has been described according to a prefered realization of it, so that it can be susceptible to modifications, but this does not make any alteration of the base of such invention, could affect these modifications to the form, size or/and the materials to produce it.
Sheets can combine complementary colours (a and b) or not, like how is represented in 5 and 6 figures. When two complementary colours (a and b) are overlap gets black colour as the result.

Claims

ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, to obtain images formed by any type of graphic, inscription, anagram or similar, that is characterized, because it consist, in a first phase of forming in a determined surface an area with forms and sizes desired, for example an area (1) rectangular or square, which inner space is printed with the array of dots and/or sections of any other type filled, and dots and/or sections of any other type unfilled, according with a determined sequence that depends of the image that will be formed; in a second phase, it has to be printed or make appear by an electronic method a surface different from the first one, a second area (2) of the same structural and dimensional characteristics than in the previous area, with a succession of dots and/or sections of any other type filled, and dots and/or sections of any other type unfilled, according at the same sequence than in the first sheet but in a complementary way with this one, depending of the image that will be formed, and in a third phase, make an overlap of a surface upon the other one, matching in the most precise way both areas (1 and 2), obtaining the result of an image (5) that is notable for its tone, in a clearly differentiated form comparing to the rest of the space.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according with 1 assertion, characterized because of the mentioned sequence for printing areas (1,2) corresponding to the independent surfaces is such that dots or sections are in both of the areas so to make the overlap of the mentioned sheets, in the space in which no image has to be formed, dots or sections filled of an area overlap with other of dots or sections that are unfilled or matching colours and in reverse, while in the area of forming the image, dots or sections filled and unfilled, of both sheets are respectively overlap each other or complementary colours overlap so get the black colour as the result, achieving the same effects as if they were filled.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according with assertions 1 and 2, characterized because, with preference, at least one of the sheets is transparent.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according with assertions 1 and 3, characterized because stacking can be done on a display located in a physical location where should go for overlap.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according with assertion 1, characterized because sheets can be vitual to overlap on the screens of devices as mobile phones or a computer or electronic tablet able to have internet connection, or other system for mobile phones.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according to the above assertions, characterized because prints that will be combine can be done with complementary colour that when overlap will give black colour.
ª Method for forming images or inscriptions by stacking, according to the above assertions, characterized because the number of physical sheets to overlap can be two or more and can overlap also with another that is electronic.