JP2003281163A - Image processor, image processing method and storage medium - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processor, enabling automatic classification and rearrangement of image data according to a designated condition. <P>SOLUTION: Meta-data which is associated with an image data and is information on the image data is obtained (S502). According to event information recorded as meta-data, a plurality of image data are classified (S503). The classification results are collected and provided for creating an album (S505). <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus and an image processing method, and more particularly to an image processing apparatus and an image processing method capable of automatically classifying and rearranging image data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Album creation using image data stored in a storage device such as a hard disk or a memory card has been performed more frequently than before. The album referred to here is not only a state in which the laid out image data is printed by a printer as shown in FIG. 3A, but also a format called a digital album which is viewed on a display such as a computer terminal. Including those.

Usually, an album is created for each event such as travel, athletic meet, and wedding. However, when shooting with a digital camera, etc., it is often the case that shooting is performed over multiple events without creating an album until there is no free space in the storage medium such as a memory card that stores the shot image data. In many cases, the album created in [1] contains images related to a plurality of events.

As a result, the captured images are stored in the same folder in the hard disk or the memory card even if they were captured at different events. Therefore, when the images in the folder are collectively printed, the images of a plurality of events are mixed. The normal album is an image in which images are sequentially arranged along the time axis. However, in particular, when the images taken by a plurality of cameras at the same time are collectively printed, the order of the images may not be arranged in time series in the album.

[0005]

Therefore, when an album of a certain event is to be created using the image data in the folder, it is necessary to manually select the image corresponding to the event from the folder. . When the images in the folder are arranged in the order of shooting, it is necessary to judge from the contents of the images and manually arrange in the order of shooting. As a result, a very complicated work of browsing each image and checking the image is involved.

The present invention has been made in view of the above problems of the prior art, and provides an image processing apparatus and an image processing method capable of automatically classifying and rearranging image data according to a predetermined condition. With the goal.

[0007]

That is, an object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus capable of handling image data and information regarding this image data, and to provide information regarding image data corresponding to a plurality of image data. An image processing apparatus characterized by having an information acquisition unit for acquiring and a classification unit for classifying and / or rearranging a plurality of corresponding image data based on the acquired information about the image data.

Another aspect of the present invention is an image processing method capable of handling image data and information relating to the image data, which is information acquisition for obtaining information relating to image data corresponding to a plurality of image data. An image processing method comprising: a step and a classifying step of classifying and / or rearranging a plurality of corresponding image data based on the acquired information about the image data.

Another subject matter of the present invention lies in a computer program characterized by causing a computer device to function as the image processing device of the present invention.

Another subject matter of the present invention lies in a computer-readable storage medium storing the computer program of the present invention.

[0011]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION The present invention will now be described based on its preferred embodiments with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration example of a computer device that can be used as an image processing device according to an embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, an input device 101 is a device for inputting instructions and data from a user, and includes a keyboard and a pointing device such as a mouse. A device 102 outputs data to a printer or a display. Storage device 1
A device 03 stores image data and metadata.
Usually, a removable medium such as a hard disk or a memory card is used.

A CPU 104 controls the entire computer system. ROM 105 and RAM 106 are C
It provides programs, data, work areas, etc. necessary for the processing of the PU 104. Further, the control program necessary for realizing the processing shown in the flowcharts of FIG. 5 and subsequent figures described below is stored in the storage device 103 or RO
It is assumed to be stored in M105. Storage device 103
If the control program is stored in
It is executed after being read in 06.

Such an image processing apparatus can be realized by a general-purpose computer apparatus such as a personal computer generally used in homes and businesses. In addition, in the following, GUI-based O that is commonly used
It is assumed that the image data file is managed on S.

FIG. 2 shows an outline of the contents of a certain folder in the storage device 103. In the storage device 103,
There is a folder 202 for storing image files, in which image files 203 and image files 204 captured at parties and travels that are different events are mixed.

When an album is simply created by using the image files included in the folder 202, an album in which a travel image 303 and a party image 304 are mixed is created as shown in FIG. 3B, for example. Will end up.

FIG. 4 shows the metadata added to the image file. As shown in FIG. 4, the metadata is mainly described in a markup language such as XML, HTML, or SGML, and the type of data and an identifier (for example, <Event>) indicating its start and actual information (see ))
And one piece of data is described by an identifier indicating the end of the data (same </ Event>). The contents of the data include the photographer (<Image_Creator>), the shooting date and time (<Creat
ion_Time>), shooting location (<Location>), event (<Event>), subject (<Person>), and the like. Further, as shown in the figure, the metadata is often described at the end of the image data, but it may be described in the header part of the image data, or as a separate file associated with the image data. It doesn't matter.
When describing as a separate file, for example, when the image file name is “IMG_0001.JPG”, the metadata file has a file name “IMG_0001.XML” with a different extension, and corresponds to the image data. Be attached. Also, the method of describing the metadata file name in the header portion of the image file may of course be used.

To create the metadata described in XML, the user needs to input the event name, the shooting date and time, and the subject name using an image management application or the like. In this case, the metadata is created after the image is taken, but there is also a method of previously inputting information such as the event name and the shooting date and time that is known in advance. In this method, metadata in which an event name and a shooting date and time are described is created in advance, and this is saved in a memory card or the like where images are saved after shooting. Then, when an image is taken by a digital still camera or the like, the metadata in the memory card is automatically associated with the generated image data. (Note that this method has already been described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-075846.)

The metadata is, for example, TIFF (Tagged Image).
File Format) Rev.6.0 and Exif (Exchangeable image fi
le format) Metadata such as tags defined by standards such as Ver. 2.1 (JEIDA-49-1998) may be used. Such metadata can be added at the time of shooting with a digital still camera, for example. In addition, even if the image data is compressed like JPEG format, B
It may be an uncompressed format such as MP format.

In short, the essence of the present invention is to obtain metadata regarding image data and automatically perform classification, rearrangement, etc. of image data based on the metadata.
The type of metadata, description method, format of image data, etc. are arbitrary.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart for explaining a process of creating an album by classifying images by event using the metadata added to the image data in the image processing apparatus according to the present embodiment.

The user selects an image file and / or a folder containing the image file, a volume, etc., for which an album is desired to be created through the GUI, and designates the classification for each event to instruct the creation of the album. Processing of is carried out.

First, the metadata is read from one piece of image data included in the designated image group, and the RAM shown in FIG.
The data is stored in 106 (S502). In S503, RAM
From the metadata stored in 106, the event information (<
(Information following Event>) is read and the image is classified for each event. A specific classification method will be described later with reference to FIG.
In S504, it is a step of investigating whether or not the classification processing has been performed for all the images included in the designated image group. If all the images have not been processed, the process returns to S502. If the processing has been completed for all images, the process proceeds to S505. In S505, an album is created for each event based on the classification result. As described above, the generated album may be a printed matter or electronic data viewed on a display.

FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining the image classification process of S503 in FIG. Specified image group 60
1 shows different events (“travel”,
Image files related to "Party") are mixed.
As described with reference to FIG. 4, an event name 602, which is metadata, is added to each image file, and a file name 603 used in the image processing apparatus is added.

The image processing apparatus reads the event name 602 from the metadata of each image file included in the designated image group 601, and the corresponding event list (in the example shown in FIG. , The file list of the corresponding image file is entered in the party list 605). Then, at the time of creating the album in S505, these event lists are referenced to acquire image files belonging to the same event.

The classified and generated list is given a certain identifier and stored in the memory.
For each image included in the list, information on the identifier of the list is added as metadata. This makes it possible to know which list has been included so far when the metadata of the image is confirmed later. Then, by accessing the recognized list, the other images included in the list can be known.

As described above, in this embodiment, by automatically classifying the metadata added to the image data using the event information, for example, image data belonging to a plurality of events are mixed. Also, it is possible to easily create an album for each event.

(2nd Embodiment) In the first embodiment, the image processing apparatus for automatically classifying by using the event information in the metadata has been described, but in the present embodiment,
It is characterized in that images are automatically rearranged in order of shooting date and time to create an album by using shooting date and time information of metadata.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart for explaining the process of creating an album by sorting the images in the order of shooting date and time using the metadata added to the image data in the image processing apparatus according to this embodiment.

The user selects an image file and / or a folder containing the image file, a volume, etc., for which an album is desired to be created via the GUI, and designates the classification for each event to instruct the creation of the album. Processing of is carried out.

First, the metadata is read from one sheet of image data included in the designated image group, and the RAM shown in FIG.
The data is stored in 106 (S702). In S703, RAM
From the metadata stored in 106, shooting date / time information (<
(Information following Create_Time>) is read and the images are sorted in order of shooting date and time. A specific rearrangement processing method will be described later with reference to FIG. In S704, it is a step of investigating whether the rearrangement processing has been performed for all the images included in the designated image group. If all images have not been processed, the process returns to S702. If the processing has been completed for all images, the process proceeds to S705. S
At 705, an album is created based on the sorted result.

FIG. 8 is a diagram for explaining the image rearrangement process of S703 in FIG. Each image file included in the designated image group 801 is added with a shooting date / time 802 as metadata and a file name 803 used in the image processing apparatus, as described with reference to FIG. . Here, the file name 803 is A01. j
pg-A03. jpg image file and B01. jp
g-B03. It is assumed that the jpg image files are images captured by different cameras.

The image processing apparatus reads the photographing date / time information 802 from the metadata of each image file included in the designated image group 801, and accumulates it in the RAM 106. Then, when the newly read shooting date / time information is added to the RAM 106, or after the shooting date / time information for all image files is accumulated in the RAM 106, the shooting date / time information is rearranged collectively. And
A list 804 in which the file paths of the corresponding image files are described in the order of the sorted date and time information is created. Then, at the time of creating the album in S805, the list 804 is referred to and the image files are acquired in order of shooting date and time.

As described above, in the present embodiment, the rearrangement is automatically performed using the shooting date / time information in the metadata added to the image data, so that, for example, a plurality of cameras can be displayed in the designated image group. Even when image files taken at the same time are mixed, it is possible to easily create albums in the order of shooting.

(3rd Embodiment) The present embodiment is characterized in that images are automatically classified for each subject using the subject information in the metadata to create an album. Here, the subject information means the person in the image,
Information about things.

FIG. 9 is a flow chart for explaining a process of creating an album by sorting images by subject using the metadata added to the image data in the image processing apparatus according to this embodiment.

The user selects an image file and / or a folder containing the image file, a volume, etc., for which an album is desired to be created via the GUI, and designates the classification for each event to instruct the creation of the album. Processing of is carried out.

First, the metadata is read from one piece of image data included in the designated image group, and the RAM shown in FIG.
The data is stored in 106 (S902). In S903, RAM
From the metadata stored in 106, subject information (<Pe
(information following rson>) is read and the image is classified for each subject. A specific classification method will be described later with reference to FIG. S
A step 904 is a step of investigating whether or not the classification processing has been performed on all the images included in the designated image group.
If you haven't processed all images,
It returns to S902. If the processing has been completed for all images, the process proceeds to S905. In S905, an album is created based on the classification result.

FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining the image classification processing of S903 in FIG. Specified image group 1
In 001, images in which two subjects are moving by one person or by two persons are mixed. In addition, as described with reference to FIG. 4, each image file included in the designated image group 1001 has the subject name 10 as metadata.
02 is added, and a file name 1003 used in the image processing apparatus is added. As shown in the example of FIG. 4, a plurality of subject names 1002 may be included in one image.

The image processing apparatus uses the designated image group 1001.
The subject name 1002 is read from the metadata of each of the image files included in the file and stored in the RAM 106. Then, a subject name list corresponding to the subject name (in the example shown in FIG. 10, the Suzuki list 1004
Then, the file path of the image file is entered in the Sato list 1005). Image file "02.JP
For an image file having a plurality of subject names such as “G”, the file path of the image file is entered in all the corresponding subject name lists. At the time of creating the album in S905, these lists are referred to and the image file path necessary for creating the album for each subject is acquired.

As described above, in this embodiment, it is possible to easily create an album for each object by automatically classifying the object information among the metadata added to the image data. is there.

[0041]

Other Embodiments In the above embodiments, the image processing apparatus for classifying and rearranging image files using one type of metadata has been described. However, it is also possible to perform processing using a plurality of types of metadata.

Specifically, the sorting process as described in the second embodiment may be performed after the classification process described in the first or third embodiment. It is also possible to classify the same subject for each month of shooting. As described above, the information added to the image file as metadata can be combined under arbitrary conditions to automatically perform the processing such as classification and rearrangement. Also, the type of metadata is arbitrary and is not limited to the types described above.

In the above embodiment, only the image processing apparatus composed of one device has been described, but the same function as that of the image processing apparatus of the present invention can be realized by a system composed of a plurality of devices. good.

A software program (in the embodiment, a program corresponding to the flowchart shown in any one or more of FIG. 5, FIG. 7, and FIG. 9) for realizing the functions of the above-described embodiment is directly recorded from a recording medium. Alternatively, the same function may be achieved by using wired / wireless communication to supply the program to a system or apparatus having a computer capable of executing the program, and the computer of the system or apparatus executing the supplied program. Included in the present invention.

Therefore, the program code itself supplied to and installed in the computer to implement the functional processing of the present invention by the computer also implements the present invention. That is, the computer program itself for realizing the functional processing of the present invention is also included in the present invention.

In this case, the program may take any form such as an object code, a program executed by an interpreter, or script data supplied to an OS as long as it has the function of the program.

As a recording medium for supplying the program, for example, a magnetic recording medium such as a floppy (registered trademark) disk, a hard disk, a magnetic tape, an MO or a CD.
-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, D
There are optical / magneto-optical storage media such as VD-R and DVD-RW, and non-volatile semiconductor memory.

As a method of supplying a program using wired / wireless communication, the present invention can be implemented on a client computer such as a computer program itself forming the present invention in a server on a computer network or a compressed file including an automatic installation function. A method of storing a data file that can be a computer program to be formed (a program data file) and downloading the program data file to a connected client computer can be used. In this case, it is also possible to divide the program data file into a plurality of segment files and arrange the segment files in different servers.

That is, the present invention also includes a server device that allows a plurality of users to download a program data file for implementing the functional processing of the present invention on a computer.

The program of the present invention is encrypted to C
The key information is stored in a storage medium such as a D-ROM and distributed to users, and the key information for decrypting the encryption is supplied to users who satisfy predetermined conditions by downloading it from a homepage via the Internet, for example, and the key is supplied. It is also possible to execute the encrypted program by using the information and install the program in a computer to realize the program.

Further, the computer executes the read program to realize the functions of the above-described embodiments, and the OS running on the computer executes the actual processing based on the instructions of the program. The function of the above-described embodiment can be realized also by performing a part or all of the above.

Further, after the program read from the recording medium is written in the memory provided in the function expansion board inserted into the computer or the function expansion unit connected to the computer, based on the instruction of the program,
CPU provided on the function expansion board or function expansion unit
Etc. perform part or all of the actual processing, and the functions of the above-described embodiments can also be realized by that processing.

[0053]

As described above, according to the present invention, various image files can be automatically classified, rearranged, etc. by using the metadata added to each image file. Will be easier to create.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration example of an image processing apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a storage state of images in a storage device.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of an album created by printing an image.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of metadata added to an image file.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating classification processing for each event according to the first embodiment of this invention.

FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining the details of the classification process in FIG.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a rearrangement process in order of shooting date and time according to the second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is a diagram for explaining the details of the rearrangement processing in FIG.

FIG. 9 is a flowchart illustrating a classification process for each subject according to the third embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining the details of the classification process in FIG.

Claims (20)

[Claims] 1. An image processing apparatus capable of handling image data and information about the image data, the information acquiring unit acquiring information about the image data corresponding to a plurality of the image data, and the acquired information. An image processing apparatus comprising: a classification unit that classifies and / or rearranges the corresponding plurality of image data based on information about the image data. 2. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the information about the image data is included in the same image file together with the corresponding image data. 3. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the information regarding the image data is included in a file different from the corresponding image data. 4. The information regarding the image data includes at least one of information regarding a generation date and time of the image data, information regarding a photographing location of the image data, information regarding a photographed subject, and information regarding a creator of the image data. The image processing device according to any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that. 5. The apparatus further comprises output means for printing out the image data based on a result of classification and / or rearrangement by the classification means.
The image processing apparatus according to claim 4. 6. The information regarding the image data is associated with an identifier representing the type of information, and the classification means uses the identifier to acquire information necessary for the classification and / or rearrangement. The image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5, which is characterized. 7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the classification unit generates and stores a list in which storage destination information of image data belonging to the classification is collected for each classification classification.
The image processing device according to any one of 1. 8. The list has an identifier for identifying the list, and the classifying unit adds the identifier of the list including the image to information about the image data of the image data. The image processing apparatus according to claim 7, wherein 9. The information regarding the image data is XM.
9. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the image processing apparatus is described in any one of L, SGML, and HTML languages. 10. An image processing method capable of handling image data and information about the image data, the information obtaining step of obtaining information about the image data corresponding to a plurality of the image data; And a sorting step of sorting and / or rearranging the corresponding plurality of image data based on information about the image data. 11. The image processing method according to claim 10, wherein the information about the image data is included in the same image file together with the corresponding image data. 12. The image processing method according to claim 10, wherein the information about the image data is included in a file different from the corresponding image data. 13. The information about image data includes at least one of information about a date and time of generation of image data, information about a shooting place of the image data, information about a photographed subject, and information about a creator of the image data. The image processing method according to any one of claims 10 to 12, characterized in that. 14. The method according to claim 10, further comprising an output step of printing out the image data based on a result of classification and / or rearrangement by the classification step. The image processing method described in. 15. Information related to the image data is associated with an identifier representing a type of information, and the classification step uses the identifier to acquire information necessary for the classification and / or rearrangement. 11. The method according to claim 10,
The image processing method according to claim 14. 16. The classification step comprises:
The image processing method according to any one of claims 10 to 15, wherein a list in which the storage destination information of the image data belonging to the type is collected is generated and stored. 17. The list has an identifier for identifying the list, and the classifying step adds the identifier of the list including the image to information about the image data of the image data. The image processing method according to claim 16, characterized in that. 18. The information about the image data is XM.
The image processing method according to any one of claims 10 to 17, wherein the image processing method is described in any one of L, SGML, and HTML. 19. A computer program causing a computer device to function as the image processing device according to claim 1. Description: 20. A computer-readable storage medium storing the computer program according to claim 19.