JP2005142768A - Image processing system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processing apparatus capable of carrying out coding taking into account the importance of each information included in a document. <P>SOLUTION: The image processing system includes an image processing apparatus 10 that selects a document including at least one description column for a processing object document, generates a coded image on the basis of information described on the description column and data with respect to a described position of the information, composes the generated code image with the processing object document and outputs a composite document. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an image processing system that performs processing related to images such as administrative documents.

  In recent years, various documents have been printed using a printer. These documents include important documents such as official documents such as resident's cards and contracts.

With regard to such highly important documents, it is traditionally guaranteed that the document is original by imprinting a seal or using special paper (in other words, guaranteeing the originality) so that the contents cannot be tampered with later. It was.
JP-A-6-176036 Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 10-224540

  On the other hand, in recent years, attempts have been made to increase the convenience for users by outputting documents issued by administrative agencies and the like at local branch offices or printers at home. However, in the conventional method described above, since the tampering prevention measure is applied by a method such as stamping or special paper, the above attempt has not been realized specifically.

  Therefore, Patent Document 1 discloses a technique for embedding a document image representing the content of a document and a digital signature in the document using a two-dimensional code. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2004-228688 discloses a technique for synthesizing and printing a two-dimensional code obtained by encoding a document content on a document background. According to these, it becomes possible to know the presence or absence of falsification by comparing the document image represented by the two-dimensional code with the contents of the document in which the two-dimensional code is embedded.

  However, since the formats of many highly important documents including official documents are determined in advance, the entire contents of the documents need not be encoded. However, the disclosed technique does not take this point into consideration, so that there is a problem that the area of the image of the two-dimensional code portion becomes large and the layout of the document is limited.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and an object thereof is to provide an image processing apparatus capable of performing encoding in consideration of the importance of each piece of information included in a document.

  The present invention for solving the problems of the conventional example described above is an image processing system including an encoding side device and a decoding side device, wherein the encoding side device processes a document including at least one text description field. As a target document, a means for generating a code image based on the text described in the text description field and data relating to the description position of the text, and the generated code image are combined with the processing target document and combined. Means for generating a document, wherein the decoding side device accepts the synthesized document, and the text included in the synthesized document and its description based on the code image synthesized in the received synthesized document Means for decoding data relating to position, the decoded text and its description position Data about the is characterized by being subjected to a predetermined processing related to authentication of the composite document.

  In addition, the present invention for solving the problems of the conventional example described above includes a document including at least one description field as a processing target document, and includes information described in the description field and data related to a description position of the information. And a means for generating a code image, and a means for generating the synthesized document by synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document.

  Here, the information that is the basis of the code image may include a character string included in the information and data related to a display mode of the character string.

  Furthermore, the data related to the description position of the information may be data that specifies the position of the description column on the processing target document. In this case, according to an instruction from the user, the image processing apparatus further includes a target selection unit that selects at least a part of the information included in the received processing target document as a processing target, and the unit that generates the code image includes the processing target and The code image may be generated based on at least a part of the information and the data regarding the description position of the information. At this time, the target selecting means may allow the user to specify one of the description fields and select information described in the specified description field as the processing target.

  Further, the present invention for solving the problems of the above-described conventional example is a decoding-side device, which is combined with means for receiving a composite document generated by the above-described image processing device, and the received composite document. Based on the code image, means for decoding the information included in the synthesized document and the data related to the description position, generating an image based on the decoding result, and generating the generated image and the image of the synthesized document And a means for generating a difference image and a means for outputting the difference image.

  In the image processing apparatus, the data related to the description position of the information may be data including form identification information for specifying a form of the processing target document. A decoding-side apparatus according to an aspect of the present invention corresponding to such an image processing apparatus is based on a means for receiving a composite document generated by the image processing apparatus and a code image combined with the received composite document. A means for decrypting the information included in the composite document and data relating to the form identifier, and generating a form based on the decrypted form identifier, and the decrypted information in the description field in the generated form. And a means for generating a difference image between the image and the synthesized document image, and a means for outputting the difference image.

  Furthermore, an image processing method according to an aspect of the present invention uses a document including at least one description field as a processing target document, based on information described in the description field and data related to a description position of the information. And a step of synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document.

  In addition, a program according to another aspect of the present invention provides a computer with a document including at least one description field as a processing target document, based on information described in the description field and data on a description position of the information. A procedure for generating a code image and a procedure for synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document are executed.

[Embodiment 1]
A first embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. As shown in FIG. 1, the image processing system according to the present embodiment includes a coding side system 1 and a decoding side system 2. Here, the code side system 1 includes an image processing apparatus 10 and an image forming apparatus 20, and the decoding side system 2 includes an image processing apparatus 30 and an image reading apparatus 40.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the image processing apparatus 10 includes a control unit 11, a storage unit 12, an operation unit 13, a display unit 14, and an external interface (I / F) 15. The control unit 11 operates in accordance with a program stored in the storage unit 12, generates a document to be processed, generates a code image related to the generated document, and synthesizes it (synthesized document generation process). Is going. Specific processing contents of the control unit 11 such as the synthetic document generation processing will be described in detail later. Note that these processes may be implemented as printer driver processes for the image forming apparatus 20 executed by the control unit 11.

  The storage unit 12 is a computer-readable recording medium that stores a program executed by the control unit 11. The storage unit 12 also operates as a work memory that stores various data in the processing of the control unit 11.

  The operation unit 13 is a mouse, a keyboard, or the like, accepts a user instruction operation, and outputs the content of the instruction operation to the control unit 11. The display unit 14 is a display that displays an image in accordance with an instruction input from the control unit 11. The external I / F 15 is, for example, a USB (Universal Serial Bus) interface, and in the present embodiment, the image forming apparatus 20 is connected via the external I / F 15.

  The image forming apparatus 20 is a printer, for example, and forms an image on a sheet based on image data input from the image processing apparatus 10.

  The image processing device 30 of the decoding-side system 2 basically has the same configuration as the image processing device 10 of the coding-side system 1, and like the image processing device 10 shown in FIG. The storage unit 32, the operation unit 33, the display unit 34, and an external interface (I / F) 35 are included (not shown), but the contents of processing in the control unit 31 are different. That is, the control unit 31 of the image processing apparatus 30 extracts a code portion from the image data input from the image reading apparatus 40 and performs a decoding process, and a process (authentication) for authenticating the content of the document using the decoding result. Support processing). The specific contents of this authentication support process will be described in detail later.

  The storage unit 32, the operation unit 33, and the display unit 34 are the same as the storage unit 12, the operation unit 13, and the display unit 14 of the image processing apparatus 10, respectively. Further, the external I / F 35 is, for example, a USB (Universal Serial Bus) interface as well as the external I / F 15, except that the image reading device 40 is connected to the external I / F 35.

  The image reading device 40 may be a general scanner, optically reads a document placed on a reading surface, and outputs the read result as image data.

[Processing of control unit 11]
The document to be processed, which is generated by the control unit 11 according to the present embodiment, is common to at least one information description column (X1 to X3) as shown in FIG. Information (for example, text) is described in each information description column of form data including included information (hereinafter referred to as fixed information; Y1 to Y5 in FIG. 3). That is, in this type of document, information described in the information description column is variable information, that is, variable information. One of the characteristic features of the present embodiment is that the control unit 11 can change the information. Generating a code image with at least a part of information as a processing target.

  Although the control unit 11 generates a document to be processed here, the document to be processed may be acquired from the outside (for example, a server device) via a network or the like.

  Based on the document to be processed (processing target document), the control unit 11 includes information described in each information description column, data related to the description position of each information (position data), and data related to an information display mode. And extract. Since the information described here is generally a text, in the following description, only the text information will be described for the sake of simplicity. However, this information may be an image.

  In addition, the position data related to the description position of the information includes the vertical and horizontal sizes of the information displayed on the processing target document (in the case of text, the vertical and horizontal sizes of the rectangle surrounding the character string image representing the text) and the position coordinates (predetermined coordinate system). The coordinate information of the description position in FIG. The coordinate system representing the position coordinates may be a coordinate system of a predetermined unit such as a point with the lower left corner of the document being (0, 0). Specifically, the position coordinates represent the position of the upper left corner of the rectangle surrounding the character string image. Instead of these, the coordinates of two vertices on the diagonal line of the rectangle on this coordinate system may be used as position data relating to the description position.

  The control unit 11 performs a predetermined encoding process based on the information described in each extracted information description column and the position data regarding the description position of each information, and generates a code image. Here, the encoding method may be one in which text information is expressed in binary. If the code is expressed in binary as described above, a pattern representing “0” (FIG. 4A) and a pattern representing “1” (FIG. 4B) according to the code are displayed as shown in FIG. 4. A two-dimensional code image (FIG. 4C) arranged in a rectangular shape can be obtained. In FIG. 4C, the entire outer periphery is a pattern (in other words, a synchronous pattern) representing “1”, and is used for the process of specifying the code image portion at the time of decoding.

  The control unit 11 combines the generated code image at a predetermined position on the processing target document to generate a combined document, and ends the process. An image of the synthesized document obtained by this synthesis is as shown in FIG. In FIG. 5, the code image (C) is overwritten at the corresponding position of the original document to be processed and synthesized.

  The control unit 11 outputs the image data of the composite document to the image forming apparatus 20 via the external I / F 15, and the image forming apparatus 20 forms an image of the document as shown in FIG.

  As described above, in the present embodiment, the information described in the information description column is more important than the fixed information because the information described in the information description column is more important than the fixed information. By mainly encoding the included information, the area of an image of a portion such as a two-dimensional code that is a code image can be suppressed small, and the degree of freedom of document layout can be ensured.

[Processing of control unit 31]
Next, processing of the control unit 31 of the image processing device 30 of the decoding side system 2 will be described. The control unit 31 performs processing (authentication support processing) that assists the user in determining whether the content has been tampered with based on image data (combined document reading result) received via the external I / F 35. .

  Specifically, the control unit 31 specifies the code image portion from the image data input from the external I / F 35. The processing for specifying this differs depending on the type of code image, but when a code image as shown in FIG. 4 is used, a synchronous image portion is detected, and a binary image is detected from the code image portion surrounded by the synchronous image. The code represented by is read.

  In the present embodiment, the encoded information includes each text described in each description column in the processing target document, the vertical and horizontal sizes of each rectangle surrounding the character string image representing each text, and each rectangular Position coordinates.

  And the control part 31 performs the process shown in the following FIG. 6, selecting each text as an attention text sequentially. First, the control unit 31 secures a storage area for storing an image of the size on the storage unit 32 based on the rectangular vertical and horizontal size data surrounding the character string image corresponding to the text of interest, and stores the storage area in the storage area. The attention text is drawn (S1).

  Next, the control unit 31 extracts a partial image of a rectangular area defined by the position coordinates and size data of the rectangle corresponding to the text of interest from the image data input from the external I / F 35 (S2). . The control unit 31 generates a difference image between the extracted partial image and the image obtained by the drawing in the process S1 (S3). The difference image here is an emphasis expression (for example, represented by a red pixel) where the corresponding pixels are different from each other between the partial image extracted in step S2 and the image obtained by the drawing in step S1. Etc.) can be generated.

  Further, the control unit 31 checks whether or not there is a text that is not a noticed text (S4), and if there is such a text, selects one of them as the next noticed text (S5), It returns to process S1 and continues a process.

  If there is no text that is not the text of interest in process S4 (that is, if all texts have been processed), the difference image generated for each text is displayed on the display unit 34, and the process ends.

  The user refers to the difference image of each text displayed on the display unit 34, and determines that the tampering has been performed when it is recognized that there is a difference due to the highlighted pixel (for example, a red pixel). become able to.

[Another example of encoded information]
Further, as described above, in the case of performing comparison based on an image in the decoding side device, it is preferable that data relating to a display mode of information is included as information to be encoded. Here, the display mode of information is the display mode of the character string if it is text. For example, font data (font type, shape (separate italic, bold, etc.), size used for drawing the character string Etc.). When form identification information (which identifies the position of each description field) is used as data representing the description position of the information, a character string in each description field included in the form identified by the form identification information. Data such as left-handed, centering, right-handed, etc. may be included as data relating to the display mode of information.

  In this case, the decoding-side system 2 refers to the font data and arrangement state data when drawing the information (here, text) obtained as the decoding result in the area secured in the storage unit 32. Then, drawing is performed according to these data.

[Another example of position data related to the description position]
In the description so far, in the encoding side system, the information described in the information description column and the position data are encoded to generate a composite document. Instead of such data, the form identification information and the information description column are generated. The information (text) described in (1) may be encoded to create a composite document.

  In this case, the control unit 11 of the image processing apparatus 10 extracts the information described in each information description column based on the processing target document, the information (text) described in each extracted information description column, A predetermined encoding process is performed based on the form identification information for identifying the form of the document to be processed, and a code image is generated. Here, the information described in each information description field may be arranged in a predetermined order (for example, the order of the identifiers in the description field), or is associated with the identifier in the corresponding description field and used for the encoding process. May be.

  Further, as shown in FIG. 7, the storage unit 32 of the image processing apparatus 30 of the decoding-side system 2 stores, in advance, position data and attribute data indicating the position of the description column included in the form for the form identification information. Stores the associated database. Here, the position data of the description field is obtained by associating the identifier of the description field with the coordinate information defining the description field on the composite document. For example, if the description field is a rectangle, the upper left corner and the lower right corner of the rectangle. Coordinate information. The attribute data is data relating to the display mode of the text drawn in the description column, and is, for example, the font type, font size, font shape (italic etc.), and the arrangement position (left-handed, centering, etc.) with respect to the description column .

  The control unit 31 extracts the form identification information from the read code, and retrieves and acquires the position data of the description column associated with the form identification information from the database. Then, as in the processing shown in FIG. 6, the control unit 31 sequentially selects information such as text read from the code image as attention information, and describes an image corresponding to the attention information on the storage unit 32. With reference to the position data in the description field, a storage area for storing an image of the size of the description field is secured, and attention information is drawn in the storage area according to the set attribute data.

  Next, the control unit 31 includes a description column (the order in which the attention information is included or the order in which the attention information is included) in which the image corresponding to the attention information is described among the image data input from the external I / F 35. For example, the partial image of the rectangular area defined by the position data of the corresponding description field can be specified by the identifier or the like of the description field is extracted. And the control part 31 produces | generates the difference image of this extracted partial image and the image obtained by drawing by process S1. The control unit 31 repeats this process for each piece of information, and displays the difference image generated for each piece of information on the display unit 34.

[Selection of information to be encoded]
In the above description, the code image is generated based on the information extracted from each information description field included in the processing target document. However, for example, the information description field for extracting the information that is the source of the code image is set as the user. May be specified.

  In this case, after generating the processing target document, the control unit 11 of the image processing apparatus 10 displays the generated processing target document on the display unit 14, and among the information description fields included in the processing target document, the code A selection operation of an information description column for extracting information that is the basis of an image is received from the user via the operation unit 13. Since this process is the same as the process of selecting a predetermined part in the image displayed on the screen by operating the mouse, a detailed description of the process content is omitted.

  Then, the control unit 11 extracts information included in the selected information description field, and encodes the extracted information and position data related to the description position of the information to generate a code image. Then, the control unit 11 generates a synthesized document by synthesizing the document to be processed. Here, instead of selecting the information description column, a character string portion may be selected.

[Another example of difference image generation]
In addition, in the difference image generation by the control unit 31, the number of corresponding pixels different from each other is calculated while shifting the corresponding positions of the two image data to be compared, and the comparison result at the corresponding position where the number is the minimum May be generated as a difference image.

[Another example of comparison]
Further, here, as the processing of the decoding side system 2, after drawing an image based on the text obtained by decoding the code image, the drawn image is compared with the corresponding portion of the read image to obtain a difference image It is easy to determine the presence or absence of falsification by generating the OCR (optical data) from the text obtained by decoding the code image and the portion of the read image specified by the description position of the text. It may be possible to check the presence or absence of falsification by comparison with text (OCR text) obtained by character recognition.

In addition, the display unit displays an image drawn based on text obtained by simply decoding the code image without generating a difference image, and a partial image corresponding to the drawing position of the text among the read images. 34 may be displayed so that the user can compare.
In addition, a warning message may be displayed to the user only when the generated difference image includes difference pixels of a predetermined number of pixels or more.

[Embodiment 2]
Further, in addition to the above-described example, a copy check pattern may be combined with the processing target data. Therefore, a copy check pattern is also combined with the processing target data (as disclosed in JP 2001-346032 A). The same). Therefore, an image processing system according to the second embodiment of the present invention will be described below.

  The image processing system according to the present embodiment has the same configuration as that according to the first embodiment, but the operation of the control unit 11 of the image processing apparatus 10 is slightly different. That is, the control unit 11 according to the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 3, includes at least one information description field (X1 to X3) and information (hereinafter, fixed) included in the same type of document. A processing target document including Y1 to Y5) in FIG. In this case, instead of the control unit 11 generating the document to be processed, it may be acquired from the outside (for example, a server device).

  The control unit 11 extracts information described in each information description column and data (position data) related to the description position of each information based on the document (processing target document) that is the processing target. Since the information described here is generally a text, in the following description, only the text information will be described for the sake of simplicity. However, this information may be an image.

  In addition, the position data related to the description position of the information includes the vertical and horizontal sizes of the information displayed on the processing target document (in the case of text, the vertical and horizontal sizes of the rectangle surrounding the character string image representing the text) and the position coordinates (predetermined coordinate system). The coordinate information of the description position in FIG. Note that the position data has a modification similar to that in the first embodiment.

  The control unit 11 performs a predetermined encoding process based on the information described in each extracted information description column and the position data regarding the description position of each information, and generates a code image. Here, the encoding method may be one in which text information is expressed in binary. If the code is expressed in binary as described above, a pattern representing “0” (FIG. 4A) and a pattern representing “1” (FIG. 4B) according to the code are displayed as shown in FIG. 4. A two-dimensional code image (FIG. 4C) arranged in a rectangular shape can be obtained. In FIG. 4C, the entire outer periphery is a pattern (in other words, a synchronous pattern) representing “1”, and is used for the process of specifying the code image portion at the time of decoding.

  Further, the control unit 11 according to the present embodiment generates an image in which the code images are repeatedly arranged, replaces a part of the image of each code with a pattern (latent image pattern) as shown in FIG. The image pattern is arranged so that a character string or image designated by the user in advance can be represented. The latent image pattern shown in FIG. 8 is composed of isolated points, and the character string portion formed by the latent image pattern does not appear after copying, while in FIGS. 4 (a) and 4 (b). Since the portion described by the code pattern shown appears even after copying, a whitened image emerges according to the latent image pattern shown in FIG. 4A and 4B and the latent image pattern shown in FIG. 8 have the same print density on the paper (for example, it is lit). Keep the same number of pixels (black pixels)).

  When the image arranged in this way (hereinafter referred to as copy check background image) is enlarged, as shown in FIG. 9, a character composed of a latent image pattern in a part of the code pattern (right half side in FIG. 9). The letter “C” in FIG. For reference, FIG. 9 shows a result of synthesizing characters described in the document to be processed (here, the character string “Taro Yamada”).

  The control unit 11 synthesizes the copy check background image thus generated as the background of the document to be processed to generate a composite document, and ends the process. An image of the synthesized document obtained by this synthesis is as shown in FIG. FIG. 9 is an enlarged view of a part of FIG.

  The control unit 11 outputs the image data of the composite document to the image forming apparatus 20 via the external I / F 15, and the image forming apparatus 20 puts the document image as shown in FIG. Form. Further, when the sheet on which the composite document shown in FIG. 10A is formed is copied, the latent image pattern portion is whitened as shown in FIG. 10B and embedded as a latent image. A rare image appears.

[Processing of control unit 31]
Next, the operation of the control unit 31 of the decoding-side system 2 that has received the image data as the result of reading this composite document will be described. The control unit 31 detects a code image as shown in FIG. 4C from the image read by the image reading device 40. In the read image, a plurality of code images are arranged, and all of them are detected. Then, based on the detected plurality of code image portions, the information represented by the code image is decoded, and thereafter, the same processing as that shown in FIG. 6 of the first embodiment is performed.

  Here, as a decoding method, it is possible to improve the decoding accuracy by determining each code while comparing the corresponding codes of each code image portion.

[Process to remove copy check pattern]
Here, simply by performing the same processing as in the first embodiment, the image generated based on the information decoded from the code image does not include a latent image pattern or code pattern. In some cases, it is erroneously detected as a falsified portion, or these patterns are highlighted on the difference image, making it difficult to see the difference image. Therefore, before generating a difference image, so-called isolated point removal processing may be performed in which a block of pixels having a predetermined size or less is removed from the read image data. Also, the code image is reconstructed from the decoding result, and the arrangement of the code image is subtracted from the read image data (the code reconstructed from the decoding result among the pixels that are black pixels on the read image data) Process that changes the corresponding pixel on the image array image to a black pixel) and generates a difference image between the result of the subtraction and the image drawn based on the decoding result It is good to do.

  In addition, the color and density of the copy check pattern are made different from the color and density of the character string included in the document to be processed, and the decoding side system 2 removes pixels corresponding to the color and density of the copy check pattern. (It may be a white pixel). For example, the character string of the document to be processed may be formed of black (K), and the copy check pattern may be formed of cyan (C). In addition, basically, it is only necessary to be able to separate the code image portion in a color space so that the code image portion can be recognized even in a place where the copy check pattern and the character string on the processing target document are overlapped. C) and magenta (M) may be used, and the copy check pattern may be formed of cyan (C) and yellow (Y). In this case, if the composite document formed with the color components is read by the image reading device 40 and the color space of the read image is converted to the YMC color space, only the document to be processed is included in the C component, and the Y component Since only the copy check pattern (code image) is included, the decoding process and the comparison process of the code image are facilitated. In this example, the color material is CMY, which is used for image formation, but may be separated by red (R), green (G), blue (B), and the like obtained by mixing them.

[Modification 1]
Further, the description in the first and second embodiments so far has been made on the assumption that the image processing device 30 of the decoding-side system 2 is a single device, but as shown in FIG. The server apparatus 50 may be provided in the system, and the image processing apparatus 10 may store the processing target document in a data storage (not shown) in the server apparatus 50. In this case, the image processing apparatus 10 issues a unique identifier for each generated processing target document, and stores the identifier and the processing target document in the server device 50 in association with each other. In addition, the control unit 11 of the image processing apparatus 10 encodes the identifier, and synthesizes it with the processing target document by including it in the encoded image.

  Further, as processing related to decoding and collation support, a method for performing collation support processing on the server device 50 side, and the server device 50 provides a document to be processed to the decryption side system 2 so that the decryption side system 2 Since there is a method for performing processing for supporting collation, each will be described separately.

  First, when performing processing for supporting collation on the server device 50 side, the control unit 31 of the decoding-side system 2 sends the read image data to the server device 50 side to request collation. The server device 50 extracts a code image portion from the image data, and decodes information encoded as a code image. Then, based on the information (including the identifier of the processing target document) obtained as a result of the decoding, the corresponding processing target document is extracted from the data storage, and a difference image between the processing target document and the received image data Is transmitted to the decoding side system 2, and the control unit 31 of the decoding side system 2 displays and outputs the difference image on the display unit 34.

  Note that an image generated on the server device 50 side based on text obtained as a result of decoding and position data related to the description position may also be used.

  Next, a method for performing processing for supporting collation in the decoding-side system 2 will be described. In this case, when receiving the input of the image data read by the image reading device 40, the image processing device 30 of the decoding-side system 2 detects the code image portion from the image data, and processes the target document included in the code image. Is sent to the server device 50 to request a document to be processed. In response to the request from the decryption side system 2, the server device 50 provides the requested processing target document to the decryption side system 2.

  Then, the decoding system 2 receives the processing target document received from the server device 50 and the text generated as a result of decoding based on the encoded image and the image generated by the control unit 31 based on the position data regarding the description position. Using this, a difference image is generated, and this difference image is displayed and output on the display unit 34.

  Further, when communication with the server device 50 is not possible, the decoding-side system 2 may generate a difference image itself (by the processing shown in FIG. 6 or the like). Further, when tampering is detected by the difference image obtained from the information from the server device 50 side, the user himself / herself (by the process shown in FIG. 6) generates a difference image so that the presence / absence of tampering can be confirmed. You may keep it.

  In addition, even when using any of these methods, it is preferable to encrypt the communication path among the encoding side system 1, the decoding side system 2, and the server device 50.

[Modification 2]
In the above-described first and second embodiments, the image processing apparatus 10 and the image forming apparatus 20 are described as separate apparatuses. However, the image processing apparatus 10 performs image formation. It may be configured integrally with the device 20. In this case, an input of a processing target document is received from an external device such as a personal computer, and composite document generation processing is performed. At this time, the display unit 14 and the operation unit 13 are not necessarily required.

  Furthermore, the image processing apparatus 10 of the encoding side system 1 and the image processing apparatus 30 of the decoding side system 2 may be integrated. For example, the systems according to the first and second embodiments of the present invention can be implemented as a multi-function peripheral that integrally includes the image processing apparatus 10, the image forming apparatus 20, the image processing apparatus 30, and the image reading apparatus 40.

1 is a configuration block diagram illustrating an example of an image processing system according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is a block diagram showing an example of an image processing apparatus. It is explanatory drawing showing the example of a format of a process target document. It is explanatory drawing showing the example of a code image. It is explanatory drawing showing the example of a synthetic | combination document. It is a flowchart figure showing the example of a process by the side of decoding. It is explanatory drawing showing the example for the specification of the position data using form identification information. It is explanatory drawing showing the example of the pattern which comprises a copy check pattern. It is explanatory drawing showing the partial expansion state of the synthetic document which included the copy check pattern in the code image. It is explanatory drawing showing the example of the synthetic | combination document which included the copy check pattern in the code | symbol image, and its copy result. It is a block diagram showing another example of the image processing system according to the embodiment of the present invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Code | symbol side system, 2 Decoding side system, 10,30 Image processing apparatus, 20 Image forming apparatus, 40 Image reading apparatus, 11,31 Control part, 12,32 Storage part, 13,33 Operation part, 14,34 Display part 15, 35 External interface, 50 server device.

Claims (11)

An image processing system including an encoding device and a decoding device,
The code side device is:
A document including at least one text description field is a processing target document.
Means for generating a code image based on the text described in the text description field and data relating to the description position of the text;
Means for synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document and generating a synthesized document;
Including
The decoding side device
Means for accepting the composite document;
Means for decoding the text contained in the synthesized document and the data relating to the description position based on the code image synthesized in the accepted synthesized document,
An image processing system, wherein the decrypted text and data relating to the description position thereof are subjected to a predetermined process relating to authentication of the composite document. A document including at least one description field is a processing target document.
Means for generating a code image based on information described in the description field and data relating to a description position of the information;
Means for synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document and generating a synthesized document;
An image processing apparatus comprising: The image processing apparatus according to claim 2,
The information which becomes the origin of the said code image contains the character string contained in the said information, and the data regarding the display mode of the said character string, The image processing apparatus characterized by the above-mentioned. The image processing apparatus according to claim 2 or 3,
The data relating to the description position of the information is data specifying a position of a description column on the processing target document. An image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 2 to 4,
In accordance with an instruction from the user, further includes target selection means for selecting at least a part of the information included in the received processing target document as a processing target,
The image processing apparatus, wherein the means for generating the code image generates a code image based on at least a part of information to be processed and data relating to a description position of the information. The image processing apparatus according to claim 5,
The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the target selecting unit causes a user to specify one of the description fields and selects information described in the specified description field as the processing target. The image processing apparatus according to claim 2 or 3,
The data relating to the description position of the information is data including form identification information for specifying a form of the document to be processed. Means for accepting a composite document generated by the image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 2 to 6;
Means for decoding information contained in the synthesized document and data relating to the description position based on the code image synthesized in the accepted synthesized document;
Means for generating an image based on the result of the decoding, and generating a difference image between the generated image and the image of the synthesized document;
Means for outputting the difference image;
A decoding-side apparatus comprising: Means for accepting a composite document generated by the image processing device according to claim 2 or claim 3 or claim 7;
Means for decoding information contained in the synthesized document and data relating to the form identifier based on the code image synthesized in the accepted synthesized document;
Based on the decrypted form identifier, a form is generated, an image describing the decrypted information is generated in the description field in the generated form, and the difference between this image and the image of the composite document Means for generating an image;
Means for outputting the difference image;
A decoding-side apparatus comprising: Generating a code image based on information described in the description field and data related to the description position of the information, with a document including at least one description field as a processing target document;
Combining the generated code image with the processing target document;
A method for generating a composite document, comprising: On the computer,
A procedure for generating a code image based on information described in the description field and data related to the description position of the information, with a document including at least one description field as a processing target document;
A procedure for synthesizing the generated code image with the processing target document;
An image processing program for executing

Images