JP2006121258A - Vehicle mounted camera system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To obtain a vehicle mounted camera in which sense of incongruity of a video image is prevented from occurring due to magnification of the video image by image processing. <P>SOLUTION: From the camera video image 1C of a high pixel camera (about two million pixels) fixed to a vehicle, video image of a required part 1CL is clipped with the screen size of a monitor 3M in the vehicle and projected onto the monitor 3M. Consequently, a high definition video image at a required part within the field of view on the periphery of the vehicle can be projected with the screen size of the monitor without performing image processing for magnifying the image. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an in-vehicle camera system including an imaging camera attached to a vehicle.

  As an imaging camera attached to a vehicle, a camera having a VGA size is currently used. When it is necessary to partially enlarge and display an image of the imaging camera on a monitor, image processing such as pixel interpolation technology is performed. The camera image is enlarged by generating and synthesizing pseudo data using.

  However, the monitor image enlarged by applying such image processing such as interpolation to the camera image may be blurred in the image, or the image may be uncomfortable (for example, a jaggy that occurs at a color boundary). felt.

  The present invention has been made to overcome such technical concerns, and an object thereof is to enable enlargement of a camera image while maintaining high image quality of a monitor image.

  In the in-vehicle camera system of the invention according to claim 1, the number of pixels of the imaging camera attached to the vehicle is set to be larger than the number of pixels of the screen size of the monitor provided in the vehicle and displaying the video. It is characterized by.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the in-vehicle camera system according to the first aspect, an image of a local range required during driving of the vehicle from the camera image of the imaging camera is displayed on the monitor screen size. The camera image of the cut-out part is displayed on the screen of the monitor.

  Hereinafter, various embodiments of the subject of the present invention will be described in detail along with the effects and advantages thereof with reference to the accompanying drawings.

  According to the subject matter of the present invention, it is possible to substantially enlarge an image without performing image processing such as interpolation, and to improve the quality of a displayed monitor image. I can do it.

  In particular, according to the invention of claim 2, when the driver wants to locally view an image in a range related to the safe operation on the front, rear, or side screen, the driver can display a high-definition camera image. There is an effect that can be provided.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram schematically showing a configuration example of an in-vehicle camera system according to the present embodiment. 2 and 3 are diagrams schematically showing an operation example in the in-vehicle camera system. In particular, FIG. 3 is a core drawing showing image processing when a local range image necessary for driving the vehicle is displayed on the monitor screen from the camera image of the imaging camera.

  In FIG. 1, an imaging camera 1 is attached to a front portion (not shown) of a vehicle, and includes a relatively high-quality CCD as its solid-state imaging device. The CCD converts an optical image of a subject (landscape in front of the vehicle) incident on the light receiving surface into a camera video signal and outputs the camera video signal to the control unit 2.

  The control unit 2 includes a CPU, a memory, and the like (not shown). The control unit 2 executes predetermined image processing on a camera video signal received from the imaging camera 1 in response to a selection signal to be described later. The monitor video signal thus output is output to the display unit 3 provided inside the vehicle.

  The display unit 3 has a monitor made of, for example, a liquid crystal display, and displays the video signal received from the control unit 2 on the monitor screen 3M (see FIG. 2 or FIG. 3). In addition, the display unit 3 includes a selection unit 4 such as a touch panel disposed around the monitor screen 3M, and the driver who views the video on the monitor screen 3M operates the selection unit 4 to select the display unit 3 The unit 4 outputs the selection signal to the control unit 2 side. Here, the screen size of the monitor in the display unit 3 is QVGA (240 pixels × 320 lines) or VGA (640 pixels × 480 lines). Therefore, as illustrated in FIG. 3, the size of the monitor screen 3M is expressed as X pixels × Y lines. Accordingly, the size or the number of pixels of the monitor screen 3M is XY, and in the case of VGA, the number of pixels XY is about 310,000 pixels.

  The first of the core parts in the present embodiment is to set the number of pixels of the imaging camera 1, and hence the CCD. That is, in the in-vehicle camera system, the size or the number of pixels of the imaging camera 1 is set to about 2 million pixels (1636 pixels × 1236 lines) (of course, it may be set larger than that value): For example, 5 million pixels). In other words, since the size of the monitor screen 3M is about 310,000 pixels in the VGA, the number of pixels of the imaging camera 1 is set larger than the size of the monitor screen 3M inside the vehicle or six times the number of pixels XY. I can say that.

  As described above, since the CCD camera having a relatively high image quality is employed as the imaging camera 1 outside the vehicle, the camera image 1C of the imaging camera 1 is an image of 2 million pixels (FIGS. 2 and 3). Accordingly, when the driver operates the switch of the selection unit 4 to display the entire camera image 1C of the imaging camera 1 on the monitor screen 3M inside the vehicle, the control unit 2 in FIG. 1 responds to the selection signal. By performing a predetermined thinning process on the 2 million pixel camera video 1C, a video signal for the monitor screen 3M corresponding to the reduced screen of the entire camera video is generated and output (in the case of FIG. 2).

  On the other hand, in order to display only the image of the local range 1CL required when the vehicle is driven from the camera image 1C of the imaging camera 1 on the monitor screen 3M inside the vehicle, the selection unit 4 In response to the selection signal, the control unit 2 in FIG. 1 extracts only the video of the necessary portion 1CL in the camera video 1C in response to the selection signal, and uses the extracted video signal for the monitor screen 3M. Is generated and output as a video signal (second core). That is, the control unit 2 cuts out a video of the local range 1CL corresponding to the size of the monitor screen size XY from the camera video 1C of the imaging camera 1, and then directly monitors the camera video of the cut-out location. It is displayed on the screen 3M. At that time, the control unit 2 only performs the clipping process, and does not perform any image processing necessary for enlarging the video such as interpolation. Accordingly, the driver who views the video of the local range 1CL displayed on the monitor screen in the car does not feel uncomfortable such as jaggies with respect to the cut-out screen, and the monitor screen 3M has no blur or Edges are not generated, and high-quality video is provided on the monitor screen 3M.

  As described above, only the necessary part of the image from the camera image of the high pixel camera (about 2 million pixels) attached to the front of the vehicle is cut out to the size of the monitor screen inside the vehicle and displayed on the monitor. Therefore, there is no need to perform image processing for video enlargement in the control unit (in other words, it is possible to substantially enlarge the image without creating pseudo data such as interpolation). It is possible to improve the image quality of the images displayed on the monitor screen. In particular, when the driver wants to enlarge and view a necessary part on the monitor for safety confirmation, it is possible to supply the driver with a high-definition image without blur or the like.

  In addition to the camera attached to the front part of the vehicle, the present invention can also be applied to a camera that is attached to the back (rear) or side of the vehicle and images the periphery of the vehicle.

(Appendix)
While the embodiments of the present invention have been disclosed and described in detail above, the above description exemplifies aspects to which the present invention can be applied, and the present invention is not limited thereto. In other words, various modifications and variations to the described aspects can be considered without departing from the scope of the present invention.

  The in-vehicle camera system according to the present invention can be installed in a vehicle such as an automobile.

It is a block diagram which shows typically the structural example of the vehicle-mounted camera system which concerns on this Embodiment. It is a figure which shows typically the operation example in this vehicle-mounted camera system. It is a figure which shows typically the operation example in this vehicle-mounted camera system.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Imaging camera 2 Control part 3 Display part 1C Camera image | video 1CL Image | video 3M of a required location Monitor screen

Claims (2)

The number of pixels of the imaging camera attached to the vehicle is larger than the number of pixels of the screen size of the monitor that is provided inside the vehicle and displays an image.
In-vehicle camera system. The in-vehicle camera system according to claim 1,
The image of the local range required when driving the vehicle is cut out from the camera image of the imaging camera as the size of the monitor screen, and the camera image of the cut out portion is displayed on the monitor screen. It is characterized by projecting,
In-vehicle camera system.

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