JP2007109179A - Image processing apparatus, its control method, and program - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processing apparatus capable of creating vector data that can reproduce a clipart region in an original image as faithfully as possible and is easily reused, its control method, and a program. <P>SOLUTION: The original image is divided into region image by every attribute. A predetermined region image having a predetermined attribute of the divided region images is cut from the original image. Based on the appearance color of the cut predetermined region image, at least one representative color constituting the predetermined region image is determined. A color image having the determined representative color is extracted from the predetermined region image. A border line of the extracted color image is extracted. Border line information representing the extracted border line is created. Based on the contents of the created border line information, border line information is modified. Using the modified border line information, vector data of the predetermined region image is created. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data, a control method therefor, and a program.

  2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, systems for storing or transmitting electronic documents generated by digitizing documents instead of paper have become widespread due to the digitization of information. Documents to be digitized are expanding from black and white binary documents to full-color (multi-value) documents.

  The electronic document here is not limited to simply converting a document on paper into image data by an image reading device such as a scanner. The obtained document image is divided into regions for each attribute and post-processed according to each region. Includes image data. As this post-processing, for example, a character area is subjected to character recognition processing and converted into a character code string. Also. For the line art area, there is a process of converting it into outline vector data.

  Conventionally, various attempts have been made to create such an electronic document. As a conventional example of document image area division, there is Patent Document 1.

  In Patent Document 1, a binarized image of an input color image is generated, and the binarized image is divided into areas such as a text area, a line art area, and a photograph area (picture area). It is disclosed. The area segmentation method here determines the size of the black pixel block while calculating the connectivity of the binary image, and compares each area with the characteristics of the character area, line art area, photo area, etc. It is a method of dividing.

Further, for example, Patent Literature 2 is a conventional example of outline vector conversion to be converted into outline vector data. In this patent document 2, the contour line of a binary image is traced, and the obtained contour vector is selected to vectorize the contour line. Further, by replacing the obtained vector data with a graphic command for drawing a polygon or the like, the CAD data can be used.
JP 2002-314806 A Japanese Patent No. 0288999

  However, according to the configuration of the related art, when the contour line in the image is vectorized, a plurality of contour lines in the image are handled as one contour line data. Therefore, the obtained vector data is one vector data composed of drawing information for drawing a plurality of contour lines. When such vector data is reused for editing or the like, it is not possible to individually edit arbitrary contour lines in a plurality of contour lines expressed by one vector data. It was difficult to reuse.

  The present invention has been made in order to solve the above-described problem, and an image processing apparatus capable of generating vector data that can reproduce a clip art area in an original image as faithfully as possible and can be easily reused. It is an object to provide a control method and a program.

In order to achieve the above object, an image processing apparatus according to the present invention comprises the following arrangement. That is,
An image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
Dividing means for dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Cutting out means for cutting out a predetermined area image having a predetermined attribute from the original image among the area images divided by the dividing means;
Determining means for determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined area image based on the appearance color of the predetermined area image cut out by the cutting means;
Image extracting means for extracting a color image having the representative color determined by the determining means from the predetermined area image;
Contour extracting means for extracting the contour of the color image extracted by the image extracting means;
Outline information generating means for generating outline information representing the outline extracted by the outline extracting means;
Outline information correction means for correcting the outline information based on the content of the outline information generated by the outline information generation means;
Generation means for generating vector data of the predetermined area image using the outline information corrected by the outline information correction means.

  Preferably, the generation unit generates contour line information including a drawing command for drawing a contour line, a color and width thereof, and a color in the contour line as vector data of the predetermined region image having the predetermined attribute. To do.

Preferably, the contour line information correction means is
The contour information generated by the contour information generation means includes a first outer contour line, a first inner contour line in the first outer contour line, and contour information expressed by a first inner color therebetween. First determination means for determining whether or not one image exists;
When the first image exists as a result of the determination by the first determination means, the second inner color second having the same shape as the first inner contour line constituting the first image and different from the first inner color. Second determination means for determining whether or not an outline exists;
If the second contour line exists as a result of the determination by the second determination means, the information processing apparatus includes: deletion means for deleting the contour line information expressing the first inner contour line.

  Preferably, the contour line information generation unit further includes first contour line information corresponding to the first image, the second contour line corresponding to the second image, and a second internal color representing the second internal color. 2 Controls the description order of contour information.

In order to achieve the above object, a method for controlling an image processing apparatus according to the present invention comprises the following arrangement. That is,
A control method for an image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
A division step of dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Of the region images divided in the dividing step, a cutting step of cutting out a predetermined region image having a predetermined attribute from the original image,
A determination step of determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined region image based on the appearance color of the predetermined region image cut out in the cutting step;
An image extraction step of extracting a color image having the representative color determined in the determination step from the predetermined region image;
An outline extraction step of extracting an outline of the color image extracted in the image extraction step;
An outline information generation step for generating outline information representing the outline extracted in the outline extraction step;
A contour information correction step for correcting the contour information based on the content of the contour information generated in the contour information generation step;
A generation step of generating vector data of the predetermined area image using the outline information corrected in the outline information correction step.

In order to achieve the above object, a program according to the present invention comprises the following arrangement. That is,
A program for realizing control of an image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
A division step of dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Of the region images divided in the dividing step, a cutting step of cutting out a predetermined region image having a predetermined attribute from the original image,
A determination step of determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined region image based on the appearance color of the predetermined region image cut out in the cutting step;
An image extraction step of extracting a color image having the representative color determined in the determination step from the predetermined region image;
An outline extraction step of extracting an outline of the color image extracted in the image extraction step;
An outline information generation step for generating outline information representing the outline extracted in the outline extraction step;
A contour information correction step for correcting the contour information based on the content of the contour information generated in the contour information generation step;
And generating a vector data of the predetermined area image using the contour information corrected in the contour information correcting step.

  ADVANTAGE OF THE INVENTION According to this invention, the image processing apparatus which can reproduce the clipart area | region in an original image as faithfully as possible, and can produce | generate the vector data which can be reused easily, its control method, and a program can be provided.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

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

  An image input unit 10 is an image reading apparatus such as a scanner. From here, the document image to be processed is input. An area dividing unit 11 divides an input document image into areas (for example, rectangular areas) such as a character area, a line drawing area, a table area, and a photograph area for each attribute. The remaining images other than these divided areas are set as background areas.

  Reference numeral 12 denotes a clip art area cutout unit, which further cuts out a clip art area (image) from the obtained photo area. Here, cutting out means cutting out an arbitrary area in the photographic area and cutting out the entire photographic area.

  It should be noted that the clip art area in the present invention means an image area in which the number of appearance colors is a predetermined number of colors (for example, 256 gradations) or less in the photo area. An example of such a clip art image is a computer graphic image (an image other than a natural image such as a photograph) artificially created on the image processing software by the user. That is, an image in which pixels of the same color constituting the image are not relatively discrete like a natural image corresponds to a clip art image.

  Reference numeral 13 denotes an area extraction unit that extracts a color area (color image) for each appearance color of an image constituting a clipart area. Reference numeral 14 denotes an outline extraction unit that extracts an outline for each extracted color area.

  15 is a contour line information generation unit. In particular, in this embodiment, when a contour line is expressed by vector data (image description language), a description of a drawing command that defines the contour line as contour line information (for example, , SVG path command).

  Reference numeral 16 denotes an outline information correction unit that executes correction of the obtained outline information.

  Here, a specific correction method will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining a method of correcting contour information according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  FIG. 2A shows an example in which the image 30 is expressed by a contour line according to the conventional technique. In the related art, the image 30 is expressed by designating the first color partial image 30a and the second color partial image 30b by specifying the outline and the internal color thereof. In this case, the image 30 includes the contour line 33 and the contour line 34, the internal color (first color) between them, the internal color (third color) of the contour line 34, and the internal color ( The second color) is expressed by one piece of contour line information.

  That is, in the prior art, the image 30 is expressed as a shape in which a donut-shaped image defined by the contour line 33 and the contour line 34 and an elliptical image defined by the contour line 35 are overlapped.

  On the other hand, FIG. 2B shows an example in which the image 30 is expressed by a contour line according to the embodiment of the present invention. In the embodiment, the outline information defined by the outlines 33, 34, and 35 is once generated by the outline information generation unit 15 in the image 30 as in the related art.

  Thereafter, the contour information correction unit 16 includes a plurality of second contours having the same shape and having different internal colors within the first contour 33 of interest among the contours 33, 34, and 35. 34 and 35 are determined. Then, the second contour line 34 that defines the internal color of the first contour line 33 among the determined second contour lines 34 and 35 is deleted (corrected).

  In this case, the image 30 includes the first contour information composed of a description expressing the contour 31 and its internal color, and the second contour information composed of a description expressing the internal color of the contour 35. It is expressed by one outline information.

  That is, in the embodiment, the image 30 is expressed as a shape in which two ellipses having different sizes, each consisting of an ellipse image defined by the contour line 31 and an ellipse image defined by the contour line 23, are overlapped. Become. Thereby, vector data representing the two ellipses can be generated, so that each of them can be easily edited individually (position correction, shape change, etc.).

  Thus, in the contour line information correction unit 16, the contour information obtained from the contour line information generation unit 15 includes the first outer contour line, the first inner contour line in the first outer contour line, and the first inner portion between them. It is determined whether or not there is a first image composed of contour line information representing a color.

  As a result of the determination, if the first image exists, the second contour line having the same shape as the first inner contour line constituting the first image and the second internal color (different from the first color internal color) are expressed. It is determined whether or not there is a second image composed of contour line information. In other words, the presence of the second image determines whether or not the first inner contour line constituting the first image exists.

  As a result of the determination, if the second contour line exists, the contour information related to the first inner contour line is deleted, and the first image is represented by the first contour line and its first internal color. To do. In addition, a first layer for drawing the first image and a second layer higher than the first layer for drawing the second image are set for each image so that the first image is drawn behind the second image. . When drawing, the superimposition relationship is expressed for each image according to this layer.

  In this way, by controlling the order of superimposing the images, it is possible to prevent an erroneous operation in which a small outline image is hidden under a large outline image. In addition, since this superimposition order corresponds to the description order of the contour line information representing each image, it is possible to easily generate an image drawing command having the intended superposition order.

  The image processing apparatus can be realized by an information processing apparatus such as a personal computer. This information processing apparatus has standard components (for example, a CPU, a RAM, a ROM, a hard disk, an external storage device, a network interface, a display, a keyboard, and a mouse) mounted on a general-purpose computer.

  Next, a sample document image input from the image input unit 10 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of a document image according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  This document image is printed on recording paper by an output device such as a printer. In the document image, as for characters, large characters such as titles and relatively small characters such as explanatory texts are configured. As for the image, a photographic image and a clip art image that is an image having a relatively smaller number of appearance colors than the photographic image are configured.

  When the printed matter on which the document image is printed is read by an image reading apparatus such as an image scanner and the region division processing is executed on the read image, a text region 23, a photo region 21, and a clipart region 22 are obtained as illustrated.

  Next, vectorization processing of the clip art area will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the vectorization process of the clipart area according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  First, in step S100, the region extraction unit 13 selects a representative color in the clip art region. In step S101, the region extraction unit 13 executes region division using the selected representative color. In step S102, the contour extraction unit 14 performs contour extraction of the obtained region.

  In step S103, the outline obtained by the outline extraction unit 14 is vectorized by the outline information generation unit 15 using the selected representative color and the extracted outline. This vectorization is realized, for example, by generating contour information in which a contour line is described with a Path command and an internal color is described with a Fill command in the description of SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics).

  Next, the outline information correction unit 16 analyzes the content of the outline information obtained from the outline information generation unit 15. Then, based on the analysis result, the contour information as described above is corrected.

  Next, details of the processing in step S100 in FIG. 4 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing details of the processing in step S100 according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  In step S110, if the processing target image constituting the clipart area is an RGB image of 8 bits for each color, for example, the upper 4 bits are taken out of 8 bits of each color, and any of 16 × 16 × 16 color cubes is taken. Categorize. Here, this one is called a color cube.

  In step S111, the appearance frequency (histogram) of the pixels belonging to the color cube to be processed is calculated for each color cube to be classified.

  In step S112, the color cubes are rearranged in the order of appearance frequency of pixel values belonging to the color cubes.

  In step S113, a color cube from the color cube having the highest pixel appearance frequency to the Nth (for example, 100) color cubes or a color cube having an appearance frequency equal to or higher than a predetermined value is selected. In other words, a process of placing the colors constituting the processing target image into N colors or representative colors of N colors or less is performed, ignoring color cubes with low appearance frequency of pixels.

  In step S114, when the color near the boundary of the color cube appears most frequently, the frequency of the same color region is counted across multiple color cubes due to an error. Integrate the frequency of neighboring color cubes into the most frequent color cube.

  In step S115, a representative color for each finally obtained color cube is calculated. For example, the average color of the color values of the appearing pixels on the color cube may be calculated as the representative color, or the most frequently appearing color in the color cube may be calculated as the representative color.

  Next, details of the processing in step S101 in FIG. 4 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing details of the processing in step S101 according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  In step S120, each pixel of the image to be processed is mapped to the closest representative color group. When each group is represented by an index value, an index image is generated.

  Next, in step S121, pixel data noise removal processing is executed. This noise removal processing includes processing such as isolated point pixel removal, edge projection removal, and hole filling. Then, by this noise removal processing, the contour line of the processing target image is formed.

  Next, details of the processing in step S102 in FIG. 4 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing details of the processing in step S102 according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  In step S130, an image having the same index value of the index image is generated. Then, the generated image is regarded as a binary image, and the obtained binary image is labeled.

  In step S131, contour tracking is performed on the image for each independent label obtained by the labeling process. Here, in particular, extraction of (X, Y) coordinate values (coarse contour vectors) that define the boundary lines of the image is executed.

  In step S132, function approximation such as a Bezier function is executed based on the extracted rough contour vector data.

  In step S133, noise data is removed from the contour line data obtained by function approximation. This noise data includes noise data that creates a minute loop.

  Next, details of the processing in step S103 in FIG. 4 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing details of the processing in step S103 according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  In step S140, the SVG Path instruction that defines the contour is replaced with an independent Path instruction for each closed path.

  In step S141, outline information including an attribute designating a color (representative color) in the region, a boundary line thickness, and a color attribute is generated in the Path command. In addition, the outline information is corrected as described above as necessary.

  Next, a specific example of the vectorization process of the clip art area will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 9 is a diagram for explaining a specific example of the vectorization processing of the clipart area according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  150 is an example of an input image, for example, a bitmap image.

  When the process of step S100 in FIG. 4 is performed on the input image 150, for example, seven representative colors (color 1 to color 7) are selected as the representative colors 151.

  Next, by executing the processing in step S101, the input image 150 is divided into region images for each representative color constituting the input image 150. Here, for example, the image 152 is a region image divided from the input image 150 of color 2. In particular, the image 152 is a binary image indicating the same color (color 2) portion extracted from the input image 150.

Next, by performing the process of step S104 on this binary image, that is, when the labeling process is performed with the black pixel block of this image 152 as a partial area one by one, as shown in FIG. A labeling image consisting of three partial areas 152a to 152c is obtained from 152. Then, contour extraction is performed on each of these three partial areas 152a to 152c. Further, when the same processing is executed for all the region images for the other representative colors, an outline image 153 for the input image 150 is obtained.

  As a result, it can be expressed by one partial area in the input image 150, for example, the partial area 154 (corresponding to the partial area 152a), the contour line 155, and the color 156 therein. As described above, each of the plurality of partial areas constituting the input image can be expressed by the outline corresponding to the partial area and the outline information indicating the internal color. That is, the input image can be expressed by the contour line information of the partial area constituting it.

  Next, a specific example of the contour line extraction unit 14 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining a specific example of the contour line extraction unit according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  The contour line extraction unit 14 searches for the next boundary point counterclockwise from the previous boundary point around the target boundary point. That is, an operation of searching for a pixel that changes from 0 to 1 among 8 neighboring pixels of the target pixel is executed. This process is continued until it returns to the start point.

  Thereby, a contour line configured as a closed loop (closed curve) can be extracted. Also, the contour line is approximated by a straight line / curve using the end point of the contour. As a result, a contour line composed of smoother line segments can be extracted, and the vectorization process is executed on the contour line.

  Next, an example of the contour line information generated by the contour line information generation unit 15 will be described with reference to FIG.

  FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of contour line information according to the embodiment of the present invention.

  As described above, the clip art image can be expressed by the contour lines of the partial areas constituting the clip art image and the colors inside thereof. Therefore, for example, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) can be expressed as the contour line information indicating the contour line and the color inside the contour line.

  In FIG. 11, a description 1100 surrounded by <˜> represents a block of commands, and this description 1100 shows a description example (Path description) of a Path command (path instruction) in SVG.

  Here, the description 1101 is a description (fill command (fill command)) for designating the color inside the area surrounded by the outline. A description 1102 is a description (stroke command (stroke command)) for designating the color of the contour line. A description 1103 is a description (stroke command (stroke command)) for designating the width of the contour line.

  A description 1104 is a description for designating the drawing position (coordinate value) of the contour line. In particular, in this description 1104, M is a relative movement element, h and v are horizontal and vertical relative coordinate movement instructions, c and q are cubic and quadratic Bezier curve instructions, and z is a closepath (path Close) command.

  A description 1105 is a comment part regarding the description 1104.

  When the clipart area in the input image is expressed by the contour line information as shown in FIG. 11, for example, the contour line information as shown in FIG. 12 can be configured. In particular, FIG. 12 shows contour information consisting of a composite path and a partial path.

  Here, the partial path represents one closed curve (contour loop) with one path description.

  In addition, the compound path represents a plurality of closed curves (contour line loops) by one path description. In this compound path, when the outer contour line and the inner contour line are described by changing the rotation direction of the contour coordinates, the contour line can be painted with a designated color.

  For example, in the contour extraction described with reference to FIG. 10, the left pixel in the tracking direction is a black pixel, so that the outer contour extraction is counterclockwise as shown in FIG. On the other hand, the extraction of the inner contour line is clockwise. When these extracted contour lines are described by a composite path, it is possible to express a description in which a space between the contour lines defined thereby is filled with a desired color.

  Further, in the image expressed by this composite path, if the description of the inner contour line is deleted, it can be changed to a description that fills the inside of the outer contour line with an arbitrary color.

  Here, in the prior art, normally, when an image in an input image is expressed by contour information, it is described by a composite path. That is, a plurality of closed curves are expressed by contour line information that represents a set of one closed curve. For this reason, it is difficult to edit each individual closed curve unit.

  Therefore, in the embodiment, the content of the contour line information obtained from the contour line information generation unit 15 is analyzed by the contour line information correction unit 16, and the description content of the contour line information as described above according to the content. To correct. Here, the correction means at least one of a case where the description content is changed and a case where the composite path is changed to some partial paths and composite paths.

  As described above, according to the embodiment, the clip art area in the read image is divided from the clip art area into partial areas of the same color, and each of the divided partial areas is a contour line (closed curve). And the color. Thereby, when generating vector data of a clip art region, it is possible to generate vector data with contour line information (contour line and its internal color) of a partial region constituting the clip art region.

  In generating the contour line information, an edge image is separately extracted from the clip art region. Then, based on the edge image, the outline of the partial area divided from the clipart area for each same color is corrected.

  Here, the edge image is extracted in a shape that is relatively close to the contour line of the read image that is the original image. Therefore, correcting the contour lines of the partial areas divided for the same color from the clip art area with this edge image generates contour information of a shape more faithful to the contour lines of the images constituting the original image. Means you can.

  As described above, in this embodiment, it is possible to generate vector data of a clipart area that can reproduce the configuration of the original image more faithfully.

  Although the embodiment has been described in detail above, the present invention can take an embodiment as a system, apparatus, method, program, storage medium, or the like. Specifically, the present invention may be applied to a system composed of a plurality of devices, or may be applied to an apparatus composed of a single device.

  In the present invention, a software program (in the embodiment, a program corresponding to the flowchart shown in the drawing) that realizes the functions of the above-described embodiments is directly or remotely supplied to a system or apparatus. In addition, this includes a case where the system or the computer of the apparatus is also achieved by reading and executing the supplied program code.

  Accordingly, since the functions of the present invention are implemented by computer, the program code installed in the computer also implements the present invention. In other words, the present invention includes a computer program itself for realizing the functional processing of the present invention.

  In that case, as long as it has the function of a program, it may be in the form of object code, a program executed by an interpreter, script data supplied to the OS, or the like.

  Examples of the recording medium for supplying the program include a floppy (registered trademark) disk, a hard disk, and an optical disk. Further, as a recording medium, magneto-optical disk, MO, CD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, magnetic tape, nonvolatile memory card, ROM, DVD (DVD-ROM, DVD-R), etc. is there.

  As another program supply method, a browser on a client computer is used to connect to an Internet home page. Then, the computer program itself of the present invention or a compressed file including an automatic installation function can be downloaded from a homepage of the connection destination to a recording medium such as a hard disk. It can also be realized by dividing the program code constituting the program of the present invention into a plurality of files and downloading each file from a different homepage. That is, a WWW server that allows a plurality of users to download a program file for realizing the functional processing of the present invention on a computer is also included in the present invention.

  In addition, the program of the present invention is encrypted, stored in a storage medium such as a CD-ROM, distributed to users, and key information for decryption is downloaded from a homepage via the Internet to users who have cleared predetermined conditions. Let It is also possible to execute the encrypted program by using the key information and install the program on a computer.

  Further, the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the computer executing the read program. Further, based on the instructions of the program, an OS or the like running on the computer performs part or all of the actual processing, and the functions of the above-described embodiments can be realized by the processing.

  Further, the program read from the recording medium is written in a memory provided in a function expansion board inserted into the computer or a function expansion unit connected to the computer. Thereafter, the CPU of the function expansion board or function expansion unit performs part or all of the actual processing based on the instructions of the program, and the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing.

It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the image processing apparatus of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure for demonstrating the correction method of the outline information of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the original image of embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the vectorization process of the clipart area | region of embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the detail of a process of step S100 of embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the detail of a process of step S101 of embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the detail of the process of step S102 of embodiment of this invention. It is a flowchart which shows the detail of a process of step S103 of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure for demonstrating the specific example of the vectorization process of the clipart area | region of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure for demonstrating the specific example of the outline extraction part of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the outline information of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure which shows an example of the outline information of embodiment of this invention. It is a figure for demonstrating the outer side outline and inner side outline of embodiment of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Image input part 11 Area division part 12 Clip art area extraction part 13 Area extraction part 14 Contour line extraction part 15 Contour line information generation part 16 Contour line correction part

Claims (6)

An image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
Dividing means for dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Cutting out means for cutting out a predetermined area image having a predetermined attribute from the original image among the area images divided by the dividing means;
Determining means for determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined area image based on the appearance color of the predetermined area image cut out by the cutting means;
Image extracting means for extracting a color image having the representative color determined by the determining means from the predetermined area image;
Contour extracting means for extracting the contour of the color image extracted by the image extracting means;
Outline information generating means for generating outline information representing the outline extracted by the outline extracting means;
Outline information correction means for correcting the outline information based on the content of the outline information generated by the outline information generation means;
An image processing apparatus comprising: generation means for generating vector data of the predetermined area image using the outline information corrected by the outline information correction means. The generating means generates contour line information consisting of a drawing command for drawing a contour line, its color and width, and a color in the contour line as vector data of a predetermined region image having the predetermined attribute. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1. The contour line information correction means includes:
The contour information generated by the contour information generation means includes a first outer contour line, a first inner contour line in the first outer contour line, and contour information expressed by a first inner color therebetween. First determination means for determining whether or not one image exists;
When the first image exists as a result of the determination by the first determination means, the second inner color second having the same shape as the first inner contour line constituting the first image and different from the first inner color. Second determination means for determining whether or not an outline exists;
2. The apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a deletion unit that deletes the contour line information representing the first inner contour line when the second contour line exists as a result of the determination by the second determination unit. The image processing apparatus described. The contour information generation means further includes first contour information corresponding to the first image, second contour information corresponding to the second image, and second contour information representing the second internal color. The image processing apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the description order is controlled. A control method for an image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
A division step of dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Of the region images divided in the dividing step, a cutting step of cutting out a predetermined region image having a predetermined attribute from the original image,
A determination step of determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined region image based on the appearance color of the predetermined region image cut out in the cutting step;
An image extraction step of extracting a color image having the representative color determined in the determination step from the predetermined region image;
An outline extraction step of extracting an outline of the color image extracted in the image extraction step;
An outline information generation step for generating outline information representing the outline extracted in the outline extraction step;
A contour information correction step for correcting the contour information based on the content of the contour information generated in the contour information generation step;
A generation step of generating vector data of the predetermined area image using the outline information corrected in the outline information correction step. A control method for an image processing apparatus, comprising: A program for realizing control of an image processing apparatus that executes image processing for converting an original image into vector data,
A division step of dividing the original image into region images for each attribute;
Of the region images divided in the dividing step, a cutting step of cutting out a predetermined region image having a predetermined attribute from the original image,
A determination step of determining at least one representative color constituting the predetermined region image based on the appearance color of the predetermined region image cut out in the cutting step;
An image extraction step of extracting a color image having the representative color determined in the determination step from the predetermined region image;
An outline extraction step of extracting an outline of the color image extracted in the image extraction step;
An outline information generation step for generating outline information representing the outline extracted in the outline extraction step;
A contour information correction step for correcting the contour information based on the content of the contour information generated in the contour information generation step;
A program that causes a computer to execute a generating step of generating vector data of the predetermined area image using the contour line information corrected in the contour line information correcting step.

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