JP2010263546A - Panoramic image compositing method and device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a method and a device for compositing a panoramic image which can utilize a memory which is to be used for compositing a panoramic image more effectively, irrespective of usage conditions of a camera. <P>SOLUTION: The device for compositing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera 101, having an effective rectangular pixel area includes: an image clipping means 103 for clipping a first image from the camera output image according to a clipping size; an image-educing means 104 for generating a second image by reducing the first image to a predetermined number of pixels in a longitudinal direction of the panoramic image; a panoramic image compositing means 105 for compositing the panoramic image from the second image by utilizing the memory; and a control means 108 for setting the clipping size, indicating the maximum square area that can be clipped, at least from the camera output image, according to the direction of the camera 101. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2011,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for generating a panoramic image by combining a plurality of images.

  An image processing apparatus that generates a panoramic image by combining a plurality of images is disclosed in Patent Document 1. This image processing apparatus attempts to determine the maximum reduction ratio of each image so that a plurality of images can be combined with less than the usable memory amount (see paragraph 0022 of Patent Document 1).

JP-A-11-355553

  By the way, in recent years, a mobile phone in which a housing provided with a display portion and a housing provided with an operation portion are separately provided, and these are connected so as to be relatively movable or rotatable has become widespread. Among such mobile phones, the display housing can be rotated 90 ° to switch between a portrait screen and a landscape screen, or the display housing is turned upside down and overlapped with the operation housing. There are also products that are aimed at operability such as digital cameras. In such a camera-equipped mobile phone, it is necessary to assume that camera photography is performed in various usage forms.

  However, since the panoramic image composition disclosed in Patent Document 1 only reduces the image uniformly according to the amount of usable memory, the image is most suitable for panoramic image composition depending on the usage form of the camera. It may not be possible. As a result, the method of Patent Document 1 still has a problem that sufficient effective use of the memory cannot be achieved.

  Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a panoramic image synthesizing method and apparatus capable of more effectively using a memory used for synthesizing a panoramic image regardless of the usage form of the camera.

  The panorama image composition device according to the present invention is a device for synthesizing a panorama image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area, and an image cutout means for cutting out a first image from the camera output image according to a cutout size. And the image reduction means for generating the second image by reducing the first image so as to have a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panorama image, and the panorama image is synthesized from the second image using a memory. Panoramic image synthesizing means and control means for setting the cut-out size indicating at least a maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image according to the orientation of the camera.

  A panoramic image synthesis method according to the present invention is a method for synthesizing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area, and is a maximum that can be cut out from at least the camera output image according to the orientation of the camera. A cutout size indicating a square area is set, an image cutout unit cuts out a first image from the camera output image according to the cutout size, and an image reduction unit sets the first image to a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panoramic image. The second image is generated by being reduced so that the panoramic image synthesizing unit synthesizes the panoramic image from the second image using a memory.

  A program according to the present invention is a program for causing a program control processor to function as a device for synthesizing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area, and the first image is extracted from the camera output image according to a cut-out size. An image cutting means for cutting, an image reducing means for generating a second image by reducing the first image so as to have a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panoramic image, and a second image using the memory. A panoramic image synthesizing apparatus comprising panoramic image synthesizing means for synthesizing a panoramic image, and control means for setting the cutout size indicating at least the maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image according to the orientation of the camera. The program control processor is made to function.

  According to the present invention, the memory used for panoramic image composition can be used more effectively regardless of the usage form of the camera.

It is a block diagram which shows the functional structure of the panoramic image synthesizer by 1st Embodiment of this invention. The external appearance of the portable communication terminal which is one application example of this invention is shown, (A) is a top view in case the direction of a display part and a camera is style 1, (B) is the direction of a display part and a camera in style 2. It is a top view in a case. It is a top view in case the direction of a display part and camera of a portable communication terminal which is one application example of the present invention is style 3. It is a typical flowchart which shows the 1st example of the panoramic image synthesis method by one Example of this invention. It is a typical flowchart which shows the 2nd example of the panoramic image synthesis method by a present Example. It is a typical flowchart which shows the 3rd example of the panoramic image synthesis method by a present Example. It is a block diagram which shows the schematic internal circuit structure of the portable communication terminal which is one example of application of this invention. (A) is a schematic flowchart showing a panoramic image synthesis method according to comparative example (1), and (B) is a schematic flowchart showing a panoramic image synthesis method according to comparative example (2). (A) is a table showing the comparison between the first and second embodiments and the comparative example (1), and (B) is a table showing the comparison between the third embodiment and the comparative example (2). . It is a block diagram which shows the functional structure of the panoramic image synthesis apparatus by 2nd Embodiment of this invention.

1. First Embodiment As shown in FIG. 1, a camera 101 as an imaging device is provided with a camera sensor 102 formed of a two-dimensional photosensor, and an imaging signal of the effective pixel region is, for example, at a constant time interval (frame interval). Stored in the image memory 102. The image cutout unit 103 sequentially outputs images of a specified size from the image data stored in the image memory 102 to the cutout image reduction unit 104. The image reduction unit 104 reduces the clipped image according to the specified thinning rate, and outputs a plurality of reduced images to the panorama synthesis engine 105 as moving images.

  The panorama synthesis engine 105 generates a panorama image by combining a plurality of reduced images using the memory 106 and outputs the panorama image to the image encoding unit 107. It is assumed that panoramic image synthesis has a general processing method. For example, an input image is treated as a moving image, and a non-common part between frames of the moving image is added to generate a synthesized result of a predetermined size as a still image. In general, as the number of pixels of the panoramic image increases, the capacity of the memory 106 necessary for generating the panoramic image increases.

  The image encoding unit 107 encodes panoramic image data by a predetermined encoding method and outputs the panorama image data to a display unit (not shown).

  The image processing control unit 108 depends on the input allowable image size of the panorama synthesis engine 105 and the orientation (style) of the camera 101 to be described later, such as the cropping size of the image cropping unit 103, the thinning rate of the image reduction unit 104, and the like. Determine the parameters. Specifically, as described later, the cut-out size is determined according to the orientation of the camera 101, and the thinning rate is determined according to the input allowable image size of the panorama synthesis engine 105. Further, the image processing control unit 108 controls the operation of the panorama synthesis engine 105 and the image encoding unit 107.

2. One Example Hereinafter, a case where a panoramic image with a viewing angle of 360 ° is synthesized will be described in detail using a mobile phone with a camera function as an example.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the mobile phone in this example has a configuration in which an upper housing 10 and a lower housing 20 are connected so as to be relatively rotatable, and a display unit 11 is provided in the upper housing 10. Yes. It is assumed that the camera 12 is mounted on the back side of the lower housing 20 so that the longitudinal direction of the lower housing 20 coincides with the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel region (arrow S direction).

  FIG. 2A shows a posture in which the longitudinal direction of the display unit 11 coincides with the longitudinal direction of the lower housing 20 (the arrow S direction of the camera) in a state where the upper housing 10 and the lower housing 20 are opened. This is shown as Style 1. 2B shows the state in which the upper housing 10 is opened and further rotated 90 ° with respect to the lower housing 20, and the longitudinal direction of the display unit 11 is the longitudinal direction of the lower housing 20 (the direction of the arrow S of the camera). ) Is shown as a style 2. In any style, the user performs an operation of holding the lower housing 20 with his hand, pointing the camera 12 toward the subject, and pressing the shutter button while viewing the subject image on the display unit 11.

  Further, as shown in FIG. 3, this mobile phone can be folded and overlapped with the lower housing 20 with the display unit 11 of the upper housing 10 exposed to the front side. In this state, the longitudinal direction of the display unit 11 coincides with and overlaps with the longitudinal direction of the lower housing 20 (the direction of the arrow S of the camera), and the display unit 11 and the camera 12 are directed in opposite directions on substantially the same line of sight. This is style 3. In style 3, the user performs an operation of holding the upper and lower sides of the overlapping housing with his / her hand, pointing the camera 12 toward the subject, and pressing the shutter button while looking at the horizontally long screen of the display unit 11 like a normal digital camera. .

  This mobile phone has means for detecting which style the current posture is, and the style detecting means itself may adopt a known method. As will be described later, according to this embodiment, appropriate image cutout and image reduction can be performed according to the orientation (style) of the mobile phone camera, and a panoramic image is synthesized while using the memory efficiently. be able to.

  As a precondition of the embodiment, the effective number of pixels of the camera sensor 102 is 1632 pixels in the horizontal (long side) direction, 1224 pixels in the vertical (short side) direction, a horizontal (horizontal) angle of view of 57 °, and vertical (vertical). The angle of view is 44 °, the maximum zoom magnification of the camera lens is 2.55, the maximum allowable number of pixels in the vertical direction of the input image (composition source image) of the panorama synthesis engine 105 is 480, and the image encoding unit 107 is JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) encoder.

2.1) Example 1
Here, it is assumed that the camera 101 is used in the style 1 or the style 2 shown in FIG. 2A or 2B.

  In FIG. 4, the original image 201 of the effective pixel area output from the camera sensor 102 is horizontal 1224 × vertical 1632 (pixels) because the camera sensor 102 is in the vertical direction (arrow S direction) as shown in FIG. .

  The image cutout unit 103 cuts out the largest square image 202 from the original image 201 in accordance with the size setting from the image processing control unit 108. In this case, the maximum square image 202 has 1224 × 1224 pixels. Therefore, an image can be cut out without changing the vertical vertical angle of view (44 °).

  Subsequently, the image reduction unit 104 reduces the square image 202 having 1224 × 1224 pixels to the number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 according to the thinning rate from the image processing control unit 108. The number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 depends on the capacity of the memory 106 and the maximum image size that can be encoded by the image encoding unit 107. Here, since the maximum number of pixels allowed in the vertical direction of the panoramic image composition engine 105 is 480, the square image 202 having 1224 × 1224 pixels is reduced to the reduced image 203 having 480 × 480 pixels (magnification 2). .55). Since the image is only reduced, the horizontal angle of view is maintained at 44 °.

  In this way, by panning the camera of the mobile phone, N reduced images 203 are output from the image reduction unit 104 to the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 as a moving image. In order to generate a 360 ° panoramic image in the panoramic image synthesis engine 105, N = 360 ° ÷ view angle 44 ° = about 8.18, and 8.18 reduced images (480 × 480) are required. . In this case, the number of pixels in the horizontal direction of the panorama composite image is 480 pixels × 8.18 = 3926 pixels.

  Therefore, generally, in the case of style 1 or style 2 shown in FIG. 2A or 2B, if the viewing angle is θ °, the image processing control unit 108 sets the number N of reduced images to θ / 44. The image cropping size is determined according to the current style, the image thinning rate is determined so that the number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image composition engine 105 can be obtained, and the image cropping unit 103 and the image reduction unit 104 are controlled. To do.

2.2) Example 2
When the camera is used in style 1 or style 2 shown in FIG. 2 (A) or FIG. 2 (B), unlike the first example, a reduced image that satisfies the above conditions for reducing the original image as it is is generated. Is also possible.

  In FIG. 5, the original image 301 of the effective pixel region output from the camera sensor 102 is 1224 × 1632 (pixels) since the camera sensor 102 is in the vertical direction (arrow S direction) as shown in FIG. .

  According to the second example, the image cutout unit 103 does not cut out, and the image reduction unit 104 directly reduces the original image 301 to the number of pixels that can be input to the panorama synthesis engine 105. That is, the image reduction unit 104 converts the original image 301 having a pixel number of 1224 × 1632 into a pixel number of 360 × 480 allowed by the panoramic image composition engine 105 according to the thinning rate (magnification 3.4) from the image processing control unit 108. The image is reduced to a reduced image 302. Since the image is only reduced, the horizontal angle of view is maintained at 44 °.

  In this way, by panning the camera of the mobile phone, N reduced images 302 are output from the image reduction unit 104 to the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 as moving images. In order to generate a 360 ° panoramic image in the panoramic image synthesis engine 105, N = 360 ° ÷ view angle 44 ° = approximately 8.18, and 8.18 reduced images (360 × 480) are required. . In this case, the number of pixels in the horizontal direction of the panoramic composite image is 360 pixels × 8.18 = 2945 pixels.

  Therefore, generally, in the case of style 1 or style 2 shown in FIG. 2A or 2B, if the viewing angle is θ °, the image processing control unit 108 sets the number N of reduced images to θ / 44. The image reduction rate is determined so that the number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 is obtained, and the image reduction unit 104 is controlled.

2.3) Example 3
In Example 3, it is assumed that the camera is used in the style 3 shown in FIG. 3 and an original image of a landscape screen is captured.

  In FIG. 6, the original image 401 of the effective pixel area output from the camera sensor 102 is 1632 × 1224 (pixels) since the camera sensor 102 is in the horizontal direction (arrow S direction) as shown in FIG. 3.

  The image cutout unit 103 cuts out the maximum square image 402 from the original image 401 in accordance with the size setting from the image processing control unit 108. In this case, the maximum square image 402 has 1224 × 1224 pixels. Since the size in the horizontal direction is limited, the horizontal angle of view in this case changes from 57 ° to 42.75 ° of the original image.

  Subsequently, the image reduction unit 104 reduces the square image 402 having the number of pixels 1224 × 1224 to the number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 according to the thinning rate from the image processing control unit 108. Here, since the maximum allowable number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panorama image synthesis engine 105 is 480, the square image 202 having the number of pixels 1224 × 1224 is reduced to the reduced image 403 having the number of pixels 480 × 480 (magnification 2). .55). Since the image is only reduced, the horizontal angle of view is maintained at 42.75 °.

  In this way, by panning the camera of the mobile phone, N reduced images 403 are output from the image reduction unit 104 to the panoramic image synthesis engine 105 as a moving image. In order to generate a 360 ° panoramic image in the panoramic image synthesis engine 105, N = 360 ° ÷ view angle 42.75 ° = approximately 8.42, and 8.42 reduced images (480 × 480) are necessary. It becomes. In this case, the number of pixels in the horizontal direction of the panorama composite image is 480 pixels × 8.42 = 4042 pixels.

  Therefore, generally, in the case of style 3 shown in FIG. 3, if the viewing angle is θ °, the image processing control unit 108 obtains the number N of reduced images by θ / 42.75, and the image according to the current style. The image cut-out rate is determined so that the number of pixels allowed by the panoramic image composition engine 105 can be obtained, and the image cutout unit 103 and the image reduction unit 104 are controlled.

3. Mobile communication terminal with camera function According to the above-described embodiment, the composition and memory of a panoramic image with a desired viewing angle are obtained by performing appropriate image cutout and image reduction according to the orientation (style) of the camera of the mobile phone. Both savings can be achieved. Hereinafter, a portable communication terminal incorporating the panoramic image synthesis apparatus according to the above-described embodiment will be described.

  7, the mobile communication terminal includes a camera 501, a display unit 502 such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), a style detection unit 503 that detects the orientation of the camera 501, an operation unit 504 such as a keypad and a touch panel, various programs, and image data. And the like, a wireless transmission / reception unit 506 for performing wireless communication with a base station of the mobile communication system, and a control unit 507 for realizing various functions of the mobile communication terminal. The control unit 507 can be realized by a program control processor such as a CPU.

  The camera 501 can perform a videophone or normal shooting, and the display unit 502 can display video information of the camera. The memory 505 stores programs for realizing the image cutout unit 103, the image reduction unit 104, the panorama image synthesis engine 105, the JPEG encoder 107, and the image processing control unit 108, and the control unit 507 stores them. By executing the program as necessary, the above-described panoramic image synthesis apparatus according to the present embodiment can also be realized. In addition, the control unit 507 performs communication control with the base station via the wireless transmission / reception unit 506.

  The mobile communication terminal shown in FIG. 7 has a configuration in which an upper housing 10 and a lower housing 20 are connected to each other so as to be relatively rotatable, as shown in FIGS. 502 is provided. A camera 501 is mounted on the back side of the lower housing 20 so that the longitudinal direction of the lower housing 20 coincides with the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel region (the arrow S direction).

  As described above, the control unit 507 executes the programs for realizing the image cutout unit 103, the image reduction unit 104, the panorama image synthesis engine 105, the JPEG encoder 107, and the image processing control unit 108, so that the style Appropriate image segmentation and image reduction are executed in accordance with the orientation (style) of the camera 501 detected by the detection unit 503, and a panoramic image having a desired viewing angle can be synthesized while using the memory 505 effectively. .

4). Effects Hereinafter, the effects of the above-described embodiments will be described in comparison with comparative examples.

4.1) Comparative Example FIG. 8A shows a case where the camera orientation is vertical, and it is assumed that the original image 601 of the effective pixel area output by the camera has the number of pixels of horizontal 1224 × vertical 1632. From this original image 601, a rectangular image 602 having a pixel number of 1060 × 796 that is the maximum in the aspect ratio of the horizontally long VGA image size is cut out. Thereby, the angle of view in the horizontal direction is reduced to 38.1 ° from the relationship of 1224: 1060 = 44: 38.1.

  Subsequently, the reduced image 603 having a pixel number of 640 × 480 is reduced by reducing the rectangular image 602 having a pixel number of 1060 × 796 pixels so that the number of vertical pixels becomes the maximum number of vertical pixels 480 allowed by the panorama image synthesis engine. Get. Since the image is only reduced, the horizontal angle of view is maintained at 38.1 °. A plurality of reduced images 603 having the number of pixels of 640 × 480 obtained in this manner are input as moving images to the panoramic image synthesis engine. In order to obtain a 360 ° panorama image with the panorama image synthesis engine, about 9.44 reduced images (640 × 480) are required because of the relationship of 360 ° ÷ view angle 38.1 ° = about 9.44. The number of pixels required in the direction is 640 pixels × 9.44 pixels = 6042 pixels.

  FIG. 8B shows a case where the camera orientation is landscape orientation, and it is assumed that the original image 701 in the effective pixel area output from the camera has 1632 pixels × 1224 pixels. An equivalent-size image is cut out from the original image 701 and reduced so that the number of vertical pixels becomes the maximum number of vertical pixels 480 allowed by the panoramic image synthesis engine. As a result, a reduced image 702 having a pixel number of 640 × 480 can be obtained directly from the original image 701. Since the image is only reduced, the horizontal angle of view is maintained at 57 °. A plurality of reduced images 702 having the number of pixels of 640 × 480 obtained in this way are input as moving images to the panoramic image synthesis engine. In order to obtain a 360 ° panorama image with the panorama image synthesis engine, about 6.32 reduced images (640 × 480) are required from the relationship of 360 ° ÷ view angle 57 ° = about 6.32. The number of pixels required is 640 pixels × 6.32 = 4042 pixels.

4.2) Comparison As shown in FIG. 9A, when Example 1 shown in FIG. 4 is compared with Comparative Example (1), the number of pixels in the horizontal direction of the combined panoramic image is compared with Comparative Example (1). Is 6042 pixels, whereas in Example 1 in this embodiment, it is 3926 pixels, and this embodiment can realize 360 ° panoramic shooting with a smaller number of pixels. Since the thinning rate (zoom magnification d) is the same, this embodiment uses the memory more effectively.

  In the same FIG. 9A, comparing Example 2 shown in FIG. 5 with Comparative Example (1), the number of pixels in the horizontal direction of the combined panoramic image is 6042 in Comparative Example (1). On the other hand, in Example 2 in this embodiment, there are 2945 pixels, and in this embodiment, 360 ° panoramic shooting can be realized with a smaller number of pixels. Although the thinning rate (zoom magnification d) is higher in the present embodiment, it can be seen that the memory is used more effectively than that. As described above, since the image quality and the memory efficiency are in a trade-off relationship, any method may be adopted depending on which element is important.

  As shown in FIG. 9B, when the example 3 shown in FIG. 6 is compared with the comparative example (2), the angle of view is lower in the example 3 of this example, and the synthesized panoramic image With respect to the number of pixels in the horizontal direction, the thinning rate (zoom magnification d), and memory efficiency, Example 3 of this example is equivalent to Comparative Example (2). In other words, in Example 3 of the present embodiment, even if the image is cut out and the angle of view is sacrificed, as a result, the performance is not deteriorated as compared with Comparative Example (2). Therefore, in the case of the style 3 shown in FIG. 3, even if the example 3 shown in FIG. 6 is adopted, neither image quality nor memory efficiency is deteriorated.

4.3) Effect As can be seen from the comparison table of FIG. 9, the overall image quality deteriorates by adopting a method (Example 1 or Example 3) that cuts out and reduces the maximum square image from the original image according to the style. The memory efficiency can be improved without doing so. Therefore, if the image quality is important, it is desirable to adopt Example 1 or Example 3 depending on the style.

  Also, style 1 or style 2 employs a method (Example 2) for reducing an original image without extracting it, and style 3 uses a method (Example 3) for extracting and reducing a maximum square image from an original image. Although the image quality is slightly deteriorated at 1 or 2, the memory efficiency can be further improved. Therefore, if emphasizing memory efficiency, it is desirable to adopt Example 2 or Example 3 depending on the style.

5). Second Embodiment Various methods are conceivable for style detection. The panoramic image synthesis apparatus according to the second embodiment of the present invention employs an acceleration sensor.

  As shown in FIG. 10, an acceleration sensor 802 is incorporated in a camera 801 to detect the direction of gravity. The style determination unit 803 determines whether the camera is style 1 or 2 (FIG. 2) or style 3 (FIG. 3) from the detected direction of gravity, and outputs it to the image processing control unit. Since other configurations and operations are the same as those of the first embodiment shown in FIG. 1, the same reference numerals are assigned and description thereof is omitted.

  The present invention is applicable to a mobile terminal such as a mobile phone with a camera.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Upper housing 11 Display part 12 Camera 20 Lower housing 101 Camera 102 Camera sensor 103 Image extraction part 104 Image reduction part 105 Panorama synthesis engine 106 Memory 107 Image encoding part 108 Image processing control part

Claims (15)

An apparatus for synthesizing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area,
Image cutout means for cutting out the first image from the camera output image according to the cutout size;
Image reduction means for generating a second image by reducing the first image so as to have a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panoramic image;
Panoramic image synthesis means for synthesizing a panoramic image from the second image using a memory;
Control means for setting the cut-out size indicating at least the maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image according to the orientation of the camera;
A panoramic image synthesizer characterized by comprising:   When the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area of the camera is the vertical direction, the first image cut out according to the cut-out size is either the image of the maximum square area or the camera output image itself. The panoramic image synthesis apparatus according to claim 1.   The first image is the image of the maximum square area when priority is given to the image quality of a panoramic image, and the camera output image itself when priority is given to the data reduction amount of the panoramic image. The panoramic image synthesis apparatus according to claim 2.   The said 1st image cut out according to the said cut-out size when the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area | region of the said camera is a horizontal direction is an image of the said largest square area, The any one of Claims 1-3 characterized by the above-mentioned. 2. A panoramic image synthesis device according to 1. A method for synthesizing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area,
Depending on the orientation of the camera, set a cutout size that indicates at least the maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image,
An image cutout means cuts out the first image from the camera output image according to the cutout size,
An image reduction means generates the second image by reducing the first image so as to have a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panoramic image,
A panoramic image synthesizing unit synthesizes a panoramic image from the second image using a memory;
A panoramic image synthesis method characterized by the above.   When the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area of the camera is the vertical direction, the first image cut out according to the cut-out size is either the image of the maximum square area or the camera output image itself. The panoramic image synthesis method according to claim 5.   The first image is the image of the maximum square area when priority is given to the image quality of a panoramic image, and the camera output image itself when priority is given to the data reduction amount of the panoramic image. The panoramic image synthesis method according to claim 6.   6. When the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area of the camera is a horizontal direction, the first image cut out according to the cut-out size is an image of a maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image. The panoramic image synthesis method according to any one of -7. A program for causing a program control processor to function as a device for synthesizing a panoramic image from an output image of a camera having a rectangular effective pixel area,
Image cutout means for cutting out the first image from the camera output image according to the cutout size;
Image reduction means for generating a second image by reducing the first image so as to have a predetermined number of pixels in the vertical direction of the panoramic image;
Panoramic image synthesis means for synthesizing a panoramic image from the second image using a memory;
Control means for setting the cut-out size indicating at least the maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image according to the orientation of the camera;
A program for causing the program control processor to function as a panoramic image synthesizing apparatus.   When the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area of the camera is the vertical direction, the first image cut out according to the cut-out size is either the image of the maximum square area or the camera output image itself. The program according to claim 9.   The first image is the image of the maximum square area when priority is given to the image quality of a panoramic image, and the camera output image itself when priority is given to the data reduction amount of the panoramic image. The program according to claim 10.   The first image cut out according to the cut-out size when the longitudinal direction of the effective pixel area of the camera is a horizontal direction is an image of a maximum square area that can be cut out from the camera output image. The program according to any one of -11.   A mobile communication terminal with a camera, comprising the panoramic image synthesis device according to claim 1.   A mobile communication terminal with a camera that executes the panoramic image synthesis method according to claim 5.   A camera-equipped mobile communication terminal having a control unit that executes the program according to claim 9.

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