JP2012054987A - Imaging device and image designation method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an imaging device capable of easily transmitting images to predetermined transmission destinations by designating images to be shared from a large number of images photographed by a plurality of imaging devices with a simple operation.SOLUTION: A transmission tag is attached to image associated data of image data to be used for creating an electronic album, among image data acquired in photographing by a digital camera 100, and also a transmission prohibition tag is attached to image associated data of image data of which transmission is not desired. Then, by infrared communication between the digital camera 100 and a digital camera 300, image designation data indicating a photographing period of the image data with the transmission tag is transmitted, and based on the image designation data, a transmission tag is attached to image data acquired in photographing by the digital camera 300. When the digital camera 100 or the digital camera 300 is connected to an image server 400, the image data with the transmission tag is transmitted to the image server 400.

Description

  The present invention relates to an imaging apparatus having a function of transmitting an image and an image designation method using such an imaging apparatus.

  In recent years, using the ease of image transmission in an imaging device such as a digital camera, an image is transmitted from the imaging device to a predetermined external device such as a server by communication using a personal computer (PC) or communication using the Internet. In addition, an image appreciation method in which an image transmitted to a server or the like can be enjoyed by everyone is becoming popular. As an example of an apparatus for transmitting an image via such a network, for example, Patent Document 1 proposes a mobile phone that automatically transmits an image attached to an e-mail when a predetermined number of images have been taken. Yes.

In addition, by using image transmission to the network, for example, it is possible to easily create a single album by collecting images taken by people gathered in the same event. This makes it possible to create an album that allows users to enjoy scenes missed while sharing time during a trip or wedding. For example, in Patent Document 2, the shooting operation of the master digital camera and the shooting operation of the master digital camera are performed in an event or the like in connection with the proposal for linking shooting by a plurality of imaging devices. By matching the shooting time of the digital camera serving as the slave, the images can be arranged according to the actual shooting order when the album is created later.
JP 2002-165195 A JP 2004-140797 A

  Here, when creating an album from images taken by multiple imaging devices on a trip or the like, not all images are necessarily used for creating an album, and images used for creating an album are used. If there is a mixture of images not to be used, such designation is required immediately after shooting. However, it is very troublesome to designate an image used for album creation and an image not used from among a myriad of images taken by a plurality of imaging devices. In this regard, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2004-228561 does not particularly refer to selectively transmitting images that are necessary for creating an album and images that are not necessary.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and uses an imaging apparatus capable of specifying an image to be shared from among a large number of images taken by a plurality of imaging apparatuses with a simple operation, and such an imaging apparatus. An object of the present invention is to provide an image communication method.
It is another object of the present invention to provide an imaging apparatus capable of easily transmitting these images to a predetermined transmission destination and an image communication method using such an imaging apparatus.

  In order to achieve the above object, an imaging apparatus according to a first aspect of the present invention includes an imaging unit that captures an image, and a recording unit that records the captured image and image-associated information associated with the image in association with each other. An image designation information generation unit that generates information for designating a specific image from an image recorded by another imaging device, from image incidental information related to the selected image among the recorded images; And a transmission unit that transmits the generated image designation information to the other imaging device.

  In order to achieve the above object, in the imaging apparatus according to the second aspect of the present invention, the image designation information generation unit includes the image designation information, the period information indicating the period during which the image is photographed, and the above information. It is generated from at least one of position information indicating a position where an image is taken.

  In order to achieve the above object, an imaging apparatus according to a third aspect of the present invention includes a network communication unit, and the network communication unit externally selects the selected image from the recorded images. It is transmitted to a device.

  In order to achieve the above object, the imaging device according to the fourth aspect of the present invention includes a display unit, and the selected image is transmitted when the image designation information is transmitted to the other imaging device. It is characterized by displaying

  In order to achieve the above object, an imaging device according to a fifth aspect of the present invention includes a transmission unit of the imaging device that transmits the image designation information to the other imaging device, and a light projecting unit that is visible light. An infrared communication unit covered with a cut filter.

  In order to achieve the above object, an image designation method for an imaging apparatus according to a sixth aspect of the present invention includes a photographing step for photographing an image, the photographed image, and image accompanying information related to the image. An image for generating information for designating a specific image from images recorded by other photographing devices, from a recording step for recording the image in association with each other and image accompanying information related to the selected image among the recorded images A designation information generation step; and a transmission step for transmitting the generated image designation information to the other imaging device.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to provide an imaging device capable of specifying an image to be shared from among a large number of images taken by a plurality of imaging devices by a simple operation, and an image communication method using such an imaging device. it can.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a digital camera 100 as an example of an imaging apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. A digital camera 100 shown in FIG. 1 includes a microprocessing unit (MPU) 101, an operation unit 102, a photographing lens 103, an autofocus (AF) unit 104, an aperture mechanism 105, an aperture control unit 106, and an image sensor. 107, an analog front end (AFE) unit 108, an image processing unit 109, a display control unit 110, a display panel 111, a focus determination unit 112, a compression / decompression unit 113, and a recording control unit 114.
The recording medium 115, the infrared communication unit 116, the communication unit 117, and the auxiliary light emitting unit 11.
8. The digital camera 100 is communicatively connected to the imaging device (digital camera in the figure) 300 by short-range wireless communication, for example, infrared communication. In the following description, infrared communication will be described as an example of short-range wireless communication.
It does not necessarily have to be infrared communication. Further, the digital camera 100 is connected to an image server 400 which is an external device through a network 500 such as the Internet so as to be communicable.

Hereinafter, in order to simplify the description, only the configuration of the digital camera 100 will be described assuming that the digital camera 100 and the digital camera 300 have the same configuration.

The MPU 101 sequentially controls each block constituting the digital camera 100 according to the operation of the operation unit 102 from the user. The operation unit 102 is connected to the digital camera 100.
A release switch for executing shooting by the camera, a changeover switch for switching the operation mode of the digital camera 100 between the shooting mode, the playback mode, the infrared communication mode, and the like. A switch for performing various selection operations such as selection of a transmission image and a transmission prohibited image is included.

The MPU 101 also has a timer for measuring the time when the user took a picture. Thereby, the photographing time is associated with the image data obtained by photographing.

The taking lens 103 forms an image from the subject 200 on the image sensor 107. The photographing lens 103 includes a lens for autofocus (focusing). During autofocus, the MPU 101 monitors the lens position of the focusing lens while
The F unit 104 is controlled to switch the lens position of the focusing lens and focus the photographing lens 103. The diaphragm mechanism 105 is a mechanism that is provided in or near the photographing lens 103 and produces the effects of a shutter and a diaphragm. The aperture mechanism 105 is opened to a predetermined aperture by the aperture controller 106 at the start of shooting and closed at the end of shooting. By changing the aperture of the aperture mechanism 105 at the time of shooting, the depth of field of the shooting lens 103 changes. Thereby, it is possible to switch the expression such as adjusting the degree of blurring of the background subject to make the main subject appear at the time of shooting, or depict the background subject firmly.

The imaging element 107 has a light receiving surface configured by arranging a large number of pixels, and the imaging lens 10.
The image from the subject 200 received through 3 is converted into an electrical signal. In the present embodiment, the image sensor 107 may use either a CCD system or a CMOS system.

The AFE unit 108 includes a CDS unit, a gain adjustment unit, an AD conversion unit, and the like, and after performing analog processing such as correlated double sampling processing and gain adjustment processing on the analog electric signal obtained in the image sensor 107, the AFE unit 108 The obtained image signal is converted into digital data and input to the image processing unit 109. In addition, the AFE unit 108 is also provided with a function of reading signals from a plurality of pixels constituting the image sensor 107 at a time. For example, the AFE unit 108 can read out signals of 4 pixels (2 × 2 pixels) and 9 pixels (3 × 3 pixels) at a time, and improve the S / N by adding these read-out electric signals. . By such processing, the apparent sensitivity of the image sensor 107 can be increased.

Furthermore, the AFE unit 108 also has a function of selecting an output signal from the image sensor 107, and can extract only signals from pixels in a limited range among all effective pixels of the image sensor 107. In general, the image sensor 107 can read signals at high speed by performing thinning. Using this function, if an image obtained for composition confirmation by the image sensor 107 is read at high speed and processed by the image processing unit 109 and then displayed on the display panel 111, the user is displayed on the display panel 111. The shooting timing and photo opportunity can be determined while viewing the image.

The image processing unit 109 corrects the color, gradation, sharpness, etc. in the image data input from the AFE unit 108, or amplifies the level of the image data to a predetermined level to adjust it to the correct shading and correct gray level. Various image processing is performed.

In addition, in order to display various images such as the framing image as described above, the image processing unit 109 resizes (reduces) the image data input from the AFE unit 108 so that the image data can be displayed on the display panel 111. It also has a function to

The display control unit 110 converts the image data obtained by the image processing unit 109 and the image data recorded on the recording medium 115 into a video signal and displays the video signal on the display panel 111. The display panel 111 is a display panel such as a liquid crystal display panel or an organic EL display panel provided on the back surface of the digital camera 100, for example. The display control unit 110 also has a multi-screen display function for displaying a plurality of images superimposed on the display panel 111. With this multi-screen display function, it is also possible to superimpose a character display of mode setting and various warning displays on the captured image or the captured image. When transmitting image data to the image server 400, a list of captured images is displayed by the multi-screen display function, and the image server 40 is displayed.
The result of sorting out what is to be transmitted and what is not to be displayed is displayed.

The focus determination unit 112 detects the contrast of the image obtained by the image processing unit 109. The contrast detected by the focus determination unit 112 is used during autofocus. That is, while the AF unit 104 changes the lens position of the focusing lens of the photographing lens 103, the focus determination unit 112 sequentially detects the contrast of the image, and stops the focusing lens at the lens position where the detected contrast is maximized. By doing so, the photographing lens 103 can be focused. It is also possible to detect the distance of the main subject, the distance of the background subject, and the like based on the information on the lens position at the time of focusing. When the photographing lens 103 includes a zoom lens, the distance is detected in consideration of the lens position of the zoom lens.

The compression / decompression unit 113 compresses the image data processed by the image processing unit 109 at the time of shooting. The compression / decompression unit 113 includes a well-known still image compression function such as JPEG, MPEG4 and H
. And a well-known moving image compression function such as H.264. The compression / decompression unit 113 also has a function of decompressing compressed image data when reproducing the image data.

The recording control unit 114 records the image data compressed by the compression / decompression unit 113 on the recording medium 115 with the accompanying image data. Examples of the image-accompanying data include photographing time and exposure control parameters.

The infrared communication unit 116 performs infrared communication with the digital camera 300. here,
The light projecting unit and the light receiving unit of the infrared communication unit 116 are arranged, for example, in front of the digital camera 100 as shown in FIG. Here, the light projecting unit 116a and the light receiving unit 116b are:
It is covered with a visible light cut filter (not shown) and is not easily affected by ambient light from the surroundings. Note that what is communicated by the infrared communication unit 116 is not image data with a large capacity but image designation data for designating image data transmitted from the communication unit 117 of the digital camera 300.

The communication unit 117 transmits image data recorded on the recording medium 115, image data obtained by photographing, or the like to the image server 400 via the network 500, or receives various data from the image server 400. Control communication.

The auxiliary light emitting unit 118 irradiates the subject 200 with auxiliary light according to the situation at the time of shooting. This prevents insufficient brightness and unevenness during shooting.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a state of image data communication in the image communication system according to the present embodiment having the digital camera 100, the digital camera 300, and the image server 400.

First, when transmitting image data, the operation mode of the digital camera 100 is set to a playback mode. At this time, candidates for image data to be transmitted are displayed on the display panel 111 of the digital camera 100. When the user of the digital camera 100 selects image data to be transmitted, the display related to the selected image data becomes, for example, a thick frame display as shown in the figure. In addition, a transmission tag is assigned to the image accompanying data related to the selected image data. Thereafter, when the infrared communication between the digital camera 100 and the digital camera 300 is executed, the digital camera 1
The image data photographed by the digital camera 300 within the same period as the image data selected at 00 is considered to be image data obtained during the same event, and the image data obtained during the same event is the digital camera. The image designation data is transmitted from the digital camera 100 to the digital camera 300 so as to be transmitted from the digital camera 100.

When the image designation data is received by the digital camera 300, the image data captured during the period designated by the image designation data is selected by the digital camera 300.
Then, a transmission tag is assigned to the image associated data related to the selected image data.

The digital cameras 100 and 300 from which such transmission images are selected are connected to the network 5
When connected to 00, an image 100a to which a transmission tag is attached in the digital camera 100
And only the image 300a to which the transmission tag is attached in the digital camera 300 is stored in the image server 4
Sent to 00. On the other hand, the unselected images 100b and 300b are not transmitted to the image server 400 as being private images.

Thus, when an image is transmitted to the image server 400, the transmitted image is stored in the image server 40.
0 is recorded in the recording unit 401. Thereafter, the images recorded in the recording unit 401 are rearranged in a predetermined order by the album creating unit 402 to create an electronic album. The created electronic album can be freely browsed using a digital camera, personal computer, mobile phone, or the like.

Here, as a wireless communication method for transmitting the image designation data from the digital camera 100 to the digital camera 300, various methods can be used depending on the directivity, the reach distance, and the like.
For example, in the case of infrared communication, there is an advantage that it can be easily used without much consideration for security because of its relatively simple configuration and directivity of infrared rays and a short reach. Of course, Bluetooth (registered trademark) or wireless LAN technology may be used. Further, if importance is placed on security, RFID technology used for wireless IC tags and the like may be used.

A lot of photographed images are recorded in both the digital camera 100 and the digital camera 300. When an electronic album is created in the image server 400 from images recorded in these digital cameras, each digital camera is It is necessary to designate an image to be transmitted to the image server 400 and an image not to be transmitted. If such a designation can be reflected in other digital cameras without performing the designation in all the digital cameras, the user's effort is not required and it becomes easy. In particular, when participating in an event with a large number of people, if the results specified by the digital camera owned by the representative can be reflected in the digital cameras owned by other members, it is possible to specify the image for the album in a short time. Then, the site is immediately disbanded, and after that, only the necessary image data is transmitted from each digital camera to the image server 400 by simply connecting each digital camera to the network 500, and the album creation in the image server 400 is performed. Is possible.

In the following, processing for realizing the operation shown in FIG. 3 will be described with reference to FIGS. FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating processing of the digital camera 100 during communication according to the present embodiment. FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing processing of the digital camera 300 in communication according to the present embodiment. Further, FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing processing of the image server 400 in communication in the present embodiment.

Here, in the following description, the digital camera that transmits image designation data is the digital camera 100, and the digital camera that receives image designation data is the digital camera 30.
The description is continued as 0, but these relationships may be reversed.

First, the processing of the digital camera 100 will be described. In FIG. 4, the MPU 101 of the digital camera 100 determines whether or not the current operation mode is the shooting mode (step S101). If it is determined in step S101 that the current operation mode is the shooting mode, the MPU 101 determines whether the user has performed a shooting operation, that is, whether the release switch has been operated (step S102). If it is determined in step S102 that no shooting operation has been performed, the process returns to step S101, and the MPU 101 determines again whether the current operation mode is the shooting mode. On the other hand, when a shooting operation is performed in the determination in step S102, the MPU 101 executes a shooting operation (step S103). And MPU
101 records the image data obtained by the shooting operation on the recording medium 115 together with image-accompanying data such as shooting date and time information (step S104).

If the current operation mode is not the shooting mode in the determination in step S101, the MPU 101 determines whether the current operation mode is the playback mode (step S10).
5). In the determination in step S105, when the current operation mode is the playback mode,
The MPU 101 causes the display control unit 110 to display a list of thumbnail images of images recorded on the recording medium 115 on the display panel 111 (step S106). Then M
The PU 101 determines whether an enlargement display of any of the images displayed as a list is instructed by a user operation (step S107). When it is determined in step S107 that an instruction to enlarge an image is issued, the MPU 101 displays the selected image on the display panel 11.
1 is enlarged and displayed (step S108).

If no enlargement display instruction is given in step 107 or after step S108, the MP
U101 determines whether image data to be transmitted to the image server 400 has been selected by a user operation (step S109). If transmission image data is selected in the determination of step S109, the MPU 101 adds a transmission tag to the image-accompanying data of the image data (step S110). On the other hand, when the transmission image data is not selected in the determination in step S109, the MPU 101 determines whether image data that is prohibited from being transmitted to the image server 400 is selected by a user operation (step S111).
). If it is determined in step S111 that transmission-prohibited image data has been selected, M
The PU 101 adds a transmission prohibition tag to the image associated data of the image data (step S).
112).

After step S110 or step S112, the MPU 101 determines whether image data transmission setting has been completed by a user operation (step S113). Step S113
If the image data transmission setting has not been completed in the determination, the process proceeds to step S.
Return to 106. On the other hand, if it is determined in step S113 that image data transmission settings have been completed, the MPU 101 generates image designation data from the shooting date / time information of the image data to which the transmission tag is added (step S114). The image designation data is generated as data having shooting date / time information of all image data to which a transmission tag is added, for example. Or it is good also as data which has the oldest imaging date information and the latest imaging date information among all the image data to which the transmission tag was added. Furthermore, the image designation data may be data indicating the range of position information. The image designation data generated in step S114 is stored in a storage unit (not shown) of the MPU 101.

If the current operation mode is not the playback mode in the determination in step S105, the MPU 101 determines whether the current operation mode is the infrared communication mode (step S115). If the current operation mode is the infrared communication mode in the determination in step S115, the MPU 101 determines whether the digital camera 100 is set to the infrared transmission side (step S116). In the determination of step S116, the digital camera 10
When 0 is set on the infrared transmission side, the MPU 101 causes the display control unit 110 to display a list of thumbnail images of images with transmission tags added to the image-accompanying data on the display panel 111 (step S117). Thereafter, the MPU 101 determines whether infrared transmission has been executed by a user operation (step S118). The user checks the images displayed in the list on the display panel 111 to check whether the image data to be transmitted to the image server 400 is set correctly, and if it is set correctly, instructs the execution of infrared transmission. . Receiving this, the MPU 101 transmits the image designation data stored in the storage unit (not shown) to the digital camera 300 by the infrared communication unit 116 (step S119).

If the digital camera 100 is set to the infrared receiving side in the determination in step S116, the MPU 101 performs infrared receiving processing (step S120). In addition,
This infrared reception process will be described in the process of the digital camera 300 described later.

If the current operation mode is not the infrared communication mode in the determination in step S115, the MPU 101 determines whether the digital camera 100 is connected to the network 500 (step S121). In the determination of step S121, the digital camera 10
When 0 is connected to the network 500, the MPU 101 uses the communication unit 117 to transmit the image data in which the transmission tag is added to the image-accompanying data to the image server 400 via the network 500 (step S122). Note that image data to which neither a transmission tag nor a transmission prohibition tag is added may be set to be transmitted to the image server 400 or may be set not to be transmitted. Also good. Moreover, you may make it transmit according to user operation.

Next, processing of the digital camera 300 will be described. In FIG. 5, the MPU 101 of the digital camera 300 determines whether the current operation mode is the infrared communication mode (step S201). If it is determined in step S201 that the current operation mode is the infrared communication mode, the MPU 101 determines whether the digital camera 300 is set on the infrared receiving side (step S202). If it is determined in step S202 that the digital camera 300 is set on the infrared transmission side, the MPU 101 performs infrared transmission processing (step S203). This infrared transmission process is the process described with reference to FIG.

On the other hand, if it is determined in step S203 that the digital camera 100 is set on the infrared receiving side, the MPU 101 prepares to receive image designation data via the infrared communication unit 116 (step S204). After the completion of reception preparation, the MPU 101 determines whether image designation data has been received (step S205), and waits until image designation data is received.
When the image designation data is received in the determination in step S205, the MPU 101 adds a transmission tag to the image associated data related to the image data of the photographing date / time (or within the photographing period) designated by the received image designation data. (Step S206). Then MP
In step U <b> 101, the display control unit 110 causes the display panel 111 to display a list of thumbnail images of images with transmission tags added to the image-accompanying data (step S <b> 207).

If the current operation mode is not the infrared communication mode in the determination in step S201, the MPU 101 determines whether the digital camera 300 is connected to the network 500 (step S208). In the determination in step S208, the digital camera 10
When 0 is connected to the network 500, the MPU 101 uses the communication unit 117 to transmit the image data in which the transmission tag is added to the image-accompanying data to the image server 400 via the network 500 (step S209).

In step S208, the digital camera 300 is connected to the network 500.
If not connected, the MPU 101 executes other processing such as shooting mode processing and playback mode processing (step S210). Since these processes are the same as those described with reference to FIG.

With the operation described with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5, in the digital camera according to the present embodiment,
It becomes possible to instantaneously set image data to be made into an album from images recorded in each digital camera owned by members who participated in a trip or wedding together. If a digital camera with such transmission settings is connected to the network 500, the image data for which the album is to be created is transmitted from each digital camera, and an album in which the transmitted image data is naturally integrated is formed. In addition, although one's own image is rarely recorded in a digital camera owned by oneself, there is a possibility that one's own image is recorded in a digital camera owned by another person. Therefore, by sending image data as described above,
It becomes possible to create an album that no one is happy with.

Next, processing of the image server 400 will be described. 6, the image server 400 determines whether image data has been transmitted from the digital camera 100 or 300 (
Step S301). In the determination of step S301, the digital camera 100 or 30
When image data is transmitted from 0, the image server 400 causes the recording unit 401 to record the transmitted image data (step S302). Here, the digital camera 100
Even if image data is not transmitted from 300, the digital camera 100 or 30
When 0 is connected to the image server 400, the image server 400 may request the digital camera currently connected to transmit image data.

After the image data from the digital camera 100 or 300 is recorded in the recording unit 401, the image server 400 rearranges the image data recorded in the recording unit 401 according to the shooting date / time information by the album creating unit 402 to display the web of the electronic album. A page is created, and the web page of the created electronic album is recorded in the recording unit 401 (step S303). FIG. 7 is a diagram showing the concept of creating an electronic album in the present embodiment. In this embodiment,
Image data to be created as an electronic album (A1, A2, B1, B2 shown in FIG. 7)
Is accompanied by a transmission tag and shooting date / time information as image-accompanying data. At the time of creating the electronic album, the image server 400 reads only the image data recorded in the recording unit 401 with the transmission tag, and reads the read image data with the shooting date / time information associated therewith. The electronic album is created by sorting and pasting it on the web page for displaying the electronic album. The rearrangement is not limited to the shooting date / time information. For example, as long as the camera can record shooting position information using the GPS function or the like, the same shooting position may be grouped on the same page. Also, the layout may be devised such that the landscape photograph is on the top and the portrait photograph is on the bottom.

When the image data is not transmitted from either of the digital cameras 100 and 300 in the determination in step S301, the image server 400 requests the electronic album to be viewed from a PC or a mobile phone (not shown) connected to the network 500. It is determined whether or not has been made (step S304). If it is determined in step S304 that an electronic album viewing request is made from a PC or the like, the image server 400 reads the web page of the selected electronic album from the recording unit 401 and transmits it to the PC or the like (step S305). The web page of the transmitted electronic album can be browsed on a display such as a PC or a mobile phone.
Also, in the determination of step S304, if the electronic album viewing request is not made from the PC or the like, the image server 400 has been requested to execute other services other than image recording and image viewing. Is determined (step S306). Step S306
If no other service execution request is made in the determination, the process returns to step S301. On the other hand, when it is determined in step S306 that another service execution request has been made, the image server 400 executes processing related to the other service. Here, creation or browsing of SNS (Social Networking Service) content will be described as an example of other services. Of course, it may be other than this. That is, in the determination of step S306, when an execution request for another service is made, the image server 4
00 determines whether the requested other service is a request to create SNS content (step S307). If it is determined in step S307 that the request is for creating SNS content, the image server 400 executes various processes so that the user can create SNS content (step S308). On the other hand, if it is determined in step S307 that the other service execution instruction is not an SNS content creation instruction, the image server 400 performs processing so that the user can browse various contents such as images (step S307).
309). By executing such an SNS service in the image server 400, opinions can be exchanged between users, centering on the electronic album obtained in the image server 400.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, an image that is desired to be used for creating an electronic album and an image that is not required can be distinguished and transmitted from image data captured by a plurality of digital cameras with a simple operation. it can. Further, by creating an electronic album by rearranging the images transmitted to the image server, it is possible to perform communication centering on the created electronic album.

Although the present invention has been described above based on the embodiments, the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, and various modifications and applications are naturally possible within the scope of the gist of the present invention. For example, in the above-described embodiment, transmission of image data with two digital cameras is described. However, the method of the above-described embodiment may be applied to transmission of image data with three or more digital cameras. it can. Even in that case, if a transmission tag is set by one digital camera and only image designation data indicating the period information during which the image data with the transmission tag is photographed is transmitted to another digital camera by infrared communication. good.

Further, the above-described embodiments include various stages of the invention, and various inventions can be extracted by appropriately combining a plurality of disclosed constituent elements. For example, even if some configuration requirements are deleted from all the configuration requirements shown in the embodiment, the above-described problem can be solved, and this configuration requirement is deleted when the above-described effects can be obtained. The configuration can also be extracted as an invention.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a digital camera as an example of an imaging apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is a figure shown about the structure of an infrared communication part. FIG. 3 is a diagram showing how image data is communicated in an image communication system according to an embodiment of the present invention. 5 is a flowchart showing processing of the digital camera 100 during communication according to an embodiment of the present invention. 5 is a flowchart showing processing of the digital camera 300 in communication according to an embodiment of the present invention. 5 is a flowchart showing processing of the image server 400 in communication according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is the figure shown about the concept of electronic album creation.

100, 300 ... Digital camera, 101 ... Micro processing unit (MPU)
), 102 ... operation unit, 103 ... photographing lens, 104 ... autofocus (AF) unit, 10
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 5 ... Diaphragm mechanism 106 ... Aperture control part 107 ... Image pick-up element 108 ... Analog front end (AFE) part 109 ... Image processing part 110 ... Display control part 111 ... Display panel 11
2: Focus determination unit, 113 ... Compression / decompression unit, 114 ... Recording control unit, 115 ... Recording medium,
116 ... Infrared communication unit, 117 ... Communication unit, 118 ... Auxiliary light emitting unit, 400 ... Image server,
401 ... Recording unit, 402 ... Album creation unit, 500 ... Network

Claims (6)

A shooting section for shooting images;
A recording unit that records the captured image in association with image-accompanying information related to the image;
An image designation information generation unit that generates information for designating a specific image from an image recorded by another imaging device, from image-accompanying information related to the selected image among the recorded images;
A transmission unit that transmits the generated image designation information to the other imaging device;
An imaging apparatus comprising:
The image designation information generation unit generates the image designation information from at least one of period information representing a period during which the image was photographed and position information representing a position at which the image was photographed. The imaging apparatus according to 1.
The imaging apparatus has a network communication unit,
The imaging apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the network communication unit transmits the selected image among the recorded images to an external device.
The imaging apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the imaging apparatus includes a display unit, and displays the selected image when transmitting the image designation information to the other imaging apparatus.
2. The imaging according to claim 1, wherein the transmission unit of the imaging device that transmits the image designation information to the other imaging device is an infrared communication unit in which a light projecting unit is covered with a visible light cut filter. apparatus.
A shooting step for shooting an image;
A recording step of associating and recording the captured image and the image accompanying information related to the image;
An image designation information generation step for generating information for designating a specific image from an image recorded by another imaging device, from the image accompanying information related to the selected image among the recorded images;
A transmission step of transmitting the generated image designation information to the other imaging device;
An image designation method for an imaging apparatus, comprising:

Images