JP2013186679A - Image processing apparatus and processing method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processing method in which in a photograph in which a plurality of pages are contained, as in a photo book, and one or plural images are disposed in each page to be printed, presence or absence of a related image is taken into consideration.SOLUTION: In an image processing method, when print processing is instructed, it is detected whether or not a related image is contained in all images instructed to be printed. When it is determined that a related image is contained, for each of all related images, an image correction amount is calculated, and on the basis of it, an image correction target is determined for a group of the related images. When one group of related images exits, in accordance with the image correction target, when a plurality of groups of related images exist, on the basis of an image correction target of the plurality of groups of related images, an image correction target in the same page is calculated, and correction is performed. As to discrimination on related images, determination is made on the basis of whether or not persons are the same by means of face recognition processing, whether images are sequentially photographed ones, or photographed places or dates are the same.

Description

  The present invention relates to a printing method and a printing apparatus, and more particularly to a method for determining image correction parameters when a plurality of images are input.

  2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, an increasing number of devices arrange images on a plurality of pages and print them as photo books.

  In photobook image processing, it is desirable not only to optimize individual images, but also for related images such as multiple images taken at the same position, white balance and gradation should not change significantly. By detecting a series of related images from the input image, fixing the parameters for image correction, and applying the same parameters to all the series of images, the color, gradation, etc. will not change between the series of images. What has been proposed has been proposed (Patent Document 1).

JP 2000-98514 A

  In a photo book, a plurality of images are often arranged in a page, and the tendency of image processing changes between an image with a fixed parameter and another frame on a page including related images. In addition, a plurality of related images may be included in a page, and when each process is performed individually, adverse effects such as an excessive contrast difference of the entire page may appear.

  In the image processing apparatus and the processing method of the present invention, in an image processing of an album configured by arranging images on a plurality of pages, an image in a page where printing processing is started is related to an image related to an image on another printing page. Is included, and when a related image is included, the calculated image correction amount is corrected so as to approach a target determined based on the related image, and executed. .

  According to the present invention, in photobook printing including related images, there is no related image while suppressing unnatural changes in image correction parameters such as color and gradation of the entire page where the related images are arranged between related images. Optimal image processing can be performed on the page.

It is a figure which shows the structure of the digital camera which can apply one Embodiment of this invention. 6 is a flowchart showing processing at the start of printing in the printer according to the embodiment of the present invention. 5 is a flowchart illustrating processing for determining an image correction amount by the printer according to the embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating correction amount correction by a correction target in image processing of a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention (part 1). FIG. 10 is a diagram showing correction amount correction by a correction target in image processing of a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention (part 2). FIG. 10 is a diagram showing correction amount correction by a correction target in image processing of a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention (part 3);

  Hereinafter, embodiments for carrying out the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

  In FIG. 1, a printer 100 is connected to an internal bus 111 from a CPU 101, an internal storage device 102, a memory 103, a display control unit 104, an input unit 105, a drive device 106, a communication I / F 107, a print head, a paper transport mechanism, and the like. The print module 109 is connected. Each unit connected to the internal bus 111 can exchange data with each other via the internal bus 111.

  The internal storage device 102 stores various programs for operating the CPU 101, display UI data, and other data. The memory 103 controls each unit of the printer 100 using the memory 103 as a work memory according to a program stored in the internal storage device 102, for example.

  The input unit 105 receives a user operation, generates a control signal corresponding to the operation, and supplies the control signal to the CPU 101. For example, the input unit 105 includes a print button, a button for determination, enlargement, reduction, or a pointing device such as a touch panel as an input device that receives a user operation. The touch panel is an input device that outputs coordinate information according to a position touched with respect to, for example, a planar input unit. The display control unit 104 outputs a display signal for displaying an image on the display 110. For example, the display control signal generated by the CPU 101 according to the program is supplied to the display control unit 104. The display control unit 104 generates a display signal based on the display control signal and outputs the display signal to the display 110. For example, the display control unit 104 causes the display 110 to display a GUI screen constituting a GUI (Graphical User Interface) based on a display control signal generated by the CPU 101. When a touch panel is used as the input unit 105, the input unit 105 and the display 110 can be integrally configured. For example, the touch panel is configured such that the light transmittance does not hinder the display of the display 110 and is attached to the upper layer of the display surface of the display 110. Then, the input coordinates on the touch panel are associated with the display coordinates on the display 110. Thereby, it is possible to configure the GUI as if the user can directly operate the screen displayed on the display 110.

  The drive device 106 can be loaded with an external storage medium 108 such as SD or CF, and reads image data or a print designation file from the loaded external storage medium 108 under the control of the CPU 101. The communication I / F 107 is connected to an external input device 112 such as a digital camera or a PC and performs communication based on the control of the CPU 101. The print module 109 is created from image data received from the external storage medium 108 attached to the drive device 106 or the external input device 112 connected by the communication I / F 107 according to an instruction from the CPU 101, and is for printing placed in the memory 103. Print processing is performed based on the data.

[Example]
FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating related image detection and image correction amount target calculation at the start of printing in the printer according to the embodiment of the present invention. Each process in this flowchart is realized by the CPU 101 executing a program stored in the internal storage device 102 using the memory 103 as a work memory.

  When the printing process is started, in step S201, the CPU 101 detects whether or not related images are included in all the images designated for printing. If it is determined in step S202 that a related image is included, the CPU 101 calculates an image correction amount for each related image in step S203. In step S <b> 204, the CPU 101 determines an image correction target of the related image group from each correction amount calculated in step S <b> 203 and stores it in the memory 103.

  The processing from step S203 to step S204 is continued until no related image is detected in step S202, and the image correction target for each related image group is stored in the memory 103. When no related image is detected in step S202, the CPU 101 starts print processing for each page in step S205.

  FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing an image correction amount determination operation according to an embodiment of the present invention. In step S301, the CPU 101 calculates an image correction amount for each frame image of the page on which the print process is executed. When the correction amount calculation for each image is completed, it is detected in step S302 whether there is an image included in the related image group in the page.

  If it is determined in step S303 that there is a related image, it is further determined in step S304 whether there are a plurality of related image groups. If there is only one group, the CPU 101 reads out the correction target of the corresponding related image group from the memory 103 as the image correction target in the page in step S307, and corrects the correction amount of the image in all the images in the page in step S308. Do.

  If it is determined in step S304 that there are a plurality of related image groups, in step S305, the CPU 101 reads out correction targets for all relevant image groups, calculates the correction target in the page in step S306, and further includes step In step S308, image correction amount correction for each image is performed.

  If it is determined in step S303 that there is no related image, the image correction amount calculated in step S301 is not corrected.

  Further, the image correction amount correction processing in step S308 determines whether or not the correction target is determined by the related image group to which the frame belongs for each image correction parameter, and is a correction target by another related image group. In such a case, it may be configured to allow a deviation from the correction target calculated in step S306 by a predetermined amount.

  FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating a relationship between input luminance and output luminance when performing luminance correction, which is one of image corrections, according to an embodiment of the present invention. The horizontal axis represents input luminance, and the vertical axis represents output luminance. FIG. 4A is a diagram illustrating an example of brightness correction parameters applied when printing. In this example, it can be seen that the input image has a high output luminance, that is, is corrected brightly by the luminance correction.

  FIG. 4B is a diagram illustrating luminance correction parameters that are corrected when the image illustrated in FIG. 4A is an image belonging to a related image group. A dotted line is a luminance correction target set in the related image group to which this image belongs. Since the correction target is corrected by the related image group, the inclination is smaller than the brightness correction straight line shown in FIG. Thereby, it is possible to prevent the brightness from being corrected to be extremely high when compared with related images on other pages. By correcting the image correction amount by the related image group in this way, the deviation of the image correction parameters such as the color and gradation of the image belonging to the related image group is suppressed within a predetermined range, and a sense of unity is given in the printing of the related image. be able to.

  FIG. 4C shows a luminance correction target corrected by the correction target of the related image group when the image shown in FIG. 4A is an image that does not belong to the related image group. By setting the correction amount to be smaller than the images belonging to the related image group, the correction amount correction by the related image group to which other images in the page belong is reduced, and the correction tendency of the entire page is made closer. It is possible to prevent image correction parameters such as color and gradation from being significantly increased between images.

  Although the present invention has been described in detail based on preferred embodiments thereof, the present invention is not limited to these specific embodiments, and various forms within the scope of the present invention are also included in the present invention. included. A part of the above-described embodiments may be appropriately combined. Also, when a software program that realizes the functions of the above-described embodiments is supplied from a recording medium directly to a system or apparatus having a computer that can execute the program using wired / wireless communication, and the program is executed Are also included in the present invention. Accordingly, the program code itself supplied and installed in the computer in order to implement the functional processing of the present invention by the computer also realizes the present invention. That is, the computer program itself for realizing the functional processing of the present invention is also included in the present invention. In this case, the program may be in any form as long as it has a program function, such as an object code, a program executed by an interpreter, or script data supplied to the OS. As a recording medium for supplying the program, for example, a magnetic recording medium such as a hard disk or a magnetic tape, an optical / magneto-optical storage medium, or a nonvolatile semiconductor memory may be used. As a program supply method, a computer program that forms the present invention is stored in a server on a computer network, and a connected client computer downloads and programs the computer program.

100 Printer 111 Internal bus 101 CPU
102 Internal storage device

Claims (4)

In the image processing of an album configured by arranging images on a plurality of pages, it is determined whether or not the images in the page where the printing process is started include related images of images on other printing pages, A printing apparatus, wherein when a related image is included, the calculated image correction amount is corrected and executed so as to approach a target determined based on the related image. The related image according to claim 1 is obtained by performing a face recognition process on the image and determining that the images are the same person, reading additional information indicating that the image was shot by continuous shooting, and adding a predetermined range from the additional information. A related image characterized in that it is determined to be a related image in any case when it is determined that the image is taken at a position and time within the range and when additional information indicating the same group set by the user is read How to determine. The image correction amount correction processing according to claim 1, wherein for the image other than the related image in the page to be printed, a correction amount smaller than the correction for the related image is set. In the image correction amount correction according to claim 1, when a plurality of related image groups are included in a page, a correction target for the entire page is determined from correction targets for all the related image groups in the page, and the processed image An image correction process for performing image processing while relaxing a restriction on a correction target for a parameter determined by a related image group different from the related image group to which the image belongs.