JP2020102788A - Imaging apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

To solve the problem in which, in recent years, an input image size has been increasing, along with this, since a memory size required for calculating WFM data also increases, a circuit scale becomes a problem, and as the number of monitor pixels increases, it becomes an even bigger problem.SOLUTION: The imaging apparatus for capturing and recording a subject includes: signal processing means for signal-processing a captured image and outputting it as image data; first storage means for holding the image data; rotation means for reading the image data of the storage means and rotating the image data; frequency information imaging means for performing arithmetic processing on a rotated image and holding it as frequency information data; second storage means for holding output data of frequency information output means; and output means for outputting the data held in the second storage means.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

The present invention relates to an image pickup apparatus, and more particularly to reduction of the circuit scale of shooting assistance.

For semi-professionals and above, images may be taken manually for further image expression. As one of the assisting methods, there is a waveform monitor (hereinafter, WFM). As shown in FIG. 2, the WFM is a measurement function for displaying the frequency information of luminance on the monitor in an easy-to-understand manner as in 202 for the input image 201. The x-axis direction is the pixel position in the horizontal direction, and the y-axis is the y-axis. The direction indicates frequency information.

The WFM generation method will be described with reference to FIG. As will be described in detail later, a general WFM display is frequency information of luminance data in the vertical direction of an image, and is calculated from the luminance information in units of one vertical column. Therefore, a continuous vertical column of information is required, and in order to obtain this information, it is necessary to hold the entire screen in memory. In other words, the image data of the input image 201 is temporarily recorded in the memory, read out in vertical column units 203, and WFM data is calculated. The WFM generating circuit is a circuit that generates frequency information of luminance, that is, it is equivalent to generating a histogram.

Patent Document 1 shows a method for generating such a general histogram, which is similarly calculated using a memory for one screen.

JP, 2005-162064, A

However, in recent years, the input image size has increased, and along with this, the memory size necessary for calculating WFM data has also increased, and therefore the circuit scale has become a problem. As the number of monitor pixels increases, it becomes an even bigger problem.

The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to reduce the memory capacity required for WFM calculation.

In order to achieve the above object, the imaging device according to the present invention is
In an image pickup apparatus for picking up and recording a subject, signal processing means for signal-processing the picked-up image and outputting it as image data, first storage means for holding the image data, and an image in the first storage means Rotating means for reading data and rotating image data, frequency information imaging means for performing arithmetic processing on the rotated image and holding it as frequency information data, and second storage means for holding output data of the frequency information imaging means. And output means for outputting the data held in the second storage means.

Further, the imaging device according to the present invention,
In an image pickup apparatus for picking up and recording a subject, reduction processing means for reducing the picked-up image to generate reduced image data; signal processing means for signal-processing the reduced image data and outputting it as image data; First storage means for holding image data, rotation means for reading out the image data from the first storage means to rotate the image data, and frequency information imaging for performing arithmetic processing on the rotated image and holding it as frequency information data. Means, second storage means for holding the output data of the frequency information imaging means, and output means for outputting the data held in the second storage means,
It is characterized by having.

According to the imaging device of the present invention, it is possible to reduce the memory capacity required for WFM calculation.

Block diagram of the imaging device of the first embodiment Figure of WFM display example for input image Operation diagram of image data rotation unit Diagram showing the SRAM structure of the WFM generation circuit Block diagram in which the first embodiment is applied to a data path essential for an imaging device The block diagram of the imaging device of the second embodiment in which the WFM display delay of the first embodiment is improved.

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

<First Embodiment>
A first embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. 1, 3, and 4.

FIG. 1 is an imaging device using the conversion device according to the first embodiment.

In the figure, 101 is a signal processing unit, 102 is a DRAM, 103 is an image data rotating unit, 104 is a WFM generation circuit, 105 is an SRAM, 106 is an address generation unit, 107 is a timing generation unit, 108 is an addition unit, and 109 is A multiplexer, 110 is a reading unit, 111 is a DRAM, and 112 is an output unit. The signal processing unit 101 includes photoelectric conversion processing such as a CMOS sensor, performs image processing such as development processing on captured image data, and stores the image data in the DRAM 102.

The image data rotation unit 103 is a unit that reads and rotates image data from the DRAM 102, and outputs the data rotated 90 degrees by changing the order of the read address and the write address of the image data in the DRAM 102. Details are shown in FIG. The image data stored in the DRAM 102 is written in the scanning order 302 by the signal processing unit 101. On the other hand, when the image data rotating unit 103 reads the image data, the addresses are generated and read as in the scanning order 304. As a result, an image 303 is obtained by rotating the image 301 by 90 degrees.

At the time of this processing, a horizontal synchronizing signal 305 corresponding to the scanning order 304 is also generated for the horizontal synchronizing signal in accordance with the image 303.

Next, the WFM generation circuit 104 performs WFM generation processing on the image data from the image data rotation unit 103. Below, a general WFM generation method is shown.

The WFM generating circuit 104 generates WFM of pixel values for each vertical column from the image data of the input image. First, the WFM generating circuit 104 is synchronized with the start timing of the horizontal synchronizing signal 305 from the image data rotating unit 103. The initialization of the SRAM 105 is started. In this case, the timing generation unit 107 generates an initialization signal in synchronization with the start timing of the horizontal synchronization signal, and the address generation unit 106 synchronizes with the timing signal and increments the address signal by one from address 0. Are sequentially generated.

Further, a fixed value "0" is output from the multiplexer 405 under the control of the timing signal, and "0" is sequentially written to each address of the SRAM 105 specified by the address signal. As a result, the SRAM 105 is initialized. After the initialization of the SRAM 105 is completed, the generation of the WFM is started during the period when the image data is input. In this case, the address generation unit 106 sequentially outputs the pixel value of the image data as an address signal of the SRAM 105.

Here, the configuration of the SRAM 105 is shown in FIG. Frequency information is assigned to the bit depth of 401. For example, if it is 8 bits, it becomes 0 to 255. The word length of 402 is assigned to the number of lines, and for example 1080 lines requires at least 10 bits. The SRAM 105 requires a capacity that satisfies the maximum bit depth and the maximum line length of the system to be mounted. By controlling the timing signal, the data is read from the address of the SRAM 105 corresponding to the pixel value of the image data, and the addition unit 108 outputs the addition value obtained by adding “1” to the read data from the multiplexer 109. It is written to the same address of SRAM 105. The WFM data is calculated by repeating this operation for the image data for each vertical column.

The reading unit 110 writes the generated WFM data output from the SRAM 105 to the DRAM 111 at the timing of the horizontal synchronization signal. The output unit 112 includes a display for reading the data from the DRAM 111 and displaying the WFM, and a scaling circuit and a color adjusting circuit for displaying the WFM on the display.

In this manner, the image data rotating unit 103 inputs the image to the WFM generating circuit 104 as data obtained by rotating the image 90 degrees in advance, so that the SRAM 105 can perform the WFM generating process if the SRAM 105 has a capacity of one vertical column. Becomes

<Second Embodiment>
In the first embodiment, the method of reducing the memory capacity by performing the WFM generation process on the image data rotating unit as the data obtained by rotating the image 90 degrees in advance has been described. FIG. 5 shows a block diagram in which the first embodiment is actually applied to the data path essential to the imaging device.

In the figure, 501 is a capture unit, 502 is a DRAM, 503 is a development unit, 504 is a DRAM, 505 is a distortion correction unit, 506 is a DRAM, 507 is a recording and display unit, and 103 to 112 are the same as in FIG.

The capture unit 501 photoelectrically converts a captured image formed by an image pickup device such as a CCD or CMOS, and further outputs a digital signal obtained by analog/digital conversion, and writes the digital signal in the DRAM 502.

The developing unit 503 reads the image data from the DRAM 502, performs RGB offset adjustment, gain adjustment, development gamma correction processing, and the like, and writes it to the DRAM 504.

The distortion correction unit 505 corrects the image data read from the DRAM 504, the image distorted by a photographing lens group (not shown), and writes the image data in the DRAM 506.

The above 501 to 505 correspond to the signal processing unit 101 in FIG.

Here, when the image is rotated by the image data rotating unit 103, the data rotated by 90 degrees is output by changing the order of the read address and the write address after writing one screen, and thus the data of at least 1 V is output. There will be a delay.

FIG. 6 shows an image recording apparatus using the conversion device according to this embodiment.

Reference numeral 601 is an image reducing unit, 602 is a developing unit, 603 is a DRAM, 501 to 507 are the same as in FIG. 5, and 103 to 112 are the same as in FIG.

For WFM generation, a data path different from the essential data paths 501 to 507 is provided, and the image reduction unit 601 performs development processing after reduction according to the display resolution of the output unit 112.

The developing unit 602 performs the same process as the developing process of the developing unit 503 on the output image of the image reducing unit 601, and after writing the process, writes it in the DRAM 603. As a result, the amount of data handled after the image reduction unit 601 is reduced, and the amount of delay is reduced by omitting the distortion correction processing of the distortion correction unit 505. The image reducing unit 601 and the developing unit 602 may be replaced with each other. 103 to 112 are the same as those in the first embodiment.

As described above, by providing the WFM-dedicated data path in addition to the data path indispensable to the image pickup apparatus, it is possible to offset the increased delay amount by inserting the image data rotation unit 103. That is, it is possible to reduce the delay amount between the display display on the display unit 507 and the display display on the output unit 111 while reducing the capacity of the SRAM 105.

101 signal processing unit, 102 DRAM, 103 image data rotating unit,
112 Output section

Claims (3)

In an imaging device that images and records a subject,
Signal processing means for signal-processing the captured image and outputting it as image data;
First storage means for holding the image data,
Rotating means for rotating the image data by reading the image data of the first storage means;
Frequency information imaging means for performing arithmetic processing on the rotated image and holding it as frequency information data,
Second storage means for holding output data of the frequency information imaging means,
Output means for outputting the data held in the second storage means;
An imaging device comprising: In an imaging device that images and records a subject,
Reduction processing means for reducing the captured image to generate reduced image data,
Signal processing means for signal-processing the reduced image data and outputting it as image data;
First storage means for holding the image data,
Rotating means for rotating the image data by reading the image data of the first storage means;
Frequency information imaging means for performing arithmetic processing on the rotated image and holding it as frequency information data,
Second storage means for holding output data of the frequency information imaging means,
Output means for outputting the data held in the second storage means;
An imaging device comprising: The image pickup apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the frequency information imaging unit is initialized by a horizontal synchronizing signal generated by the rotating unit.