JP2773866B2 - Compressed layout method for printed images - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Industrial Application Field] The present invention provides a method of positioning a plurality of color digital images for printing in which signal sequences are compressed in accordance with composition information to create a new layout image. The present invention relates to a compressed layout method for a printed image. [Prior Art] In general, when performing page makeup with a total scanner layout system, conventionally, positioning layout is performed on a digital color image input by a scanner as it is in accordance with block information. FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a conventional layout system. In the figure, 1 is an input scanner, 2 is a magnetic disk, 3 is a layout station, 4 is an image data file, 5 is a magnetic disk, and 6 is an output scanner. The color image data read from the input scanner 1 is temporarily stored on the magnetic disk 2. The layout station 3 includes a CPU, image processing hardware, software, a digitizer tablet, a CRT display,
A color separation data for each individual image stored in the magnetic disk 2 according to a desired layout.
Under the control of the computer, processing such as positioning, additional correction, clipping, halftone printing, and image synthesis are performed with reference to the composition data file 4. By this processing, a signal that has entered the station as individual image data is converted into composite image data that has been laid out as desired, is stored on the magnetic disk 5, is transferred from the output scanner 6, and exposes the laid-out image on the film. . [Problems to be Solved by the Invention] However, printing color image data requires a large amount of storage capacity due to high resolution and four primary colors (C, M, Y, K). For example, 40MByt for A4 offset printing image
e, 100MByte for gravure. Furthermore, when positioning and laying out such a large amount of data using a conventional total scanner layout system, the processing time does not fall below the order of several tens of minutes for the A4 version even with the development of computers. In addition, multiple input images (1 MB
(yte to several tens of MBytes) and the layout image as a processing result must be present on the secondary memory such as the main memory and the magnetic disk at the same time. Therefore, a huge storage capacity is required, the cost is increased, and the layout is increased. The system becomes huge. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a print image compression layout method capable of shortening a print image layout processing time and reducing a storage capacity. [Means for Solving the Problems] For this purpose, according to the present invention, image data compressed by a compression method that leaves position information in units of n × n pixels is input, and layout is performed with reference to the composition data. An overlapping position relation determining unit that determines the positional relationship between the image block boundary line, the input image block boundary line, and the picture rule line, and an input to each layout image block in the rule line based on the determination result of the overlapping positional relationship determining unit. A layout operation processing unit that allocates the level number of the input image according to the image block boundary line and allocates the level number of the printing plate color to each layout image block outside the ruled line, performs the positioning layout according to the composition data, and performs the layout. A feature is a compressed layout method of a print image for creating an image. [Operation] The compressed layout method of the print image of the present invention, the input image compressed by the compression method leaving the position information, the layout image block boundary line,
The overlapping position relationship between the input image block boundary line and the picture rule line is determined, and based on the determination result, a level number of the input image is assigned to each layout image block in the pattern rule line according to the input image block boundary line, and the rule line is determined. By assigning a level number of the printing surface color to each of the other layout image blocks, a compressed layout image is synthesized, thereby reducing the data amount and shortening the processing time. Embodiment An embodiment will be described below with reference to the drawings. First, the vector quantization used for compressing the input image data according to the present invention will be briefly described. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing vector quantization in a two-dimensional case. In the figure, for example, assume that the level numbers are 1, 2, and 3 and the representative vectors are (a1, a2), (b1, b2), and (c1, c2).
Then, the distance between each arbitrary data A and each representative vector is calculated, and the data A is represented by the minimum distance representative vector.
The representative vector is determined from the dictionary, and vector quantization in a two-dimensional case can be performed.
Then, the compression ratio can be arbitrarily selected according to the number of representative vectors. In this case, if the distance from each representative vector is prepared as a table, the vector calculation can be performed only by reading the data without calculating the distance, and the processing can be speeded up. This vector quantization can be generalized to n dimensions and has the following features. High image quality at low bit rate. The choice of the vector element is arbitrary. The errors are randomized in n-dimensional space. The printing color image data compressed by such a compression method has a data format as shown in FIG. 6 (A), and includes the number of levels of vector quantization, a dictionary (codebook), and pixel information. ing. As shown in FIG. 6 (b), the dictionary is assigned a level number for each pixel value. Therefore, the pixel information of the 8 × 8 pixel block as shown in FIG. 6 (c) is converted into the original pixel value form (8 bits × 4 / pixel) by referring to the dictionary from the level number stored here. Will be restored. In addition,
The pixel information shown in FIG. 6A is obtained by scanning and arranging the pixel information shown in FIG. 6C horizontally. Next, a compressed layout method of a print image according to the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of a compressed layout system for printed images according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining the compressed layout system, FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a dictionary, and FIG. In the figure for explanation, 11 is compressed input image data, 12 is a data processing device, 13 is an overlapping positional relationship determination unit,
14 is a layout operation unit, 15 is a composition data file, 16 is a dictionary file, 17 is a memory, 21 is an input image, 22 is a printing surface range, 31 is a picture, 32 is a ruled line, 33 is an input image block boundary line, 34 is This is a layout image block boundary line. First, the principle of the compression layout method of the present invention will be described. Consider a case where an image decomposed and compressed is applied to a rectangular printing plate as shown in FIG. The size of the input image is indicated by a broken line 21, and the trimming range on the printing plate (printing surface range)
Is indicated by the solid line 22. First, it is assumed that the layout image to be created is an image file of the same format composed of blocks of n × n pixels, similarly to the compressed image shown in FIG. If the 8.times.8 pixel block 23 has pixel information as shown in FIG. 2 (b), for example, a level number 5 of the printing plate color is assigned outside the trimming range as shown in FIG. 2 (b). Then, if the pattern color for level number 5 as shown in FIG. 3 is added to the dictionary, the pixel information of FIG. 2 (c) can be restored with reference to the dictionary of FIG.
A layout image in which the amount of image data outside the trimming range is significantly reduced can be synthesized. This data compression will be described in more detail with reference to FIG. Now, it is assumed that the layout image is as shown in FIG. 4 (A), the ruled line of the picture 31 is 32, and the enlarged view is as shown in FIG. 4 (B). When the layout image and the input image are aligned and overlapped as shown in FIG. 4C, the block boundaries 33 and 34 of the layout image and the input image generally do not match. Also, the rule 32 of the picture does not overlap with the boundary. These overlapping positional relationships can be divided into the following three cases. Block outside the ruled line and not including the ruled line Block including the ruled line inside the ruled line Block not including the ruled line Bi (i = 1, 2,...) Is the input image block name, Bj
(J = 1, 2,...) Are set as layout image block names. In the case of, the blocks B7 to B12 in FIG. 4 (c) correspond to this, and since this block is a printing plate color, the block printing color level number is applied as a block of one color, and this is newly added to the dictionary. I do. In this case, B1 to B4 in FIG. 4C correspond to this. For example, in the case of the layout image block B2, the input images include b1, b2, b4, and b5. However, above the ruled line 32, the pattern is not a pattern, and the plate color (white etc.)
Into the corresponding position of the block. At the lower part by the ruled line 32, data is extracted from the position corresponding to b4 and b5 and stored in a block of the layout image. In the case of, B5 and B6 in Fig. 4 (c) correspond to this,
Since b4, b5, b7 and b8 of the input image are related, the level number and the dictionary of the corresponding pixel are copied from each to the corresponding position of the layout image. The configuration of the present invention that performs the above processing will be described with reference to FIG. When the above-described image data compressed by the vector quantization is input, the overlapping positional relationship determination unit 13 of the data processing device 12 determines the input image, the layout image stored in the composition data file, and the boundary of the pattern. From each other to determine the overlapping positional relationship. The layout calculation unit 14
Based on the overlapping positional relationship determination result and the dictionary data read from the dictionary file 16, the above-described layout calculation is performed, and the data of the printing surface color is added to the dictionary, and the layout-calculated data is stored in the memory 17 as necessary. Alternatively, the data is transferred as an output. Thus, the data capacity can be significantly reduced and the processing time can be reduced. [Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to greatly reduce the data storage capacity by allocating one color of the printing plate outside the ruled lines of the picture, and as a result, the data processing time can be significantly reduced. Becomes

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of a compressed layout system for printed images according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining the compressed layout system, and FIG. 3 is a dictionary according to the present invention. FIG. 4, FIG. 4 is a diagram for explaining a compression layout method, FIG. 5 is a diagram showing vector quantization in a two-dimensional case, and FIG. 6 is a diagram showing pixel information and a dictionary represented by vector quantization. FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a conventional layout system. 11: Compressed input image data, 12: Data processing device, 13
...... Overlapping positional relationship discriminating unit, 14 ... Layout calculating unit,
15… Composition data file, 16 …… Dictionary file, 17…
... memory, 21 ... input image, 22 ... plate area range, 31 ... pattern, 32 ... ruled line, 33 ... input image block boundary line, 34 ...
… Layout image block boundaries.

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] Image data compressed by a compression method that leaves positional information in units of n × n pixels is input, and the layout image block boundary line, the input image block boundary line, and the picture rule line are referenced with reference to the composition data. An overlapping positional relationship determining unit for determining the positional relationship, and assigning a level number of the input image to each layout image block in the ruled line according to the input image block boundary line based on the determination result of the overlapping positional relationship determining unit, A layout calculation processing unit that assigns a plate number to each layout image block and adds a plate color to a dictionary to which a level number corresponding to a pixel value is assigned, and performs positioning layout according to the block data. A compressed layout method for a print image, wherein a layout image is created by using a compression method.