JP2930099B2 - Image input display system - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] The present invention relates to an image input and display system.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art An input device for imaging a subject and converting the image data into image data is connected to the input device via a communication path.
2. Description of the Related Art There is an image input display system having a display editing device that receives image data from an input device, reproduces and displays an image, and edits the image.

Conventionally, in this type of image input / display system, the input device and the display / editing device are substantially independent of each other, and can merely transfer image data. For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 4-27569 discloses that in a heterogeneous color image communication, a color correction means is provided for each of a transmitting device and a receiving device so that a faithful color can be obtained without depending on a communication destination device. Realizing the reproduction,
A color image processing method is disclosed. In a system in which image data of a digital camera is processed by a personal computer, the format of communication data is determined (fixed) for each type of digital camera.

[0004]

A first problem is that the improvement of the performance of the input device and the improvement of the performance of the display / editing device are not directly linked to the improvement of the performance of the image input / display system.

The reason is that the input device and the display editing device are
This is because they are independent and cannot appropriately share the load of data processing.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to distribute the data processing load according to the performance of an input device and a display / editing device, and to improve the performance of either device to improve the performance of an image input / display system. And

[0007]

According to the present invention, there is provided an input device for photographing a subject and converting it into digital data, and an input device for converting the digital data into an image, displaying the image, and editing the image. In an image input and display system having a display editing device and a communication path connecting the input means and the display editing device, a data processing means for performing the same data processing on the input device and the display editing device is provided. And a communication path inspection unit for inspecting the performance of the communication path on one of the input device and the display editing device, and a capability comparison unit for comparing data processing capabilities of the input device and the display editing device. Determining means for determining data processing in the input device based on a test result by the communication path test means and a comparison result by the capability comparing means. Preparative image input display system is obtained characterized by.

When the communication path inspection means detects that the performance of the communication path exceeds a predetermined performance, the determination means does not perform the data processing by the data processing means in the input device, The editing device determines to perform data processing by the data processing unit. Conversely, if the communication path inspection unit detects that the performance of the communication path is equal to or less than a predetermined performance, the determination unit includes the input unit. It is determined that data processing is to be performed by the data processing means in the device.

Further, the data processing means has data compression means, and when the determination means determines to perform data processing by the data processing means in the input device, the comparison result of the capability comparison means is provided. The compression ratio is determined based on the compression ratio.

[0010]

The software 19, 28 stored in the control procedure storage sections 15, 24 respectively provides the same data processing function to both the input device 10 and the display editing device 20. The transfer format determination software 29 stored in the control procedure storage unit 24 includes the communication path 30 and the CPUs 14 and 23.
And the data processing distribution is determined on the basis of the performance.

[0011]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of the image input / display system of the present invention. The image input / display system of FIG. 1 includes an input device 10, a display editing device 20, and a communication path 30 connecting these.

An input device 10 includes a lens 11, a CCD (charge coupled device) image sensor 12, and an A / D converter 1.
3, CPU 14, control procedure storage 15, internal storage 1
6, interface driver 17, and internal bus 18
have. In this input device, a CCD image sensor 12 converts an image image incident through a lens 11 into an electric signal. The A / D converter 13 has a CC
The electric signal from D12 is converted into digital data. The internal storage unit 16 receives the digital data from the A / D conversion element 13 via the internal bus 18 and stores the digital data. Also,
The CPU 14 uses the software 19 stored in the control procedure storage unit 15 to execute data processing on digital data. The CPU 14 also controls the display editing device 2 via the interface driver 17 and the communication path 30.
0, the digital data before or after the data processing is transmitted.

The display / editing device 20 has an interface driver 21, an internal storage 22, a CPU 23, a control procedure storage 24, a display (for example, a CRT) 25, a controller 26, and an internal bus 27. The display editing device 20 receives digital data from the communication path 30 via the interface driver 21. CPU23
Displays the received digital data as an image on the display unit 2
Then, the controller 26 is driven to display the image on the controller 5. Further, the CPU 23 executes digital data processing using the software 28 stored in the control procedure storage unit 24. Further, the CPU 23 stores the digital data before or after the processing in the internal storage unit 22.

The software 19 stored in the control procedure storage section 15 of the input device 10 and the software 28 stored in the control procedure storage section 24 of the display / editing apparatus 20 are used for data conversion such as color conversion of digital data and data compression. Used for processing. Software 19 and software 28
Although not necessarily the same software, they provide equivalent functions. The control procedure storage unit 24
Stores, in addition to the software 28 for data processing, transfer format determination software 29 for instructing the input device 10 in a data transfer format (transmission data format).

Next, referring to FIG. 2, the digital data transfer operation of the image input / display system of FIG.
The function of the delivery determination software 29 will be described.

First, the display editing device 20 executes step S1.
In, the performance of the communication path 30 connected to the input device 10 is checked using the transfer format determination software 29. As a result, when the communication path 30 is lower than the predetermined performance, the process proceeds from step S2 to step S3, where it is determined that the input device 10 executes processing such as color conversion and high-level data compression. This is because sending a large amount of data through the communication path 30 where the predetermined performance is not ensured takes time and greatly reduces the performance of the entire system. Therefore, the amount of data to be transmitted is reduced as much as possible. This is in order to avoid a decrease in performance.

On the other hand, if it is determined in step S2 that the communication path 30 has a predetermined performance, the display editing device 20 inquires of the CPU 14 of the input device 10 about the basic performance in step S4. If the basic performance of the CPU 14 is significantly inferior to that of the CPU 23 of the display editing device 20, the process proceeds from step S5 to step S6,
The input device 10 transmits the digital data as it is without performing the data processing, and determines that the processing such as color conversion is performed by the display editing device 20. Conversely, if the basic performance of the CPU 14 is not so inferior or superior to that of the CPU 23 of the display editing device 20, step S7
Thus, it is determined that the input device 10 performs a process such as color conversion and appropriate compression.

As described above, the display editing device 20
It is determined whether or not digital data processing is to be performed in the input device 10 and how much data processing is to be performed. Then, according to the determination, the display editing device 20 issues an instruction to the input device 10 in step S8 to transmit the digital data subjected to the data processing or the digital data not subjected to the data processing.

As described above, in the embodiment of the present invention, data processing can be performed by either the input device or the display editing device according to the performance of the communication path and the performance of the input device. It is possible to improve the overall processing capability of an image input display system in which digital data from an input device is edited by one display editing device. Further, in an image input / display system in which digital data from one input device is edited by a plurality of display / editing devices having different performances, the processing capability of the entire system can be improved.

In the present embodiment, the data processing method is determined according to the performance of the communication path and the performance of the CPU of the input device. However, the data storage capacity of the internal memory of the display editing device is also referred to. Alternatively, it may be determined.

[0022]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. Here, as shown in FIG. 3, a digital camera 100 is considered as the input device 10, and a personal computer 200 is considered as the display / editing device 20.
It is assumed that the communication path 30 is the serial interface 300.

The digital camera 100 has about 400,000 pixels as the CCD image sensor 12, converts an electric signal for one field into digital data by an 8-bit A / D converter 13, and converts the electric signal into an internal storage unit 16. To memorize. The size of the data (raw data) is about 200 kilobytes.

Each of the digital camera 100 and the personal computer 200 handles digital data for one field as an image of 640 pixels × 480 pixels, and
Converted to color image data of 8 bits each for GB (color conversion)
Then, software 19 and 28 for compressing the data are stored in the control procedure storage units 15 and 24, respectively. Although the size of the color-converted color image data is about 900 kilobytes, it can be reduced to 1/1 by compression such as JPEG.
It can be about 5 (about 60 kilobytes). Also, the compression ratio of JPEG can be changed, and the data can be compressed to a smaller data size. In this embodiment, it can be compressed to about 60 kilobytes or about 30 kilobytes.

Further, the serial interface 300
It varies from hundreds of bytes / second to hundreds of kilobytes.

The operation of the image input / display system will be described below with reference to FIG. Here, for the sake of simplicity, the digital camera 100 has a predetermined performance, and digital data from the digital camera 100 is transmitted to various types of personal computers 200.
The case of displaying / editing with will be described.

The personal computer 200 uses the delivery format determination software 29 to execute step S41.
Then, the performance of the serial interface 300 is checked. Then, in step S42, the performance of the serial interface 300 is 5 kilobytes / second (KB / sec).
If it is determined as follows, in step S43, the digital camera 100 determines to compress the color image data to about 1/30 (or at a higher compression rate).

If it is determined in step S42 that the serial interface 300 has performance higher than 5 KB / sec, the microcomputer 200 inquires of the basic performance of the CPU 14 of the digital camera 100 in step S44.

If it is determined in step S45 that the basic performance of the CPU 14 is less than half the performance of the CPU 23 of the personal computer 200, the process proceeds to step S46. Decide not to do.

If it is determined in step S45 that the basic performance of the CPU 14 is equal to or more than 1/2 that of the CPU 23, the process proceeds to step S47.
A value of 0 determines that color conversion and 1/15 data compression are performed.

The above determination is made in step S48 from the personal computer 200 to the digital camera 1 respectively.
00 is notified. Digital camera 100 notified
Transmits digital image data as it is, or color image data obtained by color conversion and data compression to a personal computer via the serial interface 300.

The performance of the serial interface 300 is 5 KB / sec, and the digital camera 100
When color image data is compressed to 1/30 and 30 KB data is transmitted to the personal computer 200,
Assuming that 3 seconds are required for the color conversion processing and 15 seconds for the compression processing, the time required to process and transfer one image and use the data on the personal computer 200 is 30/5 + 3 + 15 = 24. Seconds.

The case where the performance of the serial interface 300 exceeds 10 KB / sec and becomes 100 KB / sec.
The PU 23 is a CPU 10 of the digital camera 100.
If the digital camera 100 has twice the performance (processing speed), the digital camera 100 transmits the raw data (200 KB) to the personal computer 200. In this case, the time from the transfer until the data can be used on the personal computer 200 is 200/100 + (3 + 15) / 10 =
3.8 seconds. That is, in this example, it took 18 seconds to perform color conversion and compression with the digital camera 100, but the time was reduced to only 1.8 seconds by using a high-speed CPU. However, the serial interface 30
Even if the performance of 0 is not sufficient, if data processing is performed on the personal computer side, it takes a very long time just to transfer raw data.

FIG. 5 shows the effect of the present invention. That is, FIG.
Shows the relationship between the transmission speed of the serial interface 300 and the time (required time) until the personal computer 200 can use the data.

In FIG. 5, the results according to the embodiment of the present invention are indicated by and. Here, when the processing speed of the CPU 14 of the digital camera 100 is “1”, the capabilities of the CPU 23 of the personal computer 200 are “0.2”, “2”, and “10”, respectively. ". In this case, when the transmission speed of the serial interface 300 is lower than 5 KB / sec, compression processing and the like are performed on the digital camera 100 side. On the other hand, when the transmission speed of the serial interface 300 is 5
When the speed is equal to or larger than KB / sec,
Since compression processing is performed (the digital camera side,
And the personal computer side), there is a difference in required time. Of course, the higher the performance of the CPU 23, the shorter the required time.

As comparative examples, examples in which compression processing and the like are performed on the personal computer side are shown by and. Here, in the comparative example and the comparative example, when the processing speed of the CPU 14 of the digital camera 100 is “1”, the capabilities of the CPU 23 of the personal computer 200 are “0.2”, “2”, and “10”, respectively. ".
Also, the normal compression processing (60 KB) is performed by the digital camera 1
A comparative example performed on the 00 side is shown by.

The personal computer 20 performs compression processing and the like.
When the transmission is performed on the 0 side, if the transmission speed is low, it takes a long time to transmit data, so that the required time is extremely long. In particular, when the performance of the CPU 23 of the personal computer 200 is inferior, the required time is long even when the transmission speed is high.

FIG. 5 shows that the embodiment of the present invention is controlled so that the required time is the shortest at any transmission speed. Especially when the transmission speed is low,
The present invention is effective.

According to the present invention, even when the transmission speed of the communication path is low, the image data captured by the input device can be efficiently transmitted to the display editing device. ) Can be completed in a short time, more images can be taken, and there is no need to miss a photo opportunity. In addition, the efficiency of work for handling images is improved.

Further, if the performance of the communication channel and the display / editing device is improved, the image captured by the input device such as the CCD can be incorporated into the display / editing device without deteriorating the performance of the system. As a result, it is possible to regenerate an image without deterioration such as compression as needed, and to reproduce an image with a wider dynamic range.

[0041]

The first effect is that the improvement in the performance of the input device or the improvement in the performance of the display processing device is directly linked to the improvement in the performance of the image input and display system.

The reason is that data processing is distributed in consideration of the performance of the communication path and each device.

A second effect is that optimal processing performance is exhibited as a combination of an input device and a display editing device.

The reason is that data processing is distributed so that the performance of the communication path and the device does not become a bottleneck.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of the display editing device of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of the personal computer of FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 is a graph showing the effect of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 Reference Signs List 10 input device 11 lens 12 CCD (charge coupled device) image sensor 13 A / D converter 14 CPU 15 control procedure storage unit 16 internal storage unit 17 interface driver 18 internal bus 19 software 20 display editing device 21 interface driver 22 internal storage unit 23 CPU 24 Control procedure storage unit 25 Display unit 26 Controller 27 Internal bus 28 Software 29 Delivery format determination software 30 Communication path 100 Digital camera 200 Personal computer 300 Serial interface

Claims (3)

(57) [Claims] An input device configured to capture an image of a subject and convert the digital data into digital data; a display editing device configured to convert and display the digital data into an image and edit the image; In an image input / display system having a communication path connecting a display / editing device, the input device and the display / editing device are provided with data processing means for performing the same data processing, respectively, and the input device and the display / editing device are provided. A communication path inspection means for inspecting the performance of the communication path, a capability comparison means for comparing the data processing capacity of the input device and the display editing device, and an inspection result by the communication path inspection means Determining means for determining data processing in the input device based on a comparison result of the capability comparing means; system. 2. When the communication path inspection means detects that the performance of the communication path exceeds a predetermined performance, the determination means does not perform data processing by the data processing means in the input device, and displays the display data. The editing device determines that the data processing is to be performed by the data processing unit. Conversely, if the communication path inspection unit detects that the performance of the communication path is equal to or less than a predetermined performance, the determination unit performs the input processing. 2. The image input / display system according to claim 1, wherein the apparatus determines to perform data processing by said data processing means. 3. A comparison result of said capability comparing means when said data processing means has data compressing means and said deciding means decides to perform data processing by said data processing means in said input device. 3. The image input / display system according to claim 2, wherein the compression ratio is determined based on the following.