JP4745919B2 - IMAGING DEVICE AND IMAGING DEVICE CONTROL METHOD - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an imaging device and a method for controlling the imaging device, and more particularly to a technique suitable for recording video and audio signals on a recording medium that requires a format such as an optical disk.

  As camcorders for recording video and audio, those using an optical disk (disc) as a recording medium (hereinafter referred to as disc camcorder) are known. In such a disc camcorder, there is a technique for detecting a disc having a different physical format as an optical disc, performing a disc format process for recording in a different recording method according to the type, and recording a video signal (for example, Patent Document 1). ).

  There are various types of optical discs that can be used in disc camcorders, such as DVD-R and DVD-RW. For example, in DVD-R, video and audio are recorded according to the DVD video format. In the case of DVD-RW, video and audio are recorded in a video format (hereinafter referred to as Video format) or a video recording format (hereinafter referred to as VR format).

  In the disc camcorder, if the disc is not formatted (initialized) at the start of recording, the video and audio signals are stored in a temporary memory, and a predetermined disc formatting process is automatically performed during that time. There is a technique for starting recording of information in a temporary memory on a disk after performing a formatting process (for example, Patent Document 2).

  As described above, in a disc camcorder, before recording a video or audio signal on a disc, it is necessary to perform a disc formatting process so that data can be written to the disc.

JP 2003-78874 A JP 2005-243071 A

  By the way, when it is desired to record high-definition video and audio signals as in the high-definition standard on a disc, it is difficult to use a large-sized disc with a disc camcorder in consideration of portability and miniaturization.

  Therefore, for example, MPEG4-AVC / H. As in the H.264 standard, by using a codec with higher compression efficiency than before, it is possible to record high-quality video and audio signals on a conventional disk while suppressing the improvement in bit rate.

  In that case, the current disc format does not support high-definition video and audio standards, so a new corresponding format is required. However, in order to perform long-time recording, it is necessary to perform compression at a low bit rate by reducing the video resolution to the NTSC standard or using the current MPEG2. In consideration of reproduction on other reproduction apparatuses, there is a problem that compatibility cannot be obtained unless recording is performed as DVD-Video using the current MPEG2.

As a result, the disc camcorder initializes the disc in a format that has multiple disc disc formats and video (audio) standards, and cannot be recorded unless the appropriate combination is selected. There was a possibility.
The present invention has been made in view of the above, and it is possible to prevent inconvenience that a disc is initialized in an initialization format in which a video signal of a currently set video signal recording method cannot be recorded. For the purpose.

Whether or not the imaging device of the present invention is a format that can be recorded in the currently set video signal format file format when a format for initializing the mounted recording medium is selected by the user. When an initialization format that cannot be recorded is selected, format selection warning means for warning that effect is provided.
Another feature of the imaging apparatus according to the present invention is that a video signal generating unit that outputs video captured by the imaging unit as a plurality of types of video signals having different methods, and the plurality of types of video signals. a video selection means for selecting one of a recording means for recording the video signal to the record medium generated by the video signal generating means in accordance with the selection result of the image selecting unit, output from the video signal generating means Format selection means for selecting one of a plurality of types of recording formats for recording a plurality of types of video signals respectively, and initialization processing of the recording medium according to the recording format selected by the format selection means Initialization means, and recording of the type of video signal selected by the video selection means selected by the format selection means Recording enable / disable determining means for determining whether or not recording on the recording medium is possible, and warning display means for displaying a warning according to the determination result of the record enable / disable determining means on a display device; It is characterized by.

The control method of the image pickup apparatus of the present invention is a format that can be recorded in the file format of the currently set video signal system when the format for initializing the mounted recording medium is selected by the user. And a format selection warning step for warning the fact that an initialization format that cannot be recorded is selected.
Another aspect of the control method of the imaging apparatus according to the present invention is that a video signal generation step of outputting the video shot in the imaging step as a plurality of types of video signals having different methods, and the plurality of types of video a video selection step for selecting one of the signals, the recording process of recording the video signal generated at said image signal generating step in accordance with the selection result of the image selecting step to record medium, the video signal generation A format selection step for selecting one of a plurality of types of recording formats for recording a plurality of types of video signals generated and output in the step, and the recording according to the recording format selected in the format selection step An initialization process for initializing the medium, and a video signal of the type selected in the video selection process, A recording capability determination step for determining whether or not recording on the recording medium is possible in the recording format selected in the selection step, and a warning corresponding to the determination result of the recording capability determination step is displayed on the display device. And a warning display step.

  According to the present invention, when a disc mounted on the main body is initialized, it cannot be recorded by determining whether or not the video signal of the currently set video signal recording method is a recordable initialization format. Since the warning is displayed when the format is selected, even if there are multiple combinations of initialization format types and camera mode types, select a format that matches the currently set camera mode type. Thus, it is possible to prevent the inconvenience of initializing the disc in a format in which the video signal of the currently set video signal recording method cannot be recorded.

(First embodiment)
Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.
FIG. 1 shows a configuration of a disc camcorder using an optical disc as a recording medium. Reference numeral 101 denotes a lens, 102 denotes a CCD (Charge Coupled Device) which is a solid-state imaging device, and 103 denotes a video signal processing circuit that converts an imaging signal into a video signal.

  104 is a video display output circuit for outputting a video signal to a display device or terminal, 105 is a video output terminal, 106 is an LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) as a video display device, and 107 is a switching circuit for switching the compression method of the video signal. .

  Reference numeral 108 denotes a first video signal compression circuit, 109 denotes a second video signal compression circuit, 110 denotes a recording circuit for recording a video signal compressed by a predetermined method onto a recording medium, 111 denotes an optical disk as a recording medium, 112 Is an initialization request circuit.

  113 is a microcomputer for controlling the system of the disc camcorder, 114 is an initialization selection circuit for selecting the format of the optical disc, and 115 to 118 are first, second, third, and third for initializing the optical disc in different formats. 4 is an initialization circuit. Reference numeral 119 denotes a camera mode switching circuit, and reference numeral 120 denotes a recording medium detection circuit that detects an optical disk.

  In the imaging apparatus of the present embodiment configured as described above, the light imaged by the lens 101 is photoelectrically converted by the CCD 102 to become an imaging signal. This imaging signal is converted into a video signal by the video signal processing circuit 103. Further, in accordance with an instruction from the microcomputer 113, an OSD (On Screen Display) signal for camcorder information is also generated.

  The generated video signal is output to the video display output circuit 104 and the switching circuit 107. Further, the video signal becomes an external output signal in the video display output circuit 104 and is externally output via the video output terminal 105. The video display output circuit 104 also performs control for displaying video on the LCD 106.

  On the other hand, the video signal is also input to the switching circuit 107. The switching circuit 107 outputs the input video signal to one of the first video signal compression circuit 108 and the second video signal compression circuit 109 in accordance with an instruction from the microcomputer 113. The first video signal compression circuit 108 and the second video signal compression circuit 109 compress the video signal by different compression methods.

  For example, the compression method of the first video signal compression circuit 108 is an MPEG4-AVC (H.264) method, and compresses an HDTV video signal. The compression method of the second video signal compression circuit 109 is the MPEG2 method, and compresses the SDTV video signal.

  The video signal compressed by a predetermined compression method is recorded on the optical disk 111 by the recording circuit 110. The recording circuit 110 converts the video signal into predetermined data. Data is recorded with laser light through a pickup unit (not shown). At this time, the motor driver control for controlling the driving of the spindle motor that rotates the optical disk 111 and the tracking motor that drives the pickup unit is also performed from the recording circuit 110. The spindle motor, tracking motor, and motor driver are not shown.

  The optical disk 111 records information by irradiating the recording layer with laser light during recording, such as DVD-R and DVD-RW. Further, at the time of reproduction, the recording layer is irradiated with laser light, and the reflected light is detected by the pickup unit to extract information (the structure of the optical disk is not shown). The recording medium detection circuit 120 detects the mounting state of the optical disk 111 and outputs it to the microcomputer 113. From the result, the microcomputer 113 determines whether or not the optical disk 111 is mounted and whether or not it has been formatted.

  The initialization selection circuit 114 selects one of the four initialization circuits 115 to 118. The first initialization circuit 115, the second initialization circuit 116, the third initialization circuit 117, and the fourth initialization circuit 118 record initialization data for formatting the optical disc 111 in different formats. Output to the circuit 110. The recording circuit 110 records initialization data corresponding to the file format selected during the formatting process on the optical disk 111.

  The initialization request circuit 112 outputs to the microcomputer 113 the file format and format selected by the operation key (the operation key is not shown) from the menu screen displayed on the video output terminal 105 or the LCD 106. The camera mode switching circuit 119 selects whether to perform recording in the SDTV or HDTV camera mode from the menu screen displayed on the video output terminal 105 or the LCD 106, and outputs the selection result to the microcomputer 113.

As described above, the AVCHD standard has recently been proposed as a standard for consumer recorders for recording HDTV video signals on a recording medium such as a DVD disk.
In the AVCHD standard, the MPEG4-AVC (H.264) method is used as a moving image compression method. Further, UDF2.5 is used as a file format for recording on an optical disc. In the present embodiment, two types of recording formats, the DVD standard and the AVCHD standard, can be selected as the recording format.

Next, a combination of the camera mode, the video compression method, the optical disk file format, and the disk recording method in this embodiment will be described with reference to FIG.
There are two types of recording formats for disc camcorders: DVD and AVCHD. DVD uses MPEG2 as a moving image compression method and UDF (Universal Disk Format) 2.0 as a file format of an optical disk. As a camera mode, SDTV resolution recording is supported.

  On the other hand, AVCHD is an MPEG4-AVC / H. H.264 is used as the file format of the optical disc and UDF2.5 is used, and HDTV resolution recording is also supported. For each recording format, the video format or the VR format can be selected when recording on the optical disc.

  As shown in FIG. 2, a configuration that can be selected by a combination of each camera mode, recording format, and disc format is shown. In FIG. 2, “◯” is a selectable combination, and “X” is an impossible combination.

  As is apparent from FIG. 2, there are eight combinations, but when recording SDTV video, only DVD can be selected as the recording format. On the other hand, when recording HDTV video, only AVCHD can be selected as the recording format. Thus, when the camera mode is determined, the recording format of the optical disk is determined.

Next, an operation until an initialization process is performed when an unformatted optical disk (hereinafter referred to as a blank disk) is mounted on the disk camcorder of the present embodiment will be described.
When a blank disc is mounted on the disc camcorder as the optical disc 111, the recording medium detection circuit 120 reads data in a predetermined area on the disc. Then, the disk information including the file format type and the presence / absence of the format is sent to the microcomputer 113.

  The initialization selection circuit 114 selects a circuit for formatting from the first initialization circuit 115 to the fourth initialization circuit 118. The first initialization circuit 115 performs file formatting with UDF 2.0 for DVD recording, and disk formatting with the Video format. The second initialization circuit 116 performs file formatting with UDF 2.0 for DVD recording and disk formatting with the VR format. The third initialization circuit 117 performs file formatting with UDF2.5 for AVCHD recording, and disc formatting with the Video format. The fourth initialization circuit 118 performs file formatting with UDF2.5 for AVCHD recording and disk formatting with the VR format.

  In this embodiment, as described above, there are provided four types of initialization circuits 115 to 118 for outputting initialization data for formatting with a combination of different file formats and disk formats. The format type is instructed from the microcomputer 113.

  The microcomputer 113 is a computer for controlling the system of the disk camcorder, and includes a ROM composed of control codes and control data and a RAM for temporarily storing various information (the configuration of the ROM and RAM is the same). Not shown). When the microcomputer 113 detects the loading of the blank disk from the disk information sent from the recording medium detection circuit 120, the microcomputer 113 performs the formatting process.

  At that time, the microcomputer 113 generates OSD data for outputting a menu screen for allowing the user to select the format type to the video output terminal 105 and the LCD 106, and outputs the OSD data to the video signal processing circuit 103. Further, an instruction to switch the camera mode to either SDTV or HDTV is output to the switching circuit 107 in accordance with the user's selection. Also, the item selected on the menu screen is input from the initialization request circuit 112 to the microcomputer 113 as format type and format start information.

  A case where the optical disk 111 is initialized with the type of initialization input from the initialization request circuit 112 to the microcomputer 113 will be described. It is assumed that the microcomputer 113 determines that the video signal generated by the video signal compression circuit currently selected by the switching circuit 107 cannot be recorded on the optical disk 111.

  In this case, the microcomputer 113 initializes the optical disk 111 with the initialization type selected by the user before instructing the initialization selection circuit 114 to start initialization. An OSD for outputting a warning screen to the video output terminal 105 and the LCD 106 indicating that the video signal generated by the video signal compression circuit currently selected by the switching circuit 107 cannot be recorded on the optical disk 111. Data is generated and output to the video signal processing circuit 103.

Next, processing performed by the microcomputer 113 after the blank disk is loaded will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.
First, in step S301, the mounting of the disk is monitored. When the disc is loaded, it is detected from the disc information input from the recording medium detection circuit 120 that the optical disc is loaded, and the disc type information is acquired, and the process proceeds to step S302.

  In step S302, it is determined whether or not it is a blank disk from the acquired disk type information. As a result of this determination, if the loaded disk is a blank disk, the process proceeds to step S303, and if it is a formatted disk, the process ends.

  In step S303, the user is allowed to select a disk format. The format is selected by displaying the menu screen generated by the video signal processing circuit 103 on the LCD 106. An example of the menu screen during formatting is shown in FIG.

  FIG. 4A shows a menu screen for selecting the format type. Items corresponding to the contents of the format are displayed, and the selected item is highlighted as indicated by reference numeral 401. Further, as detailed information of the selected item, information regarding the type of the camera mode and the type of the disc format is displayed as indicated by reference numeral 402, and the format type information is shown to the user.

When a predetermined format is selected by the user, format type information is generated, and the process proceeds to step S304.
In step S304, the disc is formatted with respect to the loaded optical disc 111 in accordance with the format type selected in step S303. At that time, the switching circuit 107 determines whether the video signal output from the currently selected video compression circuit is recordable or not recordable on the mounted optical disk 111. If it is determined that recording is impossible, the process proceeds to step S305, and if recording is possible, the process proceeds to step S306.

  In step S305, a warning to the effect of the determination in step S304 is generated in the video signal processing circuit 103, and a warning screen is displayed on the video output terminal 105 and the LCD 106. FIG. 4B shows a warning screen. Thereafter, the process proceeds to step 306.

  In step S306, the disk is formatted according to the format type selected in step S303. At this time, the format menu screen is first switched to FIG. In the screen of FIG. 4C, the user is allowed to select whether or not to execute the format. The selected item is highlighted in reverse, as indicated by reference numeral 403, as with the format type selection.

  When the format start is selected, the initialization request circuit 112 outputs a disk format request to the microcomputer 113. The microcomputer 113 outputs the format type information generated in step S303 to the initialization selection circuit 114.

  For example, when the AVCHD VR mode is selected as shown in FIG. 4A, the fourth initialization circuit 118 is selected as the initialization circuit in the initialization selection circuit 114. Thereby, the file format by UDF2.5 and the disk format by VR format are executed. When the formatting is executed, the menu screen is switched as shown in FIG. 4D, and the status of the formatting process is sequentially notified to the user as indicated by 404. When the formatting process is completed, the menu screen is switched as shown in FIG. 4E, and the user is notified of the end of the process as indicated by 405, and the process ends.

Next, a modification of the processing performed by the microcomputer 113 will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.
First, in step S501, the mounting of the optical disk 111 is monitored. When the optical disk 111 is loaded, it is detected from the disk information input from the recording medium detection circuit 120 that the optical disk is loaded, disk type information is acquired, and the process proceeds to step S502.

  In step S502, it is determined from the acquired disc type information whether the mounted optical disc 111 is a blank disc. As a result of this determination, if the mounted optical disk 111 is a blank disk, the process proceeds to step S503, and if it is a formatted disk, the process ends.

  In step S503, the format of the loaded optical disk 111 is selected. This format selection is performed according to the menu screen generated by the video signal processing circuit 103. A menu screen during formatting is shown in FIG.

  FIG. 6A shows a menu screen for selecting the format type. Items corresponding to the contents of the format are displayed, and the selected item is highlighted in reverse as indicated by reference numeral 601. Further, as detailed information of the selected item, information regarding the type of the camera mode and the type of the disc format is displayed as indicated by reference numeral 602, and the format type information is shown to the user. When a predetermined format is selected, format type information is generated, and the process proceeds to step S504.

  In step S504, according to the format type selected in step S503, a determination is made as to the result when the disc is formatted with respect to the mounted optical disc 111. In the present embodiment, the switching circuit 107 determines whether the video signal output from the currently selected video compression circuit is recordable or not recordable on the mounted optical disk 111. If it is determined that recording is impossible, the process proceeds to step S505. If recording is possible, the process proceeds to step S507.

  In step S505, a warning to the effect of the determination in step S504 is generated in the video signal processing circuit 103, and a warning screen is displayed on the video output terminal 105 and the LCD 106. At this time, along with the warning display, the format of the disc selected in step S503 and the format that can record the video signal output from the currently selected video compression circuit are also displayed. FIG. 6B is an example of a warning screen.

  The format of the disc selected in step S503 is displayed as indicated by reference numeral 603, and the format in which the video signal output from the currently selected video compression circuit can be recorded is displayed at reference numeral 604. In addition, a warning icon is displayed on the upper right as indicated by reference numeral 605. Thereafter, the process proceeds to step 506.

  In step S506, it is selected whether to format the disk according to the format type selected in step S503. At this time, the format menu screen is switched to FIG.

  In the screen of FIG. 6C, the user is allowed to select whether or not to execute the format. The selected item is highlighted in an inverted manner as indicated by reference numeral 606 as in the format type selection. If format start is selected, the process proceeds to step S507. If format start is not selected, the process returns to step S503, and format selection is performed again.

  In step S507, the disk is formatted according to the format type selected in step S503. First, the initialization request circuit 112 outputs a disk format request to the microcomputer 113.

  The microcomputer 113 outputs the format type information generated in step S503 to the initialization selection circuit 114. For example, as shown in FIG. 6A, when the AVCHD VR mode is selected, the fourth initialization circuit 118 is selected as the initialization circuit in the initialization selection circuit 114. Then, the file format by UDF2.5 and the disk format by VR format are executed.

  When the formatting is executed, the menu screen is switched to FIG. 6D, and the user is informed of the status of the formatting process as indicated by reference numeral 607. When the formatting process is completed, the menu screen is switched to (e) of FIG. 6, and the user is notified of the end of the process as indicated by reference numeral 608, and the process ends.

(Other embodiments according to the present invention)
Each unit constituting the imaging apparatus and each step of the imaging apparatus control method in the embodiment of the present invention described above can be realized by operating a program stored in a RAM or ROM of a computer. This program and a computer-readable recording medium recording the program are included in the present invention.

  In addition, the present invention can be implemented as, for example, a system, apparatus, method, program, storage medium, or the like. Specifically, the present invention may be applied to a system including a plurality of devices. The present invention may be applied to an apparatus composed of a single device.

  In the present invention, a software program (in the embodiment, a program corresponding to the flowcharts shown in FIGS. 3 and 5) for realizing the functions of the above-described embodiments is directly or remotely supplied to the system or apparatus. In addition, this includes a case where the system or the computer of the apparatus is also achieved by reading and executing the supplied program code.

  Accordingly, since the functions of the present invention are implemented by computer, the program code installed in the computer also implements the present invention. In other words, the present invention includes a computer program itself for realizing the functional processing of the present invention.

  In that case, as long as it has the function of a program, it may be in the form of object code, a program executed by an interpreter, script data supplied to the OS, and the like.

  Examples of the recording medium for supplying the program include a floppy (registered trademark) disk, hard disk, optical disk 111, magneto-optical disk, MO, CD-ROM, CD-R, and CD-RW. In addition, there are magnetic tape, nonvolatile memory card, ROM, DVD (DVD-ROM, DVD-R), and the like.

  As another program supply method, a browser on a client computer is used to connect to an Internet home page. The computer program itself of the present invention or a compressed file including an automatic installation function can be downloaded from the homepage by downloading it to a recording medium such as a hard disk.

  It can also be realized by dividing the program code constituting the program of the present invention into a plurality of files and downloading each file from a different homepage. That is, a WWW server that allows a plurality of users to download a program file for realizing the functional processing of the present invention on a computer is also included in the present invention.

  In addition, the program of the present invention is encrypted, stored in a storage medium such as a CD-ROM, distributed to users, and key information for decryption is downloaded from a homepage via the Internet to users who have cleared predetermined conditions. Let It is also possible to execute the encrypted program by using the downloaded key information and install the program on a computer.

  Further, the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the computer executing the read program. In addition, based on the instructions of the program, an OS or the like running on the computer performs part or all of the actual processing, and the functions of the above-described embodiments can also be realized by the processing.

  Further, the program read from the recording medium is written in a memory provided in a function expansion board inserted into the computer or a function expansion unit connected to the computer. Thereafter, the CPU of the function expansion board or function expansion unit performs part or all of the actual processing based on the instructions of the program, and the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing.

It is a block diagram which shows the internal structure of the imaging device in connection with embodiment of this invention. It is a figure explaining an example of the combination of the camera mode in this embodiment, a video compression system, the file format of an optical disc, and the recording system of a disc. It is a flowchart explaining an example of the process sequence which a microcomputer performs after a blank disk is mounted | worn. It is a figure which shows an example of the screen transition of the display part in FIG. It is a flowchart explaining an example of the deformation | transformation procedure of the procedure of FIG. It is a figure which shows an example of the screen transition of the display part in FIG.

Explanation of symbols

101 Lens 102 CCD
103 video signal processing circuit 104 video display output circuit 105 video output terminal 106 LCD
107 switching circuit 108 first video signal compression circuit 109 second video signal compression circuit 110 recording circuit 111 optical disk 112 initialization request circuit 113 microcomputer 114 initialization selection circuit 115 first initialization circuit 116 second initialization Formatting circuit 117 Third initialization circuit 118 Fourth initialization circuit 119 Camera mode switching circuit 120 Recording medium detection circuit 401 Format type selection 402 Information on disc format type 403 Format execution availability selection 404 Format processing status 405 Processing end notification

Claims (8)

  When the format for initializing the installed recording medium is selected by the user, it is determined whether or not it is a format that can be recorded in the file format of the currently set video signal system. An image pickup apparatus comprising: a format selection warning means for warning when a format is selected. Video signal generation means for outputting video captured by the imaging means as a plurality of types of video signals having different methods;
Video selection means for selecting one of the plurality of types of video signals;
Recording means for recording the video signal generated by said video signal generating means in accordance with the selection result of said image selecting means to the record medium,
Format selection means for selecting any of a plurality of types of recording formats for recording a plurality of types of video signals output from the video signal generation means;
Initialization means for initializing the recording medium according to the recording format selected by the format selection means;
A record enable / disable determining unit that determines whether or not the type of video signal selected by the video selecting unit can be recorded on the recording medium in the recording format selected by the format selecting unit;
An image pickup apparatus comprising: a warning display unit that displays a warning according to a determination result of the recording availability determination unit on a display device.   The imaging apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the recording medium is an optical disk, and the format is a recording format composed of a combination of a file format and a video signal recording method.   The imaging apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the plurality of types of video signals are a plurality of video signals having different resolutions.   The imaging apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the plurality of types of video signals are a plurality of video signals having different video signal compression methods.   The imaging apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the plurality of types of video signals are a plurality of video signals having different compression ratios of the video signals.   When the format for initializing the installed recording medium is selected by the user, it is determined whether or not it is a format that can be recorded in the file format of the currently set video signal system. A method for controlling an image pickup apparatus, comprising: a format selection warning step for warning when a format is selected. A video signal generation process for outputting the video captured in the imaging process as a plurality of types of video signals having different methods;
A video selection step of selecting one of the plurality of types of video signals;
A recording step for recording the video signal generated at said image signal generating step in accordance with the selection result of the image selecting step to record medium,
A format selection step of selecting any one of a plurality of types of recording formats for recording a plurality of types of video signals generated and output in the video signal generation step;
An initialization step of initializing the recording medium according to the recording format selected in the format selection step;
A record availability determination step for determining whether or not the type of video signal selected in the video selection step can be recorded on the recording medium in the recording format selected in the format selection step;
A method for controlling an imaging apparatus, comprising: a warning display step for displaying a warning corresponding to a determination result of the recording possibility determination step on a display device.

Images