JP4962291B2 - In-vehicle image processing apparatus and in-vehicle image display apparatus - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an in-vehicle image processing apparatus and an in-vehicle image display apparatus for reducing and displaying an image while maintaining visibility of important parts around a vehicle.

  Conventionally, when driving a vehicle, an on-board camera is used to acquire an image of the rear side of the vehicle, highlight an object with a relative speed detected by optical flow, etc., and generate an image that is easier for the driver to understand There is a technology that aims to improve safety (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

  On the other hand, there is also a technique for reducing the image while leaving the important part by analyzing the importance of the image and cutting and pasting the part having the high importance (see, for example, Patent Document 2). Furthermore, to improve this, first calculate the image energy image showing the importance, and calculate the line that cuts through the image energy image through the less important part called Seam, and delete that part Have been proposed (see, for example, Non-Patent Document 1).

With these reduced image generation techniques, the surrounding situation can be efficiently displayed on a small monitor. When this is applied to an in-vehicle camera, for example, in the side rear camera, the overtaking vehicle is more emphasized and it is easy to understand whether or not the lane can be changed at a glance.
JP2003-274393 US2007 / 0025637 “Seam Carving for Content-Aware Image Resizing”, S. Avidan (Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs), SIGGRAPH'07

  However, the method described in Non-Patent Document 1 has a problem that an important object is not sufficiently emphasized or a reduced image is distorted depending on a method of calculating an image energy image. For example, as a general method, when an edge image is used as an image energy image, roadside structures often have strong edges, which are not so important for determining whether or not to change lanes. Get higher.

  Therefore, the importance of the truly important surrounding vehicles becomes relatively low, and the vehicles are not sufficiently emphasized. In addition, a so-called “smooth-shaped” vehicle having less unevenness of the vehicle also has a relatively low image energy, and the shape of the vehicle is distorted.

  Furthermore, even when the entire image is too complicated, such as when there are a large number of vehicles or when there is a pattern on the road surface, the deletion process is performed even though there is no portion suitable for deletion, so that the vehicle is distorted.

  The present invention has been made in view of such a problem, and displays an in-vehicle image processing apparatus capable of enhancing an important object in an image in a reduced image and obtaining a reduced image with less distortion, and the image. An object is to provide an in-vehicle image display device.

  The in-vehicle image processing apparatus according to claim 1, which has been made to solve such a problem (5: In this section, in order to facilitate understanding of the invention, the “best mode for carrying out the invention is described as necessary. The reference numeral used in the “form” column is attached, but it does not mean that the scope of claims is limited by this reference sign). Image acquisition means (10), area importance setting means (30), image energy calculation Means (30) and image reduction means (30).

  The image acquisition means (10) is for acquiring images around the host vehicle, and the area importance level setting means (30) is used to determine the importance of the area in the image acquired by the image processing acquisition means (10). Set. The image energy calculation means (30) calculates the energy in the image acquired by the image acquisition means (10).

The image reduction means (30) reduces the image by extracting and deleting a region where the energy in the image calculated by the image energy calculation means (30) is lower than a predetermined value. Further, the image energy calculation means (30), by the importance of the image set by the region importance setting means (30) for a given value or more regions, a predetermined energy pattern, the image An area having a medium importance level equal to or higher than a predetermined value is not deleted .

  The on-vehicle image processing device (5) as described above can emphasize important objects in the image in the reduced image and obtain a reduced image with less distortion, so that a reduced image display that is easy for the driver to see is provided. It becomes a possible image processing apparatus. This will be described below.

  First, “image energy in an image” will be described. This is an index indicating where an important part in an image is. An object that is calculated for each position in the image and creates an energy distribution of the entire image is called an energy image.

  Various methods can be considered for this calculation method, that is, a method for defining energy. For example, an edge image, that is, a line density, can be considered as a place where a color change is large. For example, in places that are not important, such as clear sky, line density and screen color change can hardly be made. On the other hand, in the images taken of urban roads, lanes and other paint are applied to the road surface, there are many vehicles on the road, and buildings are lined up on the side of the road. In addition, because there are advertising billboards lined up on the side of the road and buildings, the line density and color change are large.

  As described above, when the edge extraction processing is set to the image energy in the image, the portion with a strong edge becomes “high image energy in the image”, while the important thing without a pattern, for example, a vehicle with a soft design. Will be considered unimportant. For this reason, the vehicle is deleted, or the part inside the vehicle is deleted and the appearance of the vehicle is distorted. Therefore, this image energy calculation method is very important.

  According to the “energy in the image” defined as described above, in the in-vehicle image processing device (5) according to claim 1, the energy in the image is calculated and calculated by the image energy calculating means (30). A portion where the energy is lower than a predetermined value is deleted, and the image is reduced.

  At that time, a predetermined energy pattern is set for a region in which the importance in the image set by the region importance setting means (30) is a predetermined value or more. Therefore, if an area of importance or higher in the image, for example, an area such as another vehicle, a bicycle, or a person, is not deleted from the image by increasing the energy of the portion, the portion will not be distorted. An image or an image in which that portion is emphasized can be obtained.

  Here, a region having a high degree of importance in the image should be recognized as dangerous when the driver drives the host vehicle, like other vehicles, bicycles, or people. Therefore, when the images are reduced, if they remain in the image without being distorted or are emphasized, the driver can easily recognize them from the image, so that safety during driving is possible. Can be improved.

  By the way, as the predetermined energy pattern to be set for the region where the importance degree in the image is equal to or higher than the predetermined value, various patterns are conceivable. It is preferable to use a distributed energy pattern.

In this way, it is possible to obtain a reduced image in which highly important portions are emphasized and distortion is unlikely to occur in low importance portions. This will be described below.
In the on-vehicle image processing device (5) according to claim 1, since the image is reduced by deleting the line portion in the image, the reduced image is distorted. This distortion occurs when Seam runs diagonally and concentrates in one place. To prevent Seam from concentrating, you can prevent Seam from running diagonally.

  For this purpose, an energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape is set. For example, the energy size of the lattice portion of the energy pattern distributed in the lattice shape to be added is larger than the energy of the important object to be emphasized. If the value is lower and higher than the energy of the non-important material, the line is allowed to run diagonally for emphasis of the important material, and the line runs diagonally in the other non-important material region. It is suppressed. In addition, as described in Non-Patent Document 1, this line is hereinafter referred to as Seam.

More specifically, an energy pattern of a vertically long lattice pattern having higher energy than the surrounding area may be set for each pixel.
In this way, Seam is allowed to run diagonally in the important material area, and Seam is prevented from running diagonally in other non-important material areas, so it is important to delete the Seam part. Higher portions are emphasized, and unnecessary portions do not cause unnecessary distortion.

  In addition, in a grid-like energy pattern, simply setting a gradation energy pattern in which the lateral energy with respect to the traveling direction of the host vehicle is low and the rearward distance is high, the image on the side of the host vehicle is unilaterally set. There is a risk that the image will be deleted and the side is not shown at all.

  Therefore, as described in claim 3, when the grid-like energy pattern is set so that the grid interval is widened and the grid energy is set low as the distance from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle increases. It is possible to create an image in which the areas on the side of the vehicle are not all low energy, and portions where the images are thinned out are included in some places. As a result, an image that has a larger amount of thinning out in the wide-angle region that is the nearest adjacent lane region and a smaller amount in the distant adjacent lane region is obtained, and a region from far to near can be efficiently seen.

  By the way, what is important in the image is something that the driver must recognize in order to drive safely while the vehicle is traveling, that is, vehicles, people, roadside structures, There is a lane in which the host vehicle for performing a safe driving operation exists, a lane adjacent to the lane, or a horizon.

  Therefore, the region importance setting means (30), as described in claim 4, is a region in the lane where the vehicle, the person, and the own vehicle exist in the image, and a lane adjacent to the lane where the own vehicle exists. The importance of at least any one of the area, the roadside structure, and the area above the horizon may be set to a predetermined value or more.

  In this way, the above-mentioned objects that cause danger during driving and objects that are necessary for safe driving are emphasized and displayed in the image without being reduced when the image is reduced as having high importance. Therefore, it is easy for the driver to visually recognize what is important. Therefore, the driver can perform safe driving.

  Moreover, even if it is a similar object, the danger degree with respect to the own vehicle falls, so that it is separated from the own vehicle to the side. Therefore, as described in claim 5, the region importance level setting means (30) may decrease the importance level of the object as the distance from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle in the image increases.

  In this way, the importance of the object that is farther away from the host vehicle decreases. Therefore, the object that is closer to the side of the host vehicle is emphasized, and the object that is farther is reduced. That is, since a high-risk object is displayed with more emphasis, the driver can perform safe driving.

  By the way, when there is no important object such as a vehicle in the image, if an energy pattern of a predetermined value is superimposed as an original image, if there is no important object, the base pattern has priority and Become.

  Therefore, as described in claim 6, the image energy calculating means (30) has a predetermined energy pattern as a base pattern, and the importance in the image set by the area importance setting means (30) in the base pattern. If the energy in the image is calculated by further adding / subtracting energy to a region where is equal to or greater than a predetermined value, and the base pattern is an energy pattern in which the predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape, the vehicle If there is no important object such as, the base pattern is given priority and the image is free from distortion.

  Further, as described in claim 7, the image energy calculating means (30) is configured such that the grid interval is set wider as the energy pattern is distributed with respect to the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle as an energy pattern in which energy is distributed in a grid pattern. It is good to do so.

  In this way, when the base pattern lattice spacing becomes wider as it moves away from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle, the amount of thinning is increased in the wide-angle area that is the nearest adjacent lane area, and the distance is thinned out in the distant adjacent lane area. An image with a small amount becomes a base, and an area from far to near can be efficiently seen.

  An image display device (1) according to claim 8 includes an in-vehicle display means (50), an in-vehicle image processing device (5) according to any one of claims 1 to 5, and an in-vehicle image. A display control means (30) for displaying an image reduced by the processing device (5) on the display means (50) is provided.

  According to such an in-vehicle image display device (1), an in-vehicle image display device capable of displaying an image having the characteristics of the in-vehicle image processing device according to any one of claims 1 to 5 ( 1).

  By the way, when the display means (50) is mounted on the host vehicle, various methods are conceivable for the mounting position and the display direction. For example, the display screen of the car navigation device mounted in the front part of the passenger compartment may be used as the display means (50) to display inside the vehicle. The driver may be attached to the rear-viewing mirror portion of the host vehicle so that the driver can visually recognize the display screen.

  In this way, the driver can visually recognize the highlighted object by the same operation as the vehicle rear confirmation operation via the rear confirmation mirror, so it is easy to confirm the presence of the object, and thus driving. Safety at the time can be improved.

  Embodiments to which the present invention is applied will be described below with reference to the drawings. The embodiment of the present invention is not limited to the following embodiment, and can take various forms as long as they belong to the technical scope of the present invention.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of an in-vehicle image display device 1 to which the present invention is applied. The vehicle-mounted image display device 1 includes a vehicle-mounted image processing device 5 and a display device 50 as shown in FIG.

The in-vehicle image processing device 5 includes a side rear camera 10, a millimeter wave radar 20, a vehicle speed sensor 40, and an image processing unit 30.
The side rear camera 10 is a small wide-angle CCD camera that can acquire a visible light image for acquiring an image of the surroundings of the host vehicle (not shown). It is attached.

  The millimeter wave radar 20 is for detecting the relative speed of an object in the image (in the present embodiment, another vehicle), and is attached to the host vehicle so that millimeter wave radio waves can be transmitted to the rear side of the host vehicle. Yes. The millimeter wave radar 20 transmits a millimeter wave radio wave, receives a reflected wave of the transmitted radio wave, and receives the reflected wave reception intensity, reception azimuth, and the distance from the Doppler shift of the reflected wave to the other vehicle behind the vehicle side. And detect azimuth and relative speed.

  The vehicle speed sensor 40 detects the speed of the host vehicle, and may detect the speed from the number of rotations of the axle, or detects the current position of the host vehicle with a GPS onboard device, and based on the amount of change. It may be one that detects speed.

The image processing unit 30 includes a CPU, a ROM, a RAM, an I / O, and the like (not shown), and executes the following processes (a) to (e).
(A) The importance of the area in the image acquired by the side rear camera 10 is set to a value greater than or equal to a predetermined value. The importance is at least one of the following (■) to (■).

(■) Region in the lane where the vehicle, people, and own vehicle are present in the image (■) Region in the lane adjacent to the lane where the own vehicle is present (■) Region above the roadside structure or horizon ) Decrease the importance of an object as it moves away from the axis of the traveling direction of the vehicle in the image.

(C) The image energy in the image acquired by the side rear camera 10 is calculated.
(D) An energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape is set for a region in which the importance in the image set in (a) is a predetermined value or more. At this time, the energy pattern is set by using a grid whose spacing is set wider as it moves away from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle.

(E) The image is reduced by extracting and deleting a region where the image energy obtained by the processes (a) to (d) is lower than a predetermined value.
(F) The image reduced by the process (e) is displayed on the display device 50.

  The display device 50 displays an image reduced by the in-vehicle image processing device 5 and includes a liquid crystal display and an organic EL display. The display device 50 is attached so that the driver can visually recognize the display screen instead of the mirror at the rearview mirror portion of the host vehicle.

(Processing in the image processing unit 30)
Next, processing executed by the image processing unit 30 will be described with reference to FIGS. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing a flow of processing of a main routine of image processing executed by the image processing unit 30, and FIG. 3 is a flowchart of importance setting processing which is a subroutine. FIG. 4 is a flowchart of image energy image generation processing as a subroutine, and FIG. 5 is a flowchart of low image energy location deletion processing as a subroutine.

  In the image processing, as shown in FIG. 2, an image of the rear side of the host vehicle is acquired from the side rear camera 10 in S100, and in S105, importance level setting processing is performed, and an area in the image acquired in S100 is displayed. Importance is set. The importance level setting process will be described later.

In subsequent S110, an image energy image of the image acquired in S100 is generated. Details of the image energy image generation processing will be described later.
In subsequent S115, the low image energy location is deleted from the image energy image generated in S110, and a reduced image is obtained. The low image energy location deletion process will be described later.

In subsequent S120, the reduced image obtained in S115 is displayed on the display device 50, the processing is returned to S100, and the image processing is repeated.
(Importance setting process)
Next, the importance setting process will be described with reference to FIG. In the importance setting process, in S200, an important region is extracted from the image acquired in S100 (see FIG. 2).

  In other words, by a known image processing from the image, the area in the lane where the vehicle, the person, the own vehicle exists, the area in the lane adjacent to the lane area where the own vehicle exists, the area above the roadside structure, and the horizontal line The region above is extracted.

  In subsequent S205, it is determined whether or not the area extracted in S200 includes an in-lane area in which the vehicle, the person, and the own vehicle exist, and when it is determined that there is an in-lane area (S205: Yes), If the process proceeds to S225 and it is determined that there is no such area (S205: No), the process proceeds to S210.

  In S210, it is determined whether or not there is a lane area adjacent to the lane area where the host vehicle exists in the area extracted in S200, and when it is determined that there is the lane area (S210: Yes). If the process proceeds to S225 and it is determined that there is no such area (S210: No), the process proceeds to S215.

  In S215, it is determined whether or not there is a region above the roadside structure in the region extracted in S200. If it is determined that there is the region (S215: Yes), the process proceeds to S225. If it is determined that there is no such area (S215: No), the process proceeds to S220.

  In S220, it is determined whether or not there is an area above the horizontal line. If it is determined that there is the area (S220: Yes), the process proceeds to S225, and it is determined that there is no such area ( S220: No), the process ends.

In S225, the importance level is set. That is, the importance of each area is set as follows (a) to (d).
(A) In the case of an area in a lane where vehicles, people, and own vehicles exist, the importance is × 10
(B) In the case of an area in the lane adjacent to the lane where the host vehicle exists, the importance is x6.
(C) In the case of the region above the roadside structure, the importance is × 4
(D) In the case of an area above the horizontal line, the importance is x2
Here, “× 10” means that the energy of the region obtained in S100 is 10 times.

  In subsequent S230, the importance set in each region in S225 is corrected according to the distance from the traveling direction of the host vehicle. That is, the importance of the area is lowered according to the distance from the central axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle to each area.

Specifically, in the image acquired in S100 (see FIG. 2), the distance from the portion coincident with the axis of the side rear camera 10 in the traveling direction of the host vehicle to the region where the importance is set in S225 is predetermined on the screen. When the distance is more than the above, a value obtained by multiplying the importance set in S225 by 0.5 is set as the importance. After the importance is corrected, the process is terminated (image energy image generation process)
Next, the image energy image generation process will be described with reference to FIG. In the image energy image generation process, a base image energy pattern image is generated in S300. For example, an energy pattern set in a lattice shape is used as the base image. At this time, a lattice pattern is set in which the energy distribution of the lattice is set so that the interval between the lattices increases as the distance from the axis of the traveling direction of the host vehicle increases.

  In S305, an edge image is created for the base image energy pattern image generated in S300. That is, corners and edge portions in the image are extracted to generate an image (edge image). An example of the original image is shown in FIG. 6A and an example of the edge image is shown in FIG.

  In S310, the edge image generated in S305 is added to the base image energy pattern image generated in S300. That is, the edge image is superimposed on the base image energy pattern image.

  In S315, an energy pattern is generated according to the importance set in S105 (see FIG. 2). That is, an energy pattern is generated in which energy obtained by multiplying the importance set in S105 by the importance is distributed in a grid pattern in a region where the importance is higher than a predetermined value. At this time, the energy distribution of the lattice is corrected so that the interval between the lattices increases as the distance from the axis of the traveling direction of the host vehicle increases.

In S320, the energy pattern generated in S315 is added to the image energy image obtained in 310, and the process ends.
(Low image energy location deletion processing)
Next, the low image energy location deletion process will be described with reference to FIG. In the low image energy location deletion process, in S400, the line to be reduced (hereinafter referred to as “Seam”) with respect to the image energy image obtained in the image energy image generation process in S110 (see FIG. 2). ) Is calculated.

  Specifically, the ratio of the vertical and horizontal lengths of the image size acquired in S100 (see FIG. 2) and the length of the reduced image and the width of the Seam that is deleted from the screen when one Seam is deleted from the screen are deleted. The number of power seams is calculated.

  In subsequent S405, Seam is calculated. In the calculation of Seam, for one pixel on the upper side of the image energy image obtained in S320 (see FIG. 4), the image energy value of the surrounding pixels is calculated, and pixels whose image energy value is below a predetermined value are calculated. It is done by the method of connecting to the bottom side sequentially. In addition, the Seam is calculated, and the image energy value for each Seam is calculated. An example of Seam is shown in FIG. In FIG. 7A, many lines drawn from the upper side to the lower side of the image are Seam.

  In S410, it is determined from the image energy value of the seam calculated in step S405 whether or not the total value of the deleted image energy of the seam is equal to or greater than a predetermined value. Then, when the total value of the deleted image energy of the Seam is equal to or greater than a predetermined value (S410: Yes), the process is terminated. When the total value of the deleted image energy of the Seam is smaller than a predetermined value (S410: No), the process proceeds to S415.

  In S415, the Seam portion calculated in S405 is deleted from the image energy image, and in subsequent S420, it is determined whether or not the total number of Seams deleted in S415 is equal to or less than the number of Seams to be deleted calculated in S400. The

  If the total number of deleted Seams is equal to or less than the number of Seams to be deleted (S420: Yes), the process proceeds to S405 and the process is repeated. Further, when the total number of deleted Seams is larger than the number of Seams to be deleted (S420: No), the process is terminated. An example of an image that has been subjected to the low image energy location deletion process is shown in FIG.

(Characteristics of in-vehicle image display device 1)
In the vehicle-mounted image display device 1 as described above, the energy in the image is calculated, and a portion where the calculated energy is lower than a predetermined value is deleted to reduce the image. At that time, a predetermined energy pattern is set for a region having an importance level equal to or higher than a predetermined value in the image.

  Therefore, an energy pattern is set for a region having a degree of importance or higher in the image, for example, a region such as another vehicle, a bicycle, or a person. At that time, since the energy pattern portion is set to an energy higher than that of the other regions, the image is not deleted from the image, and the image is not distorted. it can.

  Here, a region having a high degree of importance in the image should be recognized as dangerous when the driver drives the host vehicle, like other vehicles, bicycles, or people. Therefore, when the image is reduced, if they remain in the image without being deleted or are emphasized, the driver can easily recognize them from the image, thereby improving the safety during driving. Can do it.

  In addition, an energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape is used as a predetermined energy pattern that is set for an area having an importance level equal to or higher than a predetermined value in the image. Therefore, it is possible to obtain a reduced image in which a portion having high importance is emphasized and distortion is hardly generated in a portion having low importance.

  This is because the image is reduced by deleting the line portion in the image, so that the image after the reduction is distorted. This distortion occurs when Seam runs diagonally and concentrates in one place. Therefore, to prevent Seam from concentrating, it is only necessary to prevent Seam from running diagonally.

  For this purpose, an energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape as described above is set. Then, if the energy magnitude of the lattice part of the energy pattern distributed in a grid pattern is lower than the energy of the important object to be emphasized and higher than the energy of the non-important object, the emphasis of the important object is obtained. Seam is allowed to run diagonally, and Seam is prevented from running diagonally in other non-important areas. Therefore, by deleting the Seam portion, the high importance portion is emphasized, and the low portion does not generate unnecessary distortion.

  Further, as the grid-like energy pattern, the grid interval is set wider as the distance from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle increases. Therefore, it is possible to create an image in which the area on the side of the host vehicle does not have low energy, and portions where the image is thinned out are included in some places.

  Furthermore, at least one of the area in the lane where the vehicle, the person, the own vehicle exists, the area in the lane adjacent to the lane where the own vehicle exists, the roadside structure, or the area above the horizon is important. The degree is set to a value greater than a predetermined value. Therefore, it is important for the driver because objects that cause danger during driving and objects necessary for safe driving are emphasized and displayed in the image without being reduced when the image is reduced. It is easy to see high-grade items. Therefore, the driver can perform safe driving.

  Further, the importance of the object is reduced as the distance from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle in the image increases. Since the importance of the object located farther away from the host vehicle decreases, the object closer to the side of the host vehicle is emphasized and the object farther away is reduced. That is, since a high-risk object is displayed with more emphasis, the driver can perform safe driving.

  In addition, since the display device 50 is attached to the rear-viewing mirror portion of the host vehicle so that the driver can view the display screen, the driver can check the rear of the host vehicle via the rear-viewing mirror. The highlighted object can be visually recognized by the same operation as the operation. Therefore, it is easy to confirm the presence of an object, and thus safety during driving can be improved.

[Other Embodiments]
As mentioned above, although embodiment of this invention was described, this invention is not limited to this embodiment, A various aspect can be taken.

  (1) In the above embodiment, the high importance area that is more than a predetermined distance away from the traveling direction of the host vehicle has an importance level of 50%, but the importance level is determined by the distance from the traveling direction of the host vehicle. May be changed.

  (2) In the above embodiment, the display device 50 is attached to the rearview mirror portion of the own vehicle so that the driver can visually recognize the display screen, but is attached to the front part of the passenger compartment of the own vehicle. Display may be performed on the inside of the vehicle using the display screen of the car navigation device.

  (3) In the above embodiment, an edge image is generated to generate an image energy image (see S305 in FIG. 4). However, instead of using an edge, another function is used in accordance with the specification of the reduction target image. It may be used. Specifically, functions such as an edge square function, a saliency function, a Harris corner function, a gaze recognition result function, a face recognition result function, an entropy function, a segmentation function, or a HoG (abbreviation of Histogram of Gradients) function may be used. .

(4) The side rear camera 10 may be an infrared camera instead of the visible light camera. An infrared camera is effective for highlighting people or bicycles in a reduced image when the surroundings of the vehicle are dark, such as at night.
(5) In the above embodiment, the Seam direction is assumed to be up and down so as to reduce the horizontal width of the image. However, when the vertical width is reduced, the Seam direction can be replaced with left and right.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a schematic configuration of an in-vehicle image display device 1. FIG. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of a process of the main routine of an image process. It is a flowchart of importance setting processing which is a subroutine. It is a flowchart of the image energy image generation process which is a subroutine. It is a flowchart of the low image energy location deletion process which is a subroutine. It is a figure which shows the example of the edge image produced | generated in an image energy image production | generation process. It is a figure which shows the example of the image in which the low image energy location deletion process was made.

Explanation of symbols

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Car-mounted image display apparatus, 5 ... Car-mounted image processing apparatus, 10 ... Side rear camera, 20 ... Millimeter wave radar, 30 ... Image processing part, 40 ... Vehicle speed sensor, 50 ... Display apparatus.

Claims (9)

Image acquisition means for acquiring an image around the host vehicle;
Area importance setting means for setting importance of the area in the image acquired by the image processing acquisition means;
Image energy calculating means for calculating energy in the image acquired by the image acquiring means;
Image reduction means for reducing the image by extracting and deleting a region where the energy in the image calculated by the image energy calculation means is lower than a predetermined value;
With
The image energy calculating means includes
By setting a predetermined energy pattern for an area in which the importance in the image set by the area importance setting means is a predetermined value or more, an area in which the importance in the image is a predetermined value or more is set. An in-vehicle image processing apparatus characterized by not being deleted . The in-vehicle image processing apparatus according to claim 1,
The image energy calculating means includes
An in-vehicle image processing apparatus using an energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape as a predetermined energy pattern set for a region having an importance level equal to or higher than a predetermined value in the image. The in-vehicle image processing device according to claim 2,
The image energy calculating means includes
The vehicle-mounted image processing apparatus, wherein the grid-like energy pattern is set such that a grid interval is widened and a grid energy is low as the grid pattern is moved away from an axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle. In the in-vehicle image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 3,
The area importance setting means includes:
Importance of at least one of the area in the lane where the vehicle, the person, the own vehicle exists, the area in the lane adjacent to the lane where the own vehicle exists, the roadside structure, or the area above the horizon in the image Is set to a value greater than or equal to a predetermined value. In the in-vehicle image processing device according to any one of claims 1 to 4,
The area importance setting means includes:
An in-vehicle image processing apparatus that reduces the importance of an object as it moves away from an axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle in the image. In the in-vehicle image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5,
The image energy calculating means includes
A predetermined energy pattern is used as a base pattern, and the image is obtained by further adding / subtracting energy to / from an area in which the importance in the image set by the area importance setting means is greater than or equal to a predetermined value. Calculate the energy inside,
The base pattern is
An in-vehicle image processing apparatus having an energy pattern in which predetermined energy is distributed in a lattice shape. The in-vehicle image processing device according to claim 6,
The image energy calculating means includes
The vehicle-mounted image processing apparatus, wherein the grid interval is set wider as the energy pattern in which energy is distributed in a grid shape is further away from the axis in the traveling direction of the host vehicle. In-vehicle display means;
The in-vehicle image processing device according to any one of claims 1 to 7,
Display control means for displaying on the display means an image reduced by the in-vehicle image processing apparatus;
An in-vehicle image display device comprising: The in-vehicle image display device according to claim 8,
The display means includes
An in-vehicle image display device, wherein the driver is attached to a mirror portion for visually recognizing the rear of the host vehicle so that a driver can visually recognize a display screen.