JPH01276331A - Video synthesizing device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To realize the display of the picture information of high quality by applying a picture synthesizing process to those picture information controlled by a converting means. CONSTITUTION:A 2nd picture information to be synthesized with a 1st picture information DPDT stored in a memory 1 is supplied to a scan converting part 2 via an interface unit 3. Then the video frequency and the refresh timing of the 2nd picture information are converted into those of the 1st picture information and at the same time the synchronization is secured among them. The 2nd picture information DPDT2 undergone the scan conversion is magnified for production of the 2nd picture information DPDT3. Then the information DPDT3 undergone the scan/magnification conversion in many steps is given to a synthesizing device 5 and then synthesized with the information DPDT read out of the memory 1. Thus it is possible to synthesize those picture information into a sheet of pictures and to display them in a state where these information contents are easily understood.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Objective of the Invention] (Industrial Application Field) The present invention provides a video system that can synthesize and display multiple types of image information with different video frequencies and refresh timings into one image. Regarding a synthesis device.

(Prior Art) In recent years, personal computers and workstations have become rapidly popular, and as their prices have fallen, the number of cases in which multiple types of computers and workstations are used at the same time is increasing. In such cases, the processed data (image information, etc.) is displayed exclusively on a display connected to each computer, and then operations are performed on each computer, but it is not necessary to view many displays at once. There are some problems.

Therefore, it has been considered to combine and display image information from a plurality of computers on a single display.

However, the image information generated by each computer often has a video frequency and refresh timing depending on the system specifications, and due to the difference in video frequency and refresh timing between these image information, it is difficult to effectively synthesize the images. There are some problems, such as it being difficult to carry out.

In addition, due to differences in the size and resolution of the display screen of each system, and differences in the size of image information handled by each system, when multiple types of image information are combined, the image information on the composite image may differ. Problems such as difficulty in viewing were also likely to occur.

(Problem to be Solved by the Invention) When trying to synthesize image information handled by multiple types of computers into one image and display it, conventionally, the video frequency of each image information is different. Due to differences in image size and resolution, as well as differences in image size and resolution, it has been difficult to effectively obtain an easy-to-see composite image that accurately captures the image information. .

The present invention was made in consideration of these circumstances, and its purpose is to combine multiple types of image information with different video frequencies and refresh timings into a single image in a manner that makes it easy to understand the information content. An object of the present invention is to provide a video compositing device with a simple configuration that can synthesize and display images.

[Structure of the Invention] (Means for Solving the Problems) The video synthesis device according to the present invention provides: (1) operation conversion means for converting the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information into the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information and synchronizing the first image information with the first image information; The above-mentioned second image information.

or a second image scan-converted by the scan-converting means;
size converting means for variably controlling (enlarging/reducing) the size of the image information of the second image information processed by the scan converting means and the size converting means, respectively; This feature is characterized in that it is combined with information and output for display.

(Function) According to the present invention, even when multiple types of image information with different video frequencies and refresh timings are provided, the video frequency and refresh timing are matched by scan conversion processing, and the synchronization is maintained. It will be done. Further, the size of the image is adjusted by a size conversion means.

Since image synthesis processing is performed on the image information adjusted by such conversion means,
The compositing process can be performed very easily, and the composite image can be made very easy to see. Therefore, regardless of differences in image types caused by differences in system specifications, it is possible to obtain a composite image favorably and display this as high-quality image information.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a schematic configuration diagram of a video compositing apparatus according to an embodiment, and 2 is a storage device that stores first image information DPDT to be composited. The second image information to be combined with the first image information DPDT stored in the storage device 1 is sent to the scan converter 2 via the interface unit 3.
is input. The scan conversion unit 2 converts the video frequency and refresh timing of the second image information into the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information DPDT, and synchronizes them with the first image information DPDT. Through this scan conversion, the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information DPDT and the second image information DPDT2 are made to match,
Moreover, the synchronization is taken.

The enlarging device 4, which serves as image size conversion means, enlarges the second image information DPDT2 that has been scan-converted as described above, and produces second image information DP whose size has been enlarged.
This is to generate DT3. The second image information DPDT3, which has been subjected to such scan conversion and enlargement conversion in multiple stages, is provided to the synthesis device 5, and is image synthesized with the first image information DPDT read out from the storage device. The synthesized image obtained by the synthesizer 5 is then displayed on the display device 6.

Incidentally, here, image size conversion will be explained in terms of enlargement processing, or it is of course possible to perform reduction processing, and it is also possible to perform size conversion processing on the second image information before performing the above-mentioned scan conversion processing. Of course, it is also possible to scan-convert the second image that has been subjected to the size conversion process.

Now, the storage device 1 that stores the first image information DPDT
is configured, for example, as shown in FIG. The frame buffer 10 stores the first image information DPDT for one frame, and writing and reading of the image data is controlled by the memory selection unit 14 according to address data sequentially generated from the address generation unit 11. It is received and done. The display control section 13 controls the display of the first image information DPDT stored in the frame buffer 10 on the display device 6, and the address selection section 12 controls the display control section 13.
The frame buffer 10 is access-controlled by selecting the address data generated by the address generator 11 under the control of the address generator 11 .

Through such access control and control by the memory selection section 14, the first image information is written to the frame buffer 10, and the first image information is read from the frame buffer 10. The first image information read from the frame buffer 10 is transmitted to a parallel-serial (P/S) converter 1.
5 and output as serial data.

FIG. 3 shows an access operation of the frame buffer 10 in the storage device 2 configured as described above. To briefly explain this access operation, reading and writing of the image information is performed using read request signal RDRQ from the system.
, a write request signal νTRQ, and is controlled by setting a read cycle and a write cycle. Then, R is sent from the memory control unit 14 to the frame buffer 10.
This is performed by applying a control signal such as an AS signal or a CAS signal, and supplying address data from the address generation unit 11 from the address selection unit 12 to the frame buffer 10.

On the other hand, the display request signal 1) SPRQI output once per horizontal period during image composition is the read request signal RDRQ.
and the write request signal WTRQ.
A display read cycle is set according to this display request signal DSPRQI. As a result, the address selection signal MUXSCI is applied to the address selection section 12,
The address from the display control section 13 is selected. At this time, the address selection section 12 provides a row address to the frame buffer 10, and upon receiving the RAS signal and CAS signal from the memory control section 14, switches to a column address. By switching this address, frame 7<
One line of first image information is set in the shift register in the buffer 10, read out in accordance with the clock SC at the timing shown in FIG. 4, and outputted via the P/S converter 15.

On the other hand, with respect to the first image information DPDT read out from the storage scan 1 in this way, the second image information to be synthesized with this first image information is generated by the scan converter 2 and the enlarger 4.
It is processed as follows.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the configuration of the scan converter 2 including a part of the functions of the enlarging device 4, in which 20 converts the second image information input via the S/P converter 21. This is a frame memory that stores one frame. The writing of image data into the frame memory 20 is carried out by the memory control unit 2.
5, the write address generator 22
This is done by selecting the generated address data via the selector 24 and accessing the frame memory 20. The image data written in the frame memory 20 is read out under the read control by the memory control section 25, and the address data generated by the read address generation section 23 is selected via the selector 24 and read out from the frame memory 20. This is done by accessing .

Incidentally, writing and reading of image data into and from the frame memory 20 are controlled by the area specifying section 26, and are performed only for the specified image area. The second image information read from the frame memory 20 is converted into serial data via the P/S converter 27 and output. In addition, here is the above P/S
The converter 27 is composed of a shift register as shown in FIG. 6, and converts the image of the second image information by repeatedly outputting the image data read out in parallel for each four pixels from the frame memory 20 twice. It will be doubled in size.

FIG. 7 shows the signal timing of the second image information input to the scan conversion section 2 configured as described above, in which the vertical synchronization signal VSYNC20 and the horizontal synchronization signal H8YNC20 are input.
is added, and video data VDT2 synchronized with video clock VCLK2 is added in the interval of blanking signal BLANK.
given as. Note that although a digitalized video signal will be explained here as an example, the present invention can be similarly applied to an analog video signal.

In this case, an A/D converter may be incorporated into the interface unit 3.

By the way, the second image information given in this way is
- the video frequency and refresh timing of the film surface are often different from the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information read from the storage device 1; Therefore, the scan converter 2 scan-converts the second image information as follows, and adjusts its video frequency and refresh timing to the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information, respectively.
Moreover, the synchronization has been established. At this time, image enlargement processing is also performed at the same time.

That is, the frame memory 20 of the scan converter 2 has a dual port memory configuration, and as shown in FIG. 8, the write cycle and read cycle are alternately set to write image information and its operation. Perform reading.

The writing of image data to the frame memory 20 is performed using the horizontal synchronizing signal HSY in the write cycle.
The frame memory 20 is accessed in synchronization with the video clock VCLK2 in synchronization with the video clock VCLK2, in accordance with the address signal output from the write address generation section 22, and in accordance with the control signals RΔso, cAso, wEo, etc. given from the memory control section 25. This is done by writing VDT2 to the frame memory 20.

On the other hand, in order to read out the second image information written in the frame memory 20 as described above, the frame memory 20 is accessed using an address generated by the read generation section 23 in one cycle as described above, and an area is specified. This is done by controlling the read timing from the frame memory 20 by the memory control section 25 which operates under the control of the section 26.

The area specifying unit 26 converts the first image information shown in FIG. 9(a) stored in the storage device 1 to the first image information shown in FIG. 9(b) stored in the scan conversion unit 2 (frame memory 20). This is an instruction to specify at which image position the second image information such as DXI is to be combined.

DYl, ) is specified, for example, as shown in FIG. Note that this position is specified by the CPU or the like. At this time, it is instructed how large the second image information should be combined with the first image information. For example, if it is instructed to enlarge the second image information twice and combine it, the 11th As shown in the figure, the video composition area is determined.

Control over this video compositing area is performed by checking the timing at which the first image information is refreshed, and checking whether the position is within the video compositing area specified by the position information (DXl, DYI). The readout of image information from the frame memory 20 by the memory control unit 25 is controlled by checking whether

Specifically, if the second image information is enlarged twice and combined with the first image information, the area setting unit 26
As shown in the figure, the blanking signal BL of the first image information
Find the vertical (Y) direction french position from the counter that counts ANKO or vertical synchronization signal VSYNCO,
Synthesis signal YMIXE that specifies the video synthesis area in the Y direction
N is generated. Furthermore, in the horizontal (X) direction, by counting the video clock VCLK, a composite signal XMIXEN that specifies the video composite area in the X direction is generated.

Note that here, since the second image information is enlarged twice and combined with the first image information, the combined signal YMIXEN is set as a period in which the blanking signal BLANK is counted (Y2)X2 times.

The composite signal YMIXEN generated in this manner.

XMIXEN is logically processed as shown in FIG. 13, and a synthesis enable signal MIXEN, which will be described later, is generated as shown in FIG.

When the memory control unit 25 receives the display request signal DSPR01 from the storage device 1, it switches its operation mode to the display read cycle. Then, according to the timing signal of the first image information given from the storage device 1, the memory control section 25 and the read address generation section 23 are controlled, and the first
The image data is read out from the frame memory 20 in synchronization with the image information of the frame memory 20 and with the same video frequency and refresh timing as shown in FIG.

In this case, as described above, in order to double the second image information and combine it with the first image information, the same address data is sent from the read address generation unit 23 in the Y direction as shown in FIG. is repeatedly applied to the frame memory 20 over the line. By reading the image data at a timing different from the timing when writing the image data to the frame memory 20, that is, at the timing of the first image information, the video frequency and refresh timing of the second image information can be changed. is scan converted to be equal to the first image information.

The scan-converted image data read out from the frame memory 20 is output twice by the P/S converter 27, thereby being enlarged twice in the X direction, and the image data is enlarged twice in the Y direction as described above. In addition to enlarging the image, the image is also subjected to size conversion processing before being output.

That is, basically, the second image information written in the frame memory 20 is read out at the signal timing of the first image information and over the period indicated by the synthesis enable signal order XEN. The scan conversion is carried out by the above method, and the video frequency and refresh timing are made to match. Here, at the same time as this scanning conversion, an enlargement process is performed on the image.

The second image information subjected to the scan conversion and enlargement processing as described above is applied to a compositing device configured as shown in FIG. 16, and the images are synthesized. Then, a composite image as shown in FIG. 11 mentioned above is obtained.

In this embodiment, when a display read cycle is executed in response to the display request signal DSPRQI, the next write cycle is canceled and the display read cycle described in "1" is executed with priority. This kind of control is performed in consideration of the fact that if the display read cycle is executed during the display period, the displayed image will be disturbed, and if the display is delayed by one cycle, it will not be possible to obtain regular image information. . At this time, the image information at the time of the write cycle is not written to the frame memory 20, and only the image information written in the previous write cycle is read out and displayed as an image. However, video signals subjected to scan conversion are usually refreshed at least 60 times per second in the case of non-interlaced, and 30 times per second even in the case of interlaced, so I
/30. After 1760 seconds, the image information is rewritten. Therefore, it is possible to obtain a composite image with no display disturbances, which is completely acceptable to the human eye.

Thus, according to the present device, even when multiple types of image information with different video frequencies and refresh timings are provided, the video frequencies and refresh timings can be made to match through the above-described scan conversion process, and the image information to be synthesized can be matched. It becomes possible to generate one composite image by changing the size of the image information, and to display this as an image.

Particularly in the case of multiple types of image information having different video frequencies, etc., the sizes of the images themselves often differ due to their resolution and the like. For this reason, when multiple types of images are combined using only scan conversion, the scan conversion results in a difference between the second image information and the 10th image information compared to the first image information.
As shown in the figure, the image becomes smaller involuntarily, making it difficult to grasp (understand) the contents of the image information. In this regard, according to the present apparatus, since the size of the image of the second image information to be combined is variably controlled and then subjected to the combining process, it is possible to combine images with an appropriate size.

Therefore, there is an effect that problems such as difficulty in understanding the image contents are not caused.

Note that the present invention is not limited to two consecutive embodiments. Here, an example has been described in which the second image information is enlarged to twice the size and combined with the first image information, but it is of course possible to enlarge it at other magnifications. Of course, it is also possible to perform this enlargement process before scan conversion. In this case, the enlarged image will be stored in the frame memory 20.

In addition to enlarging the second image information, it is also possible to appropriately reduce the image and combine it with the first image information. In this case, it is possible to prevent problems such as the second image being unintentionally enlarged to a large extent by scan conversion and only a portion of it being able to be combined with the first image information. Furthermore, regarding the combination of images, it is of course possible to combine not only two types of images but also three or more types of images. In addition, the present invention can be implemented with various modifications without departing from the gist thereof.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, image information to be synthesized is scan-converted and its video frequency and refresh timing are converted into video frequencies and refresh timings of image information to be synthesized. Since the image information is matched and synchronized, and the size of the image is variably controlled and composited with the above-mentioned target image information, there is no possibility that the image information in the composite image will be involuntarily reduced or enlarged. It is possible to prevent problems such as only a portion of the image being combined, and to effectively combine and display multiple types of image information at a size (resolution) that makes it easy to understand the information content. As a result, even when various computers are gathered in one place to perform predetermined processing, it becomes possible to effectively synthesize and display those images using one image display device, reducing the processing burden. This brings about great practical effects, such as making it possible to significantly reduce the amount of damage. Furthermore, according to the video composition apparatus according to the present invention, it is possible to synthesize images with a simple hardware circuit configuration and with relatively simple control, so this point is also a great practical advantage.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

The figures show a video synthesis device according to an embodiment of the present invention, in which FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram of the device, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of a storage device, and FIGS. 3 and 4 are storage device configurations. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of a scan converter including the function of the enlarging device; FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of a P/S converter in the scan converter; FIG. Figure and 8th
The figure shows the operation timing of the scan converter, FIGS. 9 to 11 show examples of processed image information, and FIG.
The figure shows the signal timing of the second image information.
The figure shows an example of the configuration of a circuit that generates a synthesis enable signal, Figure 14 shows a synthesis enable signal, Figure 15 is a timing diagram showing an example of image enlargement processing, and Figure 16 shows the configuration of a synthesis device. It is a figure which shows an example. 1. Storage device (first image information), 2. Scan conversion unit (second image information), 4. Enlargement device, 5. Composition device, 6
...Display device, 1D...Frame buffer (first image information), 20・Frame memory (second image information), 2
2.. Write address generation section, 23.. Read address generation section, 25.. Memory control section, 26.. Area specification section, 27.. P/S conversion section. Applicant's agent Patent attorney Takehiko Suzue Kankyu Kyoi" 1 ", l -" F-r-total-r o 0 Q 0 cLCLCLQ- QOO

Claims (1)

[Claims] converting the video frequency and refresh timing of second image information having a video frequency and refresh timing different from those of the first image information into the video frequency and refresh timing of the first image information; scan converting means for synchronizing with the image information of the scan converting means, and variable the size of the second image information before conversion by the scan converting means or the second image information whose video frequency and refresh timing have been converted by the scan converting means. It is characterized by comprising a size conversion means for controlling, and a means for synthesizing the second image information processed by the scan conversion means and the size conversion means with the first image information and outputting it for display. Video synthesis equipment.