JPH0316390A - Picture transmitter - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the quality of a picture by synthesizing a moving picture sent from an opposite party with a same display means with a picture other than a received picture and eliminating the information of the part corresponding to an undesired picture such as own picture monitor or document picture so as to send the resulting information. CONSTITUTION:A moving picture sent from an opposite party and an own monitor picked up by a telecamera 1 are synthesized and displayed on one display section 3. Moreover, a picture processing section 2 assigns its own picture monitor B picked up by the telecamera 1 to the position of the picture data eliminated according to a control signal S2 to execute the synthesis processing with a moving picture A sent from the opposite party. Thus, the transmission of undesired information is avoided and the transmission and reception of useful information are attained. Then the picture quality is improved by the reduction of the pattern.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] [Object of the invention] {Industrial application field} TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to an image transmission device.

(Prior Art) Conventionally, in television (TV) conference systems and TV telephone equipment, an image transmission device that compresses the band of an image signal and transmits the image signal has been used. For example, when transmitting a moving image, a wide band transmission path is required and the communication cost is expensive, so in order to transmit it over an inexpensive narrow band transmission path, the band I1ltff is compressed using various band compression methods before transmission. do.

By the way, the TV conference system requires video and still image transmission to transmit calligraphy and still images such as meeting materials, in addition to video transmission for transmitting images of people participating in the conference. Therefore, in addition to the display for displaying moving images of people, it is also equipped with a display for displaying calligraphic images and still images.

Generally, in the case of a video conference, it is held with multiple people, so
When images are taken so that the people participating in a TV conference are evenly displayed on the screen, the proportion of images other than people (background images) displayed on the screen increases as the number of people taking images increases. Therefore, if you make a hook statue of multiple people, unnecessary back WAii! iiJ&
Also, it was not possible to efficiently transmit moving images.

Furthermore, since a display for moving images, a display for document images, and a display for still images must be prepared separately, the number of devices used increases.

On the other hand, video telephone devices are used for communication between individuals, and a large person is displayed on the screen. It is necessary to monitor the image screen.In such cases,
Self-portrait! To monitor the III screen, you need to prepare another display for monitoring in addition to the display for displaying the received moving image to display the opponent's attack, but having two displays increases the size of the device. I end up.

{VR problem to be solved by the invention} In this way, conventional TV conference systems and TV telephone devices are equipped with a display for received moving images and a display for prisoner images, still images, or self-portrait monitors. If! 1+11u, there was a problem that the device became larger. Furthermore, there is a problem in that images other than the actually necessary moving images are also transmitted, resulting in unnecessary transmission.

In view of these circumstances, it is an object of the present invention to provide an image transmission device that can be miniaturized, eliminate unnecessary information transmission, and thereby improve the quality of the southern image.

[Configuration of the Invention (Means for Solving the Problems)] The image transmission device of the present invention that solves the above problems displays both images of the communication partner 13 and an image unique to the receiving side on the same display screen. It is equipped with a display means that displays the composite image, and the communication partner side displays a piece of information corresponding to the part of the image that is compositely displayed on the display of the receiving side and displays an image unique to the receiving side. The present invention is characterized in that it includes a means for transmitting only the required image information by omitting the image information.

(Function) In the present invention, on the receiving side, the image sent from the transmitting side and the image fixed to the received measurement, such as the monitor image, are combined and displayed on one screen. When displaying calligraphy, still images, etc., it is possible to display them using a single display means, and it is possible to reduce the size of the sleeping device. On the other hand, on the sending side, the information corresponding to the image unique to the receiving side that is displayed on the receiving side's table is deleted and sent, so it is possible to eliminate the transmission of unnecessary information. The image quality can be improved as the screen becomes smaller.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of an image transmission system according to the present invention.

In FIG. 1, a television camera 1 is used to photograph a person on the phone, and the captured image data is sent to an image section 98. The two-image processing unit 2 is a circuit that executes processing of various image data according to instructions from a control unit (not shown), and performs a process of combining the received moving image of the other party with images other than the received image. I do. Further, the processing for deleting image data to be sent to the other party is also executed as described later.

The display unit 3 displays the image processed by the image processing unit 2, and for example, as shown in FIG. Combine and display B on one screen. , the decoding unit 4 is a circuit for encoding the image data processed by the image processing unit 2 and decoding the image data received from the other party. The image data encoded by the decoding unit 4 is transmitted from the interface unit 5 to the other party via the transmission line 6, and the image data from the other party is decoded by the decoding unit 4. The image is then sent to the image processing section 2.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained. First, when transmitting image data to the other party, the image signal transmitted by the television camera 1 is sent to the image processing section 2, where some information is deleted. Also, on the other party's display unit 3, the self-portrait monitor is displayed on the screen in the same way as on the sending side, so
Delete the information corresponding to the self-portrait Tanabata. When performing deletion processing in this image processing section 2, the image processing section 2
υ] control signal $1 is sent from the decoder 4 to the decoder 4.

The control signal S1 controls not to encode the part corresponding to the self-portrait monitor, and the compound code section 4 encodes the image data sent from the image 98 science section 2 in accordance with this control signal @S1. Turn into a bow. The image data marked with B is
It is transmitted from the interface section 5 to the other party via the transmission line 6.

On the other hand, when receiving image data from the other party, the ii'[ii image data transmitted via the transmission path 6 is received by the interface section 5. The received image data is sent to the decoding unit 4, where it is decoded and then sent to the image processing unit 2. At the same time, a control signal S2 is sent from the decoding encoder 4 to the both processors 2 bit+'l
The control signal S2 is a control signal for the image synthesis process in the image processing section 2, and the image synthesis process is executed according to this control signal 82.

In this case, the image data transmitted from the other party is transmitted with the information corresponding to the size of the self-portrait monitor deleted, just as described above. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 2, in the image processing unit 2, the self-portrait monitor B, which was displayed with the television camera 1, is assigned to the position of the deleted image data according to the control signal S2, and the moving image A sent from the other party is and execute the compositing process.

In this way, in this embodiment, the moving image sent from the other party and the self-portrait monitor carried by the television camera 1 are combined and displayed on one display section 3, so it is possible to display the moving image sent from the other party on one display section 3 individually. There is no need to prepare one, and the device can be made smaller. Also. The information corresponding to the self-portrait monitor is deleted before transmission, eliminating the transmission of unnecessary information.
Information can be transmitted without waste. This means that image data corresponding to the area of the self-portrait monitor is not transmitted, so that data can be allocated to transmitting other information, thereby improving the quality of the transmitted screen.

The screen size, display position, etc. of the self-portrait monitor shall be determined in advance by both parties, and the composition and deletion of image data may be set based on this.

In addition, if the self-portrait monitor size and display location are not determined in advance, it is sufficient to transmit information on how the screen composition will be performed to the communication partner before transmitting the image signal, and the receiving party Then, according to the screen alignment,
ii! according to the setting status of imB4 signal! ii) All that is needed is to change the setting state of the image signal and decide which part of the image signal to be transmitted to the other party is to be deleted.

FIG. 3 shows a specific example of the processing method.

As shown in the figure, in this example, the display mode of the self-portrait monitor is determined in step 301, and if the self-portrait monitor A is off, the process moves to step 302, and if it is on, the process moves to step 304.

In step 302, information transmission is performed with the self-portrait monitor mode turned off, and then the process moves to step 303, where the screen composition process of the image processing section 2 is turned off.

On the other hand, in step 304, information transmission of self-portrait monitor mode on is executed, and step 305 is followed by step 30.
Moving on to step 5, the screen of image processing section 2 is displayed! ! Turn on the 8th theory.

Next, in step 306, it is determined whether the other party's self-portrait monitor mode is on or off, and if it is off, step 307 is performed.
If it is on, the process advances to step 309.

In step 307 and subsequent step 308, the entire screen is input to the encoding unit of the decoding unit 4 at L with full-screen encoding turned on. In other words, here, since the other party's self-portrait mode is off, the entire screen of the other party is encoded.

On the other hand, in step 310 following step 309, the encoding of the self-portrait monitor section is turned off, and the input image to the encoding section is masked. That is, here, since the other party's self-portrait monitor mode is on, the input image to this portion is masked in order to omit unnecessary transmission to the other party's self-portrait monitor section.

Next, in step 311, the image encoding information is transmitted to the other party.

Thereafter, in step 312, a mode change is detected, and if there is a mode change, the process moves to step 313, and returns to a predetermined step (3o1 or 306) until the process ends in step 314, depending on the classification of the other party or the self.

Through the above processing, it is possible to notify the other party of one's own mode and to transmit appropriate image data according to the other party's mode.

FIG. 4 shows another embodiment, in which a plurality of television cameras are provided. The television camera 1 is used for photographing people as in the previous embodiment, and the television camera 7 is used for photographing calligraphy and paintings such as meeting materials. The other configurations are exactly the same as the embodiment shown in FIG.

The image data of the person transported by the television camera 1 and the image data of the meeting materials 8 photographed by the television camera 7 are as follows.
The image is sent to the image processing section 2. The image processing unit 2 combines the image of the television camera 1 and the image of the document 8, and performs a process of deleting the image data of the portion corresponding to the self-portrait Tanabata, similar to the above-described embodiment. The image data processed here is
The signal is sent to the decoding unit 4, where encoding processing is performed according to the control signal S1. Next, the encoded image data is
It is transmitted from the interface section 5 to the other party via the transmission path 6.

On the other hand, image data from the other party is transmitted via the transmission path 6 and received by the interface section 5. After the received data is decoded by the decoding unit 4, it is sent to the image processing unit 2, where image synthesis processing is performed by the control unit 60@82.

In this case, the image data sent from the other party is transmitted with the portion corresponding to the self-portrait monitor and the portion corresponding to the calligraphic image deleted, and the receiving side's self-portrait monitor is assigned to the deleted portion and merged. The image processed by the image processing section 2 is displayed on the display section 3, as shown in FIG. That is,
Video image A of the person sent by the other party, calligraphy and drawing IC such as documents captured by TV camera 7, F with TV camera 1
The photographed self-portrait monitor B is displayed on the same screen. Note that if video image data is not transmitted, there is no need to synthesize and display it on the screen, so that part is
J image may be displayed. Therefore, it is necessary for the sending and receiving sides to send a signal indicating whether or not to display the inner image.
This may be used to control whether or not the document image is displayed.

In this manner, in this embodiment, when displaying a lagoon drawing, in addition to the information on the self-portrait monitor, information on the portion corresponding to the calligraphic drawing may be deleted and transmitted. Therefore, just as in the embodiment described above, the amount of moving image data to be transmitted is reduced, and the image quality can be improved accordingly.

FIG. 6 shows a specific example of the processing method.

As shown in the figure, in this example, the own mode with or without screen composition is determined in step 601, and step 6 without screen composition is determined.
If there is, the process moves to step 604.

In step 604, depending on whether the composite screen is calligraphy, self-monique, or both, step 6
05 or 607 or 609.

In step 605, the fact that only the paintings are displayed is transmitted to the other party as ON information, and in the next step 606, only the calligraphy is turned on and screen synthesis processing is performed.

Similarly, in steps 607 and 608, procedures with calligraphy and self-monitoring are executed. Further, in steps 609 and 610, a procedure with only self-monitoring is executed.

Next, in step 611, the other party's screen combination mode is determined, and if there is no screen combination, step 612 is performed.
, if it is screen composition, the process moves to step 614.

In step 612, it is assumed that the entire screen will be encoded, and then the process moves to step 613, where information for the entire screen is input to the encoding section.

On the other hand, in steps 615 and 616, the input image to the encoding section corresponding to the calligraphy display section of the other party is masked. Similarly, the screens 617 and 618 mask the calligraphy and drawings of the other party and the image of the self-monitored portion. Also, step 619,
At 620, the image of the other party's own monitor is masked.

Next, in step 621, the image is encoded and transmitted to the other party.

Thereafter, in steps 622-624, the process returns to a predetermined step (601 or 611) depending on the mode change situation, similar to steps 312-314 in FIG.

In this way, in this example, transmission of unnecessary images can be omitted depending on the configuration of the screen of the user or the other party.

The present invention is not limited to the above embodiments, and can be implemented with appropriate modifications without departing from the gist thereof.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the present invention, separate display means can be prepared in order to synthesize and display a moving image sent from the other party and an image other than the received image on the same display means. The device can be made smaller. In addition, since the information corresponding to unnecessary images such as the self-portrait monitor and f1 image is deleted and transmitted, it is possible to eliminate the transmission of useless information, and because other information is transmitted accordingly, ii' li
If & quality can be improved.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the image transmission device 4 of the present invention, FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an image displayed on the display section of the embodiment of FIG. 1, and FIG. Flowchart showing the processing method of the above embodiment, FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing another embodiment, FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing images displayed on the display unit of the embodiment shown in FIG. 4, and FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the processing method of the embodiment shown in FIG. 4. FIG.

Claims (1)

[Claims] The display device is equipped with a display unit that combines and displays an image from the communication partner side and an image specific to the receiving side on the same display screen, and the communication partner side can display the combined image on the display of the receiving side. An image transmission device characterized by comprising means for transmitting only required image information by omitting image information corresponding to a portion displaying a unique image on a receiving side.