JPH05268508A - Remote controller for television camera - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To attain simultaneous start and simultaneous end of each function such as panning and tilt with simple setting operation of a moving speed in the case of movement of the pickup position of the camera from a current position to an object position. CONSTITUTION:The controller is provided with drive means 6-9 driving each function of a television camera 1, a shot storage means 12 storing position information of each function at a specific pickup position, a 1st speed setting means 13 setting an upper limit of a moving speed of a video image, a 2nd speed setting means 14 setting the moving speed of the video image adjustably depending on a speed or a time, a mode changeover means 15 selecting speed setting by both the speed setting means, and a speed arithmetic means 16 operating the moving speed of each function so that each function is finished simultaneously in the moving time required for the movement from a current position to an object position.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a remote control device for a television camera, in which each function such as pan and tilt in the television camera is operated by remote control.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in order to obtain weather information, images from above, etc., TV cameras supported by pan heads are installed at various places such as outdoors and on the ceiling, and the shooting position by this TV camera is The pan drive means provided on the platform and the pan and tilt operations by the tilt drive means, and the zoom and focus operations of the TV camera are provided to be remotely controllable.
There is known a remote control device for a television camera which is operated by an operator from a remote position.

Further, when performing remote control of the television camera, the operating states of respective functions such as pan, tilt, zoom, and focus at a specific photographing position (shot) are set and stored in advance, and from the current photographing position. For example, there is a technology that controls the movement of each function to end at the same time when automatically changing to the memory shooting position.
It is known as seen in Japanese Patent Publication No. 58-6163.

In the above prior art, when changing from an arbitrary shooting position to a preset stored shooting position, the operator sets a moving time in order to start and stop the movement of each function at the same time. A driving signal is output to each driving means at a moving speed calculated in accordance with the instructed moving time to perform control. At that time, the movement is not always completed at the instructed time, and for a function having a large movement amount such as pan or tilt, the movement may not be completed within the instructed time even at the maximum movement speed, at this time, In the above prior art example, the designated time is automatically increased and updated and corrected so that the movement of each function ends at the same time.

[0005]

However, the speed setting operation is complicated and troublesome when the photographing position is automatically moved to the preset target position as described above.

[0006] That is, as to the movement of the photographing position, firstly, there is a case where only the image at the photographing position where the shift is completed is required and the shift is completed in the shortest possible time, and the second case.
In some cases, it may be necessary to move a moving image at an appropriate speed, and in the former case, it is instructed to minimize the moving time according to the maximum speed and the moving amount. In the latter case, the moving time for obtaining the optimum moving speed for the moving amount is adjusted and instructed.In each case, it is necessary to adjust the setting of the moving time, and in order to obtain the shortest time and to transfer the image. In order to control to an appropriate speed, it is necessary to rehearse the same movement several times to make a decision, which complicates the operation.

Particularly, in the case where the changing speed to the target position is set by the transition time, it is necessary to set the time so that the maximum speed or the optimum speed can be obtained according to the amount of movement from the start position. In addition to the above, the moving time must be reset depending on whether the maximum speed or the optimum speed is set, which further complicates the operation.

In view of the above circumstances, the present invention enables the setting of the maximum speed and the optimum speed with a simple instruction operation for instructing to start the transition of each function at the same time when moving the photographing position and complete the transition at the same time. It is an object of the present invention to provide a remote control device for a television camera as described above.

[0009]

In order to achieve the above object, a remote control device for a television camera according to the present invention has a zoom lens 3 on a pan 4 and a television camera 1 as shown in the basic configuration of FIG. The pan base 4 is provided with a pan drive means 6 for panning by the turning movement of the TV camera 1 and a tilt drive means 7 for tilting by vertical tilt, and a zoom is also provided. The lens 3 is provided with a zoom drive unit 8 for zooming and a focus drive unit 9 for focusing, and further, a drive control unit 11 outputs a control signal to the drive units 6 to 9 for each of these functions. The stop position and the drive speed are controlled.

On the other hand, a shot storage means 12 for storing the position information of each function at a specific photographing position is installed in advance, and the upper limit speed of the speed of transition to the target position stored in this shot storage means 12 is set. The first speed setting means 13 for instructing and the transfer speed to the target position stored in the shot storage means 12 are operated by the operator,
The second instruction to adjust the speed or time
A speed setting means 14 is provided, and the speed setting by the first speed setting means 13 and the speed setting by the second speed setting means 14 are switched by the mode switching means 15, and the first or the first speed selected by the mode switching means 15 is selected. 2 Speed setting means 13,1
4 and each of the driving means 6 when moving from the current photographing position to the target position on the basis of the signals of the shot storage means 12
The control amounts by the drive control means 11 are set so that the operation speeds of 9 to 9 are the same at the end time of the movement of the drive means 6 to 9.

That is, when the mode switching means 15 is in the high speed mode, the upper limit set value of the transition speed set by the first speed setting means 13 is set, or when the mode switching means 15 is in the speed adjusting mode. The signal of the set value of the transition speed set by the second speed setting means 14 is input to the speed calculating means 16 together with the position information of the target position stored in the shot storing means 12. The speed calculation means 16 calculates and sets the moving speed of each function based on the set speed so that the transfer of each function ends at the same time within the transfer time required to transfer from the current position to the target position. Then, the speed signal from the speed calculation means 16 and the target position information from the shot storage means 12 are output to the drive control means 11, and the drive control means 11 pans and tilts from the current position to the target position at a desired speed. , The driving signals are output so that the driving means 6 to 9 are simultaneously actuated so as to perform the zoom and focus operations, respectively, are moved at predetermined speeds, and are simultaneously stopped at the target position.

The above functions are described in the above 4
Not limited to the kind, for example, a height function for moving the television camera up and down can be considered, and the function as a control target is increased or decreased as necessary.

[0013]

In the remote control device for a television camera as described above, the television camera can be remotely controlled to change the photographing position by operating the driving means of each function such as pan and tilt, and the image at the predetermined photographing position can be remotely controlled. In order to obtain, the position information of each function at the shooting position is registered in the shot storage means. Then, when the current shooting position is shifted to the target position stored in the shot storage means, the upper limit set value of the shift speed set by the first speed setting means by the mode switching means or the second speed setting means is set. Adjustment of the set transition speed The signal of the set value is switched and the image is moved at each speed whether moving at high speed so that the minimum transition time is reached or moving at the optimum speed for moving images in the middle. While each of the above-mentioned functions reaches the target position, the movement speed of each function is calculated based on the transition time required for the transition from the current position to the target position so that the change ends at the same time. A signal based on each moving speed is output to each driving means to control the movement to the target position so that the movement of the subject on the shooting screen becomes substantially constant. Is intended to, switching and the speed setting of the speed mode is to allow a simple operation.

[0014]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 2 shows the overall configuration of the remote control device for the television camera of this embodiment.

The television camera 1 is composed of a camera body 2 and a zoom lens 3, and the camera body 2 is supported by a pan 4 which can pan in a turning direction and tilt in a tilting direction. The platform 4 is installed on a fixed portion by a tripod 5 or the like. The pan and tilt operations of the platform 4 are provided so that they can be driven by servo motors 42 and 43 (FIG. 3) described later. Similarly, zoom and focus operations in the zoom lens 3 of the television camera 1 are provided so as to be driven by servo motors 44 and 45 (FIG. 3) described later.

Then, those pan, tilt, zoom,
The focus operation is configured such that remote control can be performed based on an operation of the controller 10 by an operator.
The platform 4 of the TV camera 1 and the controller 10 may be connected by a communication means such as a cable 21 (analog signal), and a telephone line or the like may be used as the communication means.

Explaining the operation members of the controller 10, a focus knob 22, a zoom switch 23, and a joystick 24 are provided for performing normal zoom, focus, pan, and tilt operations of the television camera 1. The focus knob 22 is a rotary operation member, and rotation of the focus knob 22 operates the rotary encoder 39 (FIG. 3) to bring the focus knob 22 into close proximity.
It is used to adjust the far focus. Further, the zoom switch 23 is a seesaw type, and the swing thereof is used to operate the potentiometer 35 (FIG. 3) to perform wide-angle / telephoto zoom adjustment. The joystick 24 is a rod-shaped operation member that can be tilted left and right and up and down. The joystick 24 tilts left and right to operate the pan potentiometer 36 (FIG. 3) to adjust left and right pans, and tilts up and down to tilt. The potentiometer 37 (Fig. 3) for operation is operated to adjust the tilt up and down. The zoom switch 23
And joystick 24 potentiometers 35 to 37
Is provided in a structure that returns to the neutral position when the operation of the operation member is released.

A large number of shot switches 25 and memo writing switches 26 are provided above the controller 10. The shot switch 25 and the memo switch 26 are provided as an on / off push button type. The shot switch 25 is turned on when the memo switch 26 is pressed once and is in the writing mode,
The position information of the pan, tilt, zoom, and focus at that time, that is, the data of the shooting position is recorded at a predetermined address, and when it is turned on in the write mode, the position information recorded at the predetermined address is not recorded. Is read out, and functions as the above-mentioned shot storage means 12.

Further, a speed adjusting knob 27 and a mode changeover switch 28 are installed, and the speed adjusting knob 27 is constituted by a rotary encoder and gives an instruction for adjusting the speed of moving from the current position to a target photographing position. The center position is set to a standard speed when a moving image is required. The standard value is provided so that the setting can be changed by a separate adjusting mechanism. The value indicated by the speed adjusting knob 27 is taken in when the shot switch 25 is turned on when the mode selector switch 28 is operated to the auto side (auto speed mode) and not in the write mode.

The mode selector switch 28 is for switching between the auto speed mode and the high speed mode. When operated to the high speed mode side, the maximum movement when the intermediate image is not required Shot switch 25 when the setting value according to speed is not in write mode
It is taken in when turning on. Note that this maximum speed setting value can also be changed by a separate adjustment mechanism, for example, if the maximum speed limit is set in the studio, the driving noise will increase, and it is necessary to set the maximum speed slightly lower. It is provided in.

Next, FIG. 3 shows a schematic configuration of the controller. The controller 10 has a built-in CPU 30 for arithmetic processing, a RAM 31 (battery backup), and a ROM.
32 is connected by the data bus 33, and the signals (voltage) of the potentiometers 35 to 37 operated by the zoom switch 23 and the joystick 24 are input through the A / D converter 34, and similarly, the I / O port A signal of the rotary encoder 39 operated by the focus knob 22, a signal of the shot switch 25, a signal of the memo switch 26, an instruction signal of the speed adjusting knob 27, and a signal of the mode switching switch 28 are input via 38.

Further, the CPU 30 has a D / A converter 41.
A control signal, specifically, a position signal is output to the pan drive unit 6 and the tilt drive unit 7 of the platform 4, and the zoom drive unit 8 and the focus drive unit 9 of the zoom lens 3 via the. Servo motors 42 to 45 are installed in the respective driving means 6 to 9 to operate respective driving members to perform pan, tilt, zoom and focus operations, and their respective operating positions are for position detection. Detected by potentiometers 46-49. Then, the position command signal from the D / A converter 41 and the position detection signals from the position detection potentiometers 46 to 49 are input to the position servo amplifiers 51 to 54, and the servo motors 42 to 45 are arranged so that they match each other. Is configured to perform the drive control of.

The remote control of the photographing position of the television camera 1 by the arithmetic processing of the CPU 30 will be described with reference to the flow charts of FIGS. In FIG. 4, after the control starts when the power is turned on, initialization is performed in step S1 and the on / off state of the memo switch 26 is read (S2). Then, in step S3, it is determined whether or not the memo switch 26 is turned on. If the determination is NO, the process proceeds to step S5 as it is, while if the determination is YES and the memo switch 26 is turned on. After setting the writing mode in step S4, the process proceeds to step S5.

In step S5, the on / off state of the shot switch 25 is read. In step S6, it is determined whether or not the shot switch 25 has been turned on. When the shot switch 25 is in the OFF state and NO is determined, the operation states of the joystick 24, the focus knob 22, and the zoom switch 23 are fetched from the signals of the potentiometers 35 to 37 and the rotary encoder 39 in step S7, and the operation amounts thereof are changed. The position data of the function is converted and added to the current position (S8), and the updated current position signal is output to the position servo amplifiers 51 to 54 of the driving means 6 to 9 via the D / A converter 41 (S).
9) If the position detection signals from the position detection potentiometers 46 to 49 are deviated, the servo motors 42 to 45 are driven so as to match the position of the input signal, and the pan and tilt drive is performed by operating the joystick 24. , And focus and zoom driving by operating the focus knob 22 and the zoom switch 23 are performed according to the respective manual operation amounts.

On the other hand, if the result of the determination in step S6 is YES and one of the shot switches 25 is turned on, it is determined in step S10 whether the writing mode is set, that is, whether the memo switch 26 has been turned on. If it is in the writing mode, the current position of the pan, tilt, zoom and focus (position detection potentiometer) is set to the address of the memory corresponding to the number of the shot switch 25 turned on in step S11.
After writing the position information input to the D / A converter 41 based on the signals of 46 to 49, the write mode is released (S12).

Subsequently, if the determination in step S10 is NO and only the shot switch 25 is turned on without being in the write mode, the process proceeds to step S13 in FIG. 5 and corresponds to the number of the shot switch 25 which is turned on. Memory (R
Pan, tilt written in the address of AM31),
Read the information of the desired position of zoom and focus Am
At the same time, the information of the current position of each function is fetched and substituted into An in step S14. Then, the current position An is subtracted from the target position Am of each function to calculate the respective movement amounts D (S15), and the function M having the maximum movement amount is selected in step S16.

The selection of the function that maximizes the movement amount is specifically performed as shown in the routine of FIG. Target position Pm of each function in steps S30-33
The difference between ~ Fm and the current position Pn ~ Fn, that is, the movement amount Pd ~ Fd is calculated.At that time, since the movement amount in each function cannot be simply compared, the coefficient K1 ~ K4 considering the maximum movement speed etc. Multiply by to unify the comparison levels. Then, in step S34, the pan movement amount Pd and the tilt movement amount Td are compared to determine whether or not the tilt movement amount Td is large.
When determining S, write T to the maximum function M (S
37), the tilt movement amount Td is written in the maximum movement amount Dmax (S38), while P is written in the maximum function M (S35) when the NO judgment, that is, the pan movement amount Pd is large.
The pan movement amount Pd is written in the maximum movement amount Dmax (S36).

Subsequently, in step S39, the maximum movement amount D
It is determined whether max is smaller than the zoom movement amount Zd and YE
If the zoom movement amount Zd is large in S determination, step S
At 40, write Z to the maximum function M and write zoom movement amount Zd to the maximum movement amount Dmax (S41), then N
Along with the O determination, the process proceeds to step S42 and the maximum movement amount Dma
It is determined whether x is smaller than the focus movement amount Fd, and Y
If the focus movement amount Fd is large in the ES determination, F is written in the maximum function M in step S43, and the maximum in step S16 is finally written according to the function names P, T, Z, and F written in the maximum function M. Select the function that will be the movement amount.

Then, step S17 in FIG. 5 is for judging whether or not the mode changeover switch 28 is in the auto speed mode in which it is operated to the auto side, and when this judgment is NO and it is operated in the high speed mode side. In step S19, the minimum moving time t is calculated by dividing the moving amount Mm-Mn of the function of the maximum moving amount by the maximum speed Vmax based on the maximum moving speed Vmax set by the mode changeover switch 28. ..

When the determination in step S17 is YES and the vehicle is in the auto speed mode, the set value V of the moving speed is fetched from the operation position of the speed adjusting knob 27 in step S18. Then, in step S20, it is determined whether or not the function M of the maximum movement amount is the zoom Z. In the case of zooming, the movement amount t is calculated by dividing the zoom movement amount Zm-Zn by the set speed V in step S23. To do.

On the other hand, if the determination in step S20 is NO and the function M of the maximum movement amount is other than zoom Z, the current angle of view θ is fetched from the current zoom position Zn in step S21. Then, in step S22, the moving time t is calculated also for speed correction by the current angle of view θ.
The movement time t is calculated by dividing the movement amount Mm-Mn of the maximum movement amount function by the product of the set speed V and the angle of view θ (actually, a coefficient corresponding to the size of the angle of view θ). The relationship between the zoom position Zn and the angle of view θ in step S21 is obtained by a calculation formula or conversion table.
Since the relationship differs depending on the lens system, it is necessary to switch the calculation formula or the conversion table according to the lens system used.

Next, in step S24, the movement amount Am-An of each function is divided by the movement time t obtained in step S19, S22 or S23 as described above to calculate each unit time movement amount. And their current position An
To the new current position An.

Then, in step S25, a unit time t = 1 (for example, several msec to several tens msec) is waited for in synchronization with the update timer, and when the unit time has elapsed, the process proceeds to step S26 to update the updated current position signal D. Output to the / A converter 41,
Based on this signal, a position signal is input to the position servo amplifiers 51-54 of the respective driving means 6-9, and the servo motors 42-45 are driven by comparison with the position detection signal, and step S
At 27, it is determined whether or not the target position has been reached, and the processes of steps S17 to S26 are repeated until the target position is reached, the current position is updated, the servomotors 42 to 45 are driven, and the shot switch 25 registered in advance is used. The driving is performed so as to stop at the photographing position corresponding to the.

According to the above-described embodiment, when moving the image from the current position to the target position, the operator indicates the moving speed with the mode changeover switch 28 and the speed adjusting knob 27, and based on the specified speed. The image moves to the target position at a predetermined speed regardless of where the current position is, and high-speed movement is performed in the high-speed mode that moves in the shortest time possible. It corrects the moving speed according to the size of the angle, and controls so that the moving speed of the subject on the screen is almost constant even when the zoom is changed according to the movement. The high speed movement and the movement at the adjustment speed can be obtained by the operation of.

In particular, in the above embodiment, since the moving speed is indicated by the speed instead of the time, the speed in the movement changes at the start time as compared with the case of setting the time to move to the target position. Regardless of the instruction value, it will be possible to perform at a speed suitable for moving the image,
The instruction operation is simple, the number of rehearsals can be reduced, and the operability can be improved.

In the above embodiment, when the shot switch 25 is operated to move to the target position, the speed specified by the speed adjusting knob 27 and the mode changeover switch 28 is taken in.
When recording the target position information at the address of the memory corresponding to the number of 25, the indicated speed at that time may be written at the same time and read at the same time as the target position information. Also,
If the maximum amount of movement from the current position to the target position is extremely large and the movement time is too long, the indicated speed V in step S18 may be automatically changed (increased) to an appropriate value. Further, the movement speed may be instructed by setting the transition time.

On the other hand, in the case of calculating the moving speed as described above, when the photographing position moves in both the pan and tilt directions, the moving speed of the subject is a combination of the two moving directions. In order to move at a speed, calculation may be performed based on the combined moving speed of both. Further, since the pan speed decreases as the tilt angle increases, speed correction may also be performed based on this tilt angle.

[0038]

According to the present invention as described above, the first speed setting means for setting the upper limit speed of the moving speed to the target position and the second speed setting for setting the moving speed to the target position adjustable. Means and mode switching means for switching the speed setting by both speed setting means are provided, and the moving speed of each function is calculated and set so that the transfer of each function ends at the same time as the transfer time required to transfer from the current position to the target position. By doing so, the speed setting in the case of changing the shooting position from the current position to the target position in the minimum time and the speed setting in the case of moving at the optimum speed when an image in the middle is necessary, This can be performed by a simple operation by switching the two and changing the set value, and the number of rehearsals can be reduced and the operability can be improved. .

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a basic configuration diagram for clearly showing the configuration of a remote control device for a television camera of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an overall configuration diagram of a remote control device for a television camera showing a specific example.

FIG. 3 is a circuit diagram showing a schematic configuration of a controller.

4 to 6 are flowcharts of main parts for explaining processing of a controller.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 TV camera 3 zoom lens 4 pan head 6 pan drive means 7 tilt drive means 8 zoom drive means 9 focus drive means 10 controller 11 drive control means 12 shot storage means 13 first speed setting means 14 second speed setting means 15 mode switching Means 16 Speed calculation means 25 Shot switch 27 Speed adjustment knob 28 Mode selection switch

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A shot storage means for preliminarily storing position information of each function at a specific shooting position is provided with a separate drive means for driving each function such as pan and tilt of a television camera. A remote control device for a television camera, wherein the drive control means controls the operation of each of the drive means so that the functions are simultaneously started from the current shooting position to the target position recorded in the storage means and simultaneously ended. First speed setting means for setting an upper limit speed of the speed of transition to the target position stored in the shot storage means, second speed setting means for setting the speed of transition to the target position adjustable by speed or time, and Mode switching means for switching the speed setting by the first speed setting means and the speed setting by the second speed setting means, and the shot storage Receiving the position information of the target position and the set speed signal stored in each stage, the moving speed of each function is calculated and set so that the transfer of each function ends at the same time as the transfer time required to transfer from the current position to the target position. A speed calculation means, and a speed signal from the speed calculation means and target position information from the shot storage means are input to the drive control means, and the drive control means moves the drive means of each function at respective speeds. A remote control device for a television camera, which outputs a control signal.