JPS62178934A - Image processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the image processing accuracy by always obtaining a distinct video, and to execute an exact AF by constituting the title processor so that a good illuminating state is always obtained in accordance with a zoom position of a lens. CONSTITUTION:A CPU 17 of an image processing part 16 inputs a zoom position data to a zoom controller 18, and the zoom controller 18 drives a zoom driving motor 22, based on the zoom position data, and drives a zoom operating mechanism of a zoom ring, etc. of a lens 11. A zoom operating position of the lens 11 is detected by a zoom operating position detecting part 14, and when it is decided from this detecting signal that a zoom position has reached a set value, a motor 22 is stopped. A detecting signal by the zoom operating position detecting part 14 is further inputted to a light adjusting device 15 from the zoom controller 18, and the light adjusting device 15 controls an illuminating deice 13 in accordance with the detecting signal, and adjusts a light quantity of the illuminating device 13. In such a way, an illuminance of a target 26 is set to a prescribed illuminance corresponding to the zoom operating position, and thereafter, an AF start signal is sent to an AF device from the image processing part 16.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (Field of Industrial Application) The present invention relates to an image processing device having a zoom operation mechanism, and particularly to an illumination device thereof.

(Prior art) Image processing devices are used to identify parts on automatic assembly lines,
It has pattern recognition and various other uses.

In an image processing apparatus, when an image processing screen is captured by a TV camera, it is necessary to illuminate a target to be captured by a camera lens. The following are conventionally known as lighting devices for image processing devices.

(1) Light emitting diode (LED) at the tip of the lens
A device equipped with a small illumination light such as a fluorescent lamp or a fluorescent lamp.

(2) A lighting lamp is attached to a position separate from the lens to illuminate the target.

(3) An illumination lamp is attached to a position separate from the lens, and the illumination light is guided to the target using a light guide.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) According to the illumination device in the conventional image processing device described above, a stable image can be obtained when the lens of the image processing device has a fixed focus. That is, the amount of light of the illumination device can be fixedly set so that an optimal image can be obtained.

However, in an image processing apparatus using a zoom lens, assuming that the amount of illumination light is always constant, the amount of light incident on the lens changes significantly due to zooming. For this reason, depending on the zoom position, the resulting image may be too bright or too dark, making it impossible to capture accurate video signals, and the accuracy of image processing such as length and surface roughness measurements decreases. Also,
In devices equipped with an autofocus (hereinafter referred to as rAFJ) device, accurate AF cannot be performed if the image is too bright or too dark.

Therefore, it is conceivable to use a lens with an automatic diaphragm mechanism and operate the automatic diaphragm mechanism according to zooming, thereby making the brightness of the obtained image constant. This is not preferable because the depth of focus changes and the cost increases.

The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned conventional problems, and by ensuring that a good lighting condition is always obtained according to the zoom position of the lens, it is possible to always obtain clear images and improve image processing. It is an object of the present invention to provide an image processing device that improves accuracy and enables accurate AF.

(Means for Solving the Problems) As shown in FIG. 1, the present invention includes a lens 11 having a zoom operation mechanism 12, an illumination device 13 for illuminating a target captured by this lens 11, A zoom operation position detection section 14 that detects the operation position of the zoom operation mechanism 12, and a light control device 15 that controls the illumination device 13 to change the illuminance of the target according to the detection signal of the zoom operation position detection section 14. It has the following.

(Function) When the zoom operation mechanism of the lens is operated to perform zooming, the zoom operation position detection section detects the zoom position. The illumination device is controlled according to this detection signal, and the illuminance of the target changes.

(Example) FIG. 2 shows an example using a lens equipped with an AF device in addition to the zoom operation mechanism. In FIG. 2, the lens 11 of the TV camera 20 has a zoom operation mechanism such as a zoom ring driven by a zoom drive motor 22, and a zoom operation position consisting of a potentiometer or the like that detects the operation position of this zoom operation mechanism. It has a detection section 14. Further, an illumination device 13 for illuminating the target 26 on the stage 25 is attached to the tip of the lens 11.

A video signal from the TV camera 20 is input to the image processing section 16, as well as to the AF device 23 and the CRT 27 as a display device. The image processing device 16 is a central processing unit (hereinafter referred to as "CPUJ")
17, and the zoom drive motor 22 is driven by the zoom controller 18 based on zoom position data from the CPU 17. Based on the drive of the zoom drive motor 22 (changes in the position of the zoom operation mechanism of the lens 11 are detected by the zoom operation position detection section 14 and input to the zoom controller 18.
8 inputs the zoom operation position detection signal to the dimmer 15, and the dimmer 15 controls the illumination device 13 according to the zoom operation position detection signal, and adjusts the light amount of the illumination device 13 to the zoom operation position. It is designed to change according to the detection signal.

The AF device 23 detects the focal position of the lens 11 based on the video signal from the TV camera 20, and can be used with various conventionally known systems. The detection method described in the specification of Japanese Patent Application No. 60-200137 may be applied. The AF device 23 drives a stepping motor in the stage 25 through the stepper controller 24 in response to the focus detection signal, moves the target 26 on the stage 25 up and down, and places the target 26 at the focal position of the lens 11. ing. Such an AF operation is performed by inputting a command signal from the CPU 17 to the stepper controller 24 in a predetermined order.

The CRT 27 receives an image from the camera 20 or the image processing unit 1
The binarized image etc. from 6 are displayed.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained. First, the CPU 17 of the image processing unit 16 inputs zoom position data to the zoom controller 18, and the zoom controller 18 drives the zoom drive motor 22 based on the zoom position data, and controls the zoom operation mechanism such as the zoom ring of the lens 11. to drive. The zoom operation position of the lens 11 is detected by a zoom operation position detecting section 14 made of a potentiometer or the like, and when it is determined from this detection signal that the zoom position has reached a set value, the motor 22 is stopped. The detection signal from the zoom operation position detection section 14 is also transmitted to the zoom controller 1
8 to the light control device 15, and the light control device 15 controls the lighting device 13 according to the detection signal and adjusts the amount of light of the lighting device 13.

In this way, after setting the illuminance of the target 26 to a predetermined illuminance according to the zoom operation position, the image processing unit 16
An AF start signal is sent to the F device to perform the AF operation. A
In the F operation, the stepper controller 24 drives the stepping motor in the stage 25 to move the target 26 up and down in steps according to a command from the CPU 17 of the image processing device 16, and the focusing state at each step position is determined by the AF device 23. This is done while detecting.

When the AF operation is completed, the video signal is taken into the image processing section 16 and various image processing is performed.

A flowchart of the operations described above is shown in FIG. Third
As is clear from the figure, first, the lens is moved to set the zoom position, and when zooming is completed, the lighting is controlled according to the zoom position, and then the AF operation is performed.
Image processing is performed only after the AF operation is completed. Therefore, since the image is captured and image processed in a state where the illumination is at the zoom position and a focusing operation is performed, it is possible to perform various types of image processing with high accuracy using a clear image.

As the light source of the lighting device, LEDs, fluorescent lights, and other light sources may be used. Figure 4 shows LE as a light source.
An example using D is shown below. In FIG. 4, the amount of light emitted from an LED 33 as a light source is controlled by controlling the voltage by a voltage controller 32.
The drive voltage is controlled. The decoder 31 may, for example, decode the upper 4 bits of the 6-bit zoom position data and input this to the voltage controller 32 as position data. A current according to the driving voltage flows through the LED 33, thereby changing the amount of light from the LED 33.

There are the following methods for controlling the amount of light of a lighting device.

(1) The current of the light source at the optimum illuminance at each zoom position is experimentally determined and set, and the voltage of the light source is set so that the current corresponding to each zoom position flows through the light source.

(2) Calculate the illuminance passed through each zoom position based on the optimal illuminance at a certain zoom position, and control the voltage of the light source so that a current commensurate with the calculated illuminance flows according to each zoom position. .

(3) As shown by the broken □ line A in FIG. 2, between the image processing unit 16 and the light control device 15, the amount of light from the light source is changed by detecting the signal level of the video signal. A signal system will be provided.

In addition to the above-mentioned means, the light source may be provided movably so that the distance from the target to the light source can be changed depending on the zoom position.

FIGS. 5 and 6 show a specific example of the installation of the lens, zoom operation mechanism, and illumination device. In FIGS. 5 and 6, a zoom ring 12 as a zoom mounting mechanism is provided on the barrel of the lens 11, and an LED 3 as an illumination device is provided inside the zoom ring 12 at the tip of the lens 11.
3 are arranged in large numbers to surround the objective lens 34.

The illumination device may be placed at the tip of the lens as in the above example, or may be placed at a different position from the lens, and
The illumination light may be guided to the target position by a light guide provided at a position different from the lens.

INDUSTRIAL APPLICATION This invention can be applied as a control device of the illumination of the optical system of various uses.

(Effects of the Invention) According to the present invention, since the illumination device is controlled according to the zoom position to change the illuminance of the target, it is possible to obtain the optimum illuminance according to the zoom position, thereby providing clear images. It is possible to perform highly accurate image processing based on the method, and when an autofocus device using a video signal is provided, accurate autofocus can be performed. Furthermore, the present invention can be easily applied to any image processing apparatus. For example, although many image processing cameras generally do not have an AGC (auto gain controller), the image processing device according to the present invention can be easily applied to such cameras, thereby producing sharp images. Highly accurate image processing can be performed under

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram showing the basic configuration of an image processing device according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the image processing device according to the present invention, and FIG. 3 explains the operation of the same embodiment. 4 is a block diagram showing a specific example of a lighting device applicable to the present invention; FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing an example of the structure of a lens and a portion of the lighting device applicable to the present invention; FIG. 6 is a longitudinal sectional view of the same as above. 11-Lens, 12-Zoom operation mechanism, 13-Lighting device, 14-Zoom operation position detection section, 15...
Dimmer device. Procedure 111″1 Masashi ζ January 2nd, 1988

Claims (1)

[Claims] a lens having a zoom operation mechanism; a lighting device that illuminates a target captured by the lens; a zoom operation position detection unit that detects the operation position of the zoom operation mechanism; An image processing device comprising: a light control device that controls an illumination device to change illuminance of the target.