JPS6279571A - Graphic pattern generating system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To realize the best graphic pattern from the minimum graphic pattern by applying a prescribed picture processing based upon the distribution of a pattern picture on the pattern picture to obtain the graphic pattern on a picture space. CONSTITUTION:A character (dai) consists of vectors v1-v4 and in each vector, the direction (v) and length (l) of the vector are corresponded. First of all, the position of a pendown is decided by a start point coordinate (x1, y1) and a stroke 10 is developed by a direction v1 and a length l1 of the vector. A high-order bit UD in information of each l represents an inflection point information and a stroke is developed with the (v) and the (l) and when the inflection point UD is '1', a pen-up is held and when it is '0', a pendown. By such inflection point information, a stroke 11 sets a start point at a coordinate (x2, y2). The pattern picture is developed within a RAM2 as a diagram with a method stated above from stroke information. Thereby, the graphic pattern with good accuracy and definition can be obtained only from pattern graphic information.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention [Industrial Application Field] The present invention restores graphic patterns, such as character fonts or graphics with improved image quality, based on, for example, stroke information or graphic pattern information consisting only of coarse graphics. The present invention relates to a graphic pattern generation method for generating or generating patterns.

[Prior Art] In this type of conventional technology, it is usual to store the original graphic pattern information such as fonts in a ROM or a tisf device. In this case, since the number of graphics such as characters to be stored is enormous, a major problem was how to reduce the amount of information on each graphic pattern.

However, such a reduction in the amount of graphic pattern information naturally leads to deterioration of image quality. Therefore, conventionally, in order to correct deterioration due to enlargement, deformation, etc. from graphic pattern information or to improve printing quality, a method has been adopted in which correction information is stored together with the original graphic pattern information. However, in such a conventional method, the amount of character pattern information ends up increasing, so the capacity of the ROM, etc. must be increased, which poses a problem that leads to an increase in the cost of the product.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] The present invention has been made in view of the problems of the prior art described above, and its purpose is to propose a graphic pattern generation method that obtains the best graphic pattern from the minimum amount of graphic pattern information. It's there.

[Means for Solving the Problems] An embodiment of a graphic generation device that implements the graphic pattern generation method proposed to achieve the above-mentioned problems is shown in FIG. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, it is assumed that the graphic pattern to be finally obtained is, for example, a character font. The configuration of this embodiment includes a first storage means (for example, ROMI) for storing graphic pattern information, and a second storage means (for example, a ROMI) having an image space in a dot matrix format for developing pattern images (in this example, the pattern RAM 2), third storage means (phono in this example) for storing graphic patterns (character fonts in this example) from pattern images in a dot matrix format, and RAM 3) as an image processing means for performing predetermined image processing, e.g. Consists of 4 CPUs.

[Operation] In the above configuration, the ROM 1, which is the first storage means, stores graphic pattern information for generating primitive character fonts. Based on this graphic notation information, the CPU 4 develops a pattern image on the notation RAM 2. Next, the CPU 4 applies image processing to the dot distribution of the pattern image developed on the pattern RAMZ, and obtains a graphic pattern (for example, a character font) on the font RAM 5.

[Embodiments] Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in more detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

First, the display of graphic pattern information using the vector method (stroke method) will be explained with reference to FIGS. 2(a) and 2(b). FIG. 2(a) illustrates the configuration of a vector with the letter "r". The character “dai” is a vector V
l, V2°V3. Consists of V4. In Fig. 2(a), white circle 0 indicates the starting point (pen down), and (xz, yu) (
X2. Y2) etc. are the starting point coordinates. The black circle/black circle indicates the position of the pen-up. Each vector is associated with its direction V and its length. Figure 2(b) is the same as Figure 2(a).
) is an example of storing the graphic pattern of the character "large" in a vector format in a storage means such as the ROM 1 in FIG. 1 (or a disk device (not shown) may be used). The pattern shown in FIG. 2(a) is obtained from the graphic pattern information shown in FIG. 2(b) as follows. That is, first, start point coordinates (xx
+yz) determines the pen-down position, and the vector direction v1 and length 1 develop the stroke 10 in FIG. 2(a). The upper 1 bit UD of each sentence's information represents inflection point information. The inflection point information is information that determines whether to develop one stroke with ■ and a sentence and then maintain the pen town state or move up.

When the inflection point information UD is 1”, press pen up, °“0”
Maintains the down state when . Based on such inflection point information, the stroke 11 has the coordinates (X2°yz) as its starting point.

The movement from stroke 11 to stroke 12 is shown in Figure 2 (
There is no need to raise the pen as in a). Therefore, the inflection point information UD is 0'' to indicate this. Character patterns are developed by the vector method by repeating the following operations.

Next, the configuration of the embodiment will be explained based on FIG. The configuration of the embodiment is R that stores primitive graphic pattern information.
OMI, Button RAM2 that stores pattern images, Phono RAM that stores pattern images that have been subjected to image processing
3, and a CPU 4 that writes or reads data into the ROMI, pattern RAM 2, and font RAM 3, and performs arithmetic processing control for image processing.

It is preferable that the pattern RAM 2 and the phono RAM 3 are storage devices configured in a dot matrix arrangement. For convenience, the coordinates of pattern RAM2 are (x, y)
, that of font RAM3 is expressed as (x, y). Further, the ROMI has built-in programs for control procedures according to the embodiments shown in FIGS. 7(L) to (C) and FIG. 8.

An outline of the operation of the embodiment based on the above configuration is as follows. For example, the graphic pattern information of ROMI is shown in Figure 2 (&)
Or it is stored as stroke information as shown in (b). From this stroke information, a pattern image is stored in the pattern RAM 2 by the method described above as shown in FIG. 2(a).
It is developed as a line diagram as shown in the figure. For this diagram, the CPU 4 is shown in Figures 3 (a) to (C) and Figure 4 (a).
~(C), Figures 5(a), (b), and Figures 6(a)(b)
) or FIG. 9(a).

The thick line processing shown in (b) is performed to obtain the desired graphic pattern, such as a font, on the phono RAM 3.

Next, a control procedure for, for example, enlargement processing or thick line processing in the embodiment will be explained. FIG. 7(a) and FIG. 8(&) are flowcharts showing a part of the control procedure according to this embodiment. The operation to obtain a pattern image is shown in Figure 7 (
a) and step S2 of FIG. 8(&). S4 and step S30 of FIG. 8(a). S32 corresponds to this.

Next, we will explain the method of enlarging the pattern image obtained in the pattern RAM 2 and obtaining the desired pattern figure in the phono RAM 3, which is one of the themes of this figure pattern generation method, as shown in FIGS. 7(a) to (C). ) will be explained with reference to the flowchart.

(First Enlargement Method) FIGS. 3(a) to 3(C) are diagrams explaining how a part of the pattern as shown in FIG. 2(a) stored in the pattern RAM 2 is enlarged. The method of enlarging is to focus on each dot on the pattern RAMZ shown in Figure 3(a), and for each dot, add three dots in the white direction from that position to obtain a square, ultimately quadrupling the entire area. The algorithm is to enlarge the dot coordinates (x, y) on the pattern RAMZ, the dot coordinates (2X, 2Y) on the pattern RAM3, (2X+1.2Y), (2X.

2Y+1), (2X+1.2Y+1) (see step S20 in FIG. 7(b)).

FIG. 3(C) smoothes the pattern obtained by enlarging as shown in FIG. 3(b). For example, (X
, V) + (2X-1,2Y).

Line segments are smoothed by dot interpolation based on the interpolation rule (2X, 2Y-1) (in a diagonal direction with respect to direction v1). The smoothing control procedure is as follows:
This is shown below in step 322 of Figure (b). Step S22
Then, it is determined whether interpolation is necessary each time one dot on the pattern RAMZ is enlarged. The magnification ratio may be considered as a criterion for such judgment. For example, if the image is enlarged by 4 times or more, interpolation is performed, and if it is less than 4 times, interpolation is not performed. Next, in step S24, the boundaries between the dots are interpolated based on the calculation described above. When the magnification is high, the amount of dots to be interpolated is increased. In this way, step S6→S 2 ops 22→S24→S8→S
10-, repeat the loop of S6 to complete the enlargement (and interpolation if necessary) process.

As described above, by obtaining a pattern image from the character pattern information and enlarging and developing all the dots, a graphic pattern at an arbitrary magnification, in this example a character pattern, can be obtained. Such an enlargement is for example 16X16
In order to obtain a dot font pattern, it is effective to develop an 8×8 pattern image as shown in FIG. 6(a) in the pattern RAM 2 and enlarge it to <16×16 as shown in FIG. 6(b). When the graphic pattern information is provided in the ROMI not as stroke information as shown in Fig. 2(b) but as the pattern itself as shown in Fig. 6(a), the size of the pattern is small. Since the required ROM capacity can be reduced, this contributes to miniaturization of the device. Moreover, if interpolation processing between dots is further performed, a high quality font can be obtained.

In addition, although Fig. 3 (a) to (C) show the case where the slope of v5 is 45 degrees, Fig. 4 (a) to (C) shows the case where the slope of V6 is 30 degrees.
This is the case for degrees.

<Second Enlargement Method> The enlargement in this example realizes enlargement and smoothing at the same time, and the algorithm first uses the coordinate (X).

y) as (2X, 2Y), (2X, 2Y-1).

(2X-1, 2Y-1), (2X-1, 2Y), that is, increase the dots in the order of white, and for the next dot, convert (x, y) to (2X, 2Y), (2X, 2Y+1
), (2X+1.2Y+1), and (2X+1.2Y), that is, the number of dots is increased in the order of the mouth. Figure 7 (
The control procedure is shown in step S26.328 of C).

<Thick line processing> The two enlargement methods described above enlarge in both the X direction and the Y direction. However, in such enlargement, although the line width becomes thicker, the entire figure also becomes larger, and as a result, the viewer may not feel the enlargement effect as much. Therefore, the method described below thickens only the line width without changing the overall size of the figure. The control procedure is shown in FIG. Step S30.32 is the same as step S2.4 in FIG. 7(a). In step S34, the slope of the stroke of the vector is checked.

In this example, when it is approximately parallel to the y-axis (-15 degrees tilted +
15 degrees) and approximately parallel to the y-axis (10 degrees tilted by 75 degrees).
5 degrees) and other cases. If it is substantially parallel to the y-axis, it is thickened in the Y-axis direction in step S8. If it is substantially parallel to the y-axis, it is thickened in the X-axis direction in step S36. If neither is the case, dots are increased in the diagonal direction with respect to the slope of the vector (steps S42, 544). Figure 9 (
Figures a) and (b) are diagrams after the character "大" has been made into a thick line.

In this way, only the line width can be increased without enlarging the entire image. Therefore, the graphic pattern information in the ROMI only needs to be stroke information, and the algorithm of the CPU 4 obtains the graphic pattern based on the pattern image developed on the pattern RAMZ, so there is no need for correction information etc. as in the past. The capacity of ROM etc. can be reduced. Furthermore, if the graphic pattern once obtained is left in the font RAM 3 without being deleted, and the corresponding graphic pattern is subsequently accessed, it will be obtained from the font RAM 1 day 3, contributing to speeding up.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the present invention, a graphic pattern with good accuracy and quality can be obtained from only the pattern graphic information, so it does not take much time to generate the pattern graphic information, and the pattern graphic information Since there is no need to store correction information and the like together with the information, the best graphic pattern can be obtained from the minimum amount of graphic pattern information.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment according to the present invention, FIG. 2(a) is a diagram showing an example of the constituent strokes of a character as an example of graphic pattern information, and FIG. 2(b) is a diagram showing an example of character pattern information storage. Figures 3 (a) to (C), Figures 4 (a) to (C), and Figures 5 (a) and (b) are diagrams illustrating the state of enlargement and correction in the example, Figures 6 (a) and (b) are diagrams explaining an example of character enlargement processing; Figures 7 (L) to (C) are flowcharts representing control procedures for enlargement processing; and Figure 8 is a thick line FIGS. 9(a) and 9(b) are diagrams illustrating an example of a character thickening process. In the figure, 1...ROM, 2...pattern RAM, 3...
... Font RAM, 4... CPU. Patent applicant Canon Corporation Figure 1 Figure 2 (a) Figure 2 (b) Figure 7 (b) Figure 7 (C)

Claims (6)

[Claims] (1) A pattern image is developed on a dot matrix image space based on the graphic pattern information corresponding to the graphic pattern, and a predetermined image processing based on the distribution of the pattern image is applied to the pattern image to create the graphic pattern. A graphic pattern generation method characterized in that it is obtained on the image space. (2) The graphic pattern generation method according to claim 1, wherein the graphic pattern is a character font. (3) The graphic pattern generation method according to claim 1, wherein the predetermined image processing is enlargement or thickening of the image. (4) The graphic pattern generation method according to claim 1, wherein the graphic pattern information is stroke information regarding a graphic. (5) The graphic pattern generation method according to claim 1, wherein the image is enlarged by two-dimensionally increasing the number of dots around each dot of the pattern image. (6) The thickening of the image is characterized by increasing the number of dots around the dots of the pattern image at a predetermined angle with respect to the stroke based on the inclination of the stroke with respect to the coordinate axis of the dot matrix. The graphic pattern generation method described in Section 4.