JPS63309874A - Battery checking device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To exactly execute a battery check by a simple constitution, by integrating a numerical value determined in advance at every operation in accordance with the power consumption quantity at every camera operation, and issuing warning, when the integrated value has reached a prescribed value. CONSTITUTION:The power consumption quantity at the time when each circuit 13-18 of photometry, distance measurement, lens driving, shutter driving, film winding and stroboscope has been operated is stored in advance in a ROM memory of a microcomputer 10. In this state, the power consumption quantity at the time when each circuit 13-18 has been operated is integrated by a check counter in a memory 6 and stored. The memory 6 is brought to backup by a battery 5, and even when a camera is not operated, an integrating value of the check counter is held in the memory 6. When the integrating value has reached a prescribed value, a warning is issued from a display circuit 14. In such a way, since the consumption quantity is integrated at every operation of each circuit 13-18 in the camera, it is unnecessary to provide a special circuit, and a battery check is executed exactly by a simple constitution.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] (Industrial application field) The present invention relates to a camera battery check device.

(Prior Art) In recent years, cameras have become increasingly electronic, and various electronic circuits have been incorporated into cameras, but batteries are usually used as the power source. When the capacity of this battery decreases, for example, the flash may not work properly or the film winding motor may stop working in the middle of winding. For this reason, cameras have conventionally been equipped with battery check devices for checking the battery capacity before operation.

Various conventional battery check devices are known, but for example, one generates a pulse depending on the operation of a shutter or a motor, and then generates another pulse depending on the operation of an attached circuit that does not always operate, such as a strobe. A battery check circuit has been proposed that generates pulses and counts these pulses to display the battery capacity (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 6
No. 0-230639), by using such a circuit, it is possible to check the battery without wasting power.

However, in this type of circuit, two types of pulse circuits must be provided, making the circuit configuration complicated. Furthermore, since the operation of the shutter, motor, or strobe is used as the standard, there is a problem in that it is not possible to check the degree of battery consumption in detail. For example, according to the above circuit, if the shutter or motor does not operate, no pulse will be generated, and therefore the battery will not be consumed, but in reality, if photometry or distance measurement is performed before the shutter operates, At that time, a small amount of power is consumed.

(Objects and Structure of the Invention) The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and an object of the present invention is to provide a simple structure and an accurate battery check.

To achieve this objective, in the present invention.

As shown in the overall configuration of FIG. 1, a predetermined numerical value corresponding to the power consumption for each camera operation is calculated for each operation by an integrating means 100, and a non-volatile storage means 200 is used to calculate the integration value of the integrating means Zoo. The value is stored and the warning means 300 issues a warning when the integrated value reaches a predetermined value.

(Example) The present invention will be explained below based on the drawings.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of the battery check according to the present invention.

In the figure, 5 is a battery, 6 is a nonvolatile memory backed up by the battery 5, 7 is an initial setting circuit that initializes the memory 6 when the battery 5 is replaced, and 8 is a transistor that becomes conductive when the switch S□ is turned on. , 9
is a power supply stabilization circuit that supplies constant voltage to each circuit of the camera,
IO is a microcomputer (
11 is a reset circuit that sets the microcomputer 10 to its initial state, 12 is a display circuit that issues a warning when the capacity of the battery 5 has decreased to a predetermined value, 13 is a photometry circuit that measures the amount of incident light, and 14 is a subject. 15 is a lens drive circuit for moving the photographing lens to the in-focus position based on the distance measurement result of the distance measurement circuit 14; 16 is a shutter shutter based on the photometry result of the photometry circuit 13; 17 is a film winding circuit that drives a motor (not shown) that winds the film after shooting; 18 is a strobe circuit for firing a strobe; 19 is for putting the strobe circuit 18 into operation. It's a strobe switch.

Note that S, , S, are switches that are turned on by operating the release button, and when the release button is lightly pressed down one step, Sl is turned on, and when the release button is pressed down two steps more deeply, S2 is turned on.

A check counter is stored in the memory 6 as an integrating means for integrating the amount of power consumed when each of the circuits 13 to 18 is activated. Further, the integrated value is stored as is in the memory 6. The memory 6 is backed up by a battery 5, and the integrated value of the check counter is held in the memory even when the camera is not operating. Since the power consumed for backup is usually very small, it is possible to back up the memory 6 even if the battery capacity becomes so low that the camera cannot operate.

In addition, each circuit 13 to 1 is stored in the ROM memory of the microcomputer IO.
The amount of power consumed when 8 is activated is stored in advance.

In this embodiment, the operation performed when S is turned on (photometering, distance measurement, etc.) is set as 1, and the count number is calculated by replacing the power consumption of other operations with an integral multiple of that value. The settings were as shown in the table below.

Note that "S□: ON" in the table includes operations performed from when switch S1 is turned on until when switch S2 is turned on, such as photometry and distance measurement. Also “shooting”
This includes lens drive, shutter drive, and film winding operations. Since these are performed as a series of actions, we decided to count them together.

In this way, the power consumption is set in advance for each operation of the camera, the power consumption is integrated each time the operation is performed, and a warning is issued when the integrated value reaches a certain value. In this embodiment, since a lithium battery is used and its capacity count is 32,400, a warning is issued when the count reaches 30,000.

Next, the operation will be explained based on the flowchart in FIG.

First, when the photographer lightly presses down the release button one step, switch S is turned on (F-1), )-Rangister 8
is conductive and power is supplied to the power supply stabilization circuit 9, and the microcomputer 10
And power is turned on to each circuit 11 to 18 (F-2)
. At the same time, a reset signal is output from the reset circuit 11 to the microcomputer 10, and the microcomputer 10 is set to the initial state (F-3).

By the way, the battery check counter (BC) in memory 6
) stores the amount of power consumed during the previous shooting. Therefore, the microcomputer 10 next checks that the integrated value stored in its battery check counter (BC) is 3000.
Check whether it exceeds 0 (F-4), and if it does, output a display signal to the display circuit 12. In response to this, the display circuit 12 causes an LED (not shown) provided in the display section of the camera to emit light to display a warning that the battery capacity is insufficient (F-5). When a warning is displayed, the program does not proceed to the next step and the camera becomes inactive. In this case, when the battery 5 is replaced, the battery counter in the memory 6 is cleared by the initial setting circuit 7, and the camera returns to the operating state.

If the battery check counter is 30,000 or less, the capacity is sufficient and the process proceeds to the next sequence.

That is, photometry is performed by the photometry circuit 13 (F-
6), distance measurement is performed by the distance measurement circuit 14 (F-7
).

Next, the microcomputer IO detects whether the switch S2 is turned on (F-8), and if the switch S2 is not turned on, then it is checked whether the switch S is turned on (F-9). If the switch S is still on, wait for the input of the switch S2 (F-8), and if the switch S is off, consider that the shooting has been stopped, and add rlJ to the battery check counter (BC). (F
-10), the operation ends.

When switch S2 is turned on, lens drive circuit 1
5 is activated to move the photographing lens from the initial position to the focusing position (F-11), then the shutter is driven by the shutter drive circuit 16 (F=12), and then the photographing lens is driven again to the initial position. Returned (F-13). When this series of shooting operations is performed, a command from the microcomputer 10 causes the battery check counter (BC) to switch S.
The count number rlJ when 1 is on and the count number "4" of the photographing operation are added.

Next, it is determined whether the strobe switch 19 is on (
F-15), if it is on, the battery check counter (
BC) is added to rloOJ (F-16). If it is not on, the film winding circuit 17 drives a winding motor (not shown) to wind the film (F-17).
, the shooting ends. Note that the power consumption for the film winding operation has already been counted in step (F-14).

In the above embodiment, the power consumption is integrated for the operation when the switch SI is on, the shooting operation, and the strobe operation. Power consumption for information input, detection operations, focus switching of a photographic lens, film rewinding, etc. can be processed in the same way. At this time, the power consumption of the film rewinding operation may be the same as that of the winding operation, and when the film winding operation is performed, the power consumption of the rewinding operation may be added (that is, doubled).

Furthermore, the count number of power consumption may also be set according to the characteristics of each operation. For example, the amount of power required to turn on the switch S□ may be determined by measuring the amount of time the switch S is kept pressed and determined accordingly. Further, in a camera equipped with a liquid crystal display device, when setting the power consumption amount, the driving time of the liquid crystal may be measured, and the count number may be determined according to that time.

Further, the initial setting circuit 7 does not necessarily need to be provided alone; for example, a battery backup memory such as a memory for a film counter used in recent cameras may also be used.

(Effects of the Invention) As explained above, according to the present invention, since the power consumption of each circuit in the camera is integrated for each operation, there is no need to provide a special circuit as in the past. With a simple configuration, detailed and accurate battery checks can be performed.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a battery check device according to the present invention, and FIG. 3 is a flowchart of the operation of the embodiment. 5...Battery, 8...Transistor, 19...
strobe switch

Claims (1)

[Claims] an integrating means for integrating a predetermined value for each camera operation corresponding to the power consumption amount for each camera operation; a non-volatile storage means for storing the integrated value of the integrating means; 1. A battery check device comprising: a warning means for issuing a warning when a battery check occurs.