KR101144875B1 - Digital image processing device and diplay method of the device - Google Patents

Abstract

The digital image processing apparatus according to the present invention comprises: an imaging unit which photoelectrically converts light from a subject into an electrical image signal; A controller for inspecting the ambient brightness from the electrical image signal and adjusting and outputting the display brightness signal according to the test result; And a display unit for displaying an image according to the adjusted display brightness signal.

According to the present invention, the display monitor visibility of the user that changes according to the ambient brightness can be improved.

Description

Digital image processing device and its display method {Digital image processing device and diplay method of the device}

1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of an exemplary digital camera to which the concept of the present invention can be applied.

2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a rear surface of a digital camera as shown in FIG. 1 as an example of a digital image processing apparatus to which the present invention may be applied.

3 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a digital image processing apparatus according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

4 is a flowchart illustrating a display method of a digital image processing apparatus according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is an embodiment specifically implementing steps S102 and S104 of FIG. 4.

The present invention relates to a digital image processing apparatus such as a digital camera, and more particularly to a digital image processing apparatus having a display apparatus such as an LCD.

Most digital cameras are difficult to see because the display screen is blurred depending on the ambient brightness. Therefore, in outdoor bright environments, the display window should be made darker by hand, but users who use digital cameras will be able to identify when it was possible to discriminate.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in an effort to provide a digital image processing apparatus having improved display monitor visibility of a user that changes according to ambient brightness.

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a digital image processing apparatus comprising: an imaging unit configured to photoelectrically convert light from a subject into an electrical image signal; A controller for inspecting ambient brightness from the electrical image signal and adjusting and outputting a display brightness signal according to the inspection result; And a display unit which displays an image according to the adjusted brightness signal.

The imaging unit outputs light through a color filter mosaic for each pixel sensor regularly arranged in a two-dimensional area of a predetermined size, and outputs light incident on the pixel sensors as a photoelectrically converted electrical image signal. An electronic circuit may be provided, and the controller may calculate a peripheral luminance from the electrical image signal for each pixel by a predetermined conversion equation.

The imaging unit includes an RGB (Red, Green, Blue) color filter mosaic to output an R (Red) signal, a G (Green) signal, a B (blue) signal as the photoelectrically converted electrical image signal, and the control unit The ambient brightness (Y) is given by

Can be calculated by

According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of displaying a digital image processing apparatus, the method including: quantifying by inspecting ambient brightness input through an imaging device; Classifying the digitized brightness into a predetermined number of grades; And setting the display brightness differentially according to the grade.

The basic concept of the present invention is to improve the visibility of the user by adjusting the brightness of the display according to the ambient brightness input through the image pickup device.

Hereinafter, the configuration and operation of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. Like reference numerals in the drawings denote components that perform the same function.

1 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of an exemplary digital camera to which the concept of the present invention can be applied.

The optical system OPS including the lens unit and the filter unit optically processes light from a subject. The lens unit in the optical system OPS includes a zoom lens, a focus lens, and a compensation lens.

A photoelectric conversion unit (OEC) of a charge coupled device (CCD) or a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) converts light from an optical system (OPS) into an electrical analog signal. Here, the DSP 7 controls the timing circuit 2 to control the operations of the photoelectric converter OEC and the analog-digital converter 1. The CDS-ADC (Correlation Double Sampler and Analog-to-Digital Converter) element 1 as an analog-to-digital converter processes the analog signal from the photoelectric converter (OEC), removes the high frequency noise, and adjusts the amplitude. (auto gain control, AGC) and then convert to a digital signal. The DSP 7 processes the digital signal from the CDS-ADC element 1 to generate a digital image signal classified into luminance and chroma signals.

The DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) 4 temporarily stores digital image signals and other temporary processing data from the DSP 7.

The EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory) 5 stores algorithms and setting data necessary for the operation of the DSP 7. The memory card of the user is attached to and detached from the memory card interface 6.

The digital image signal from the DSP (Digital Signal Processor) 7 is converted into the display signal of the LCD panel by the LCD driver 14 so that the image is displayed on the color LCD panel 17.

On the other hand, the digital image signal from the DSP 7 can be transmitted by serial communication via the USB (Universal Serial Bus) connection 18 or the RS232C interface 8 and its connection 19, and the video filter 9 And a video signal through the video output unit 20.

The audio processor 13 outputs the audio signal from the microphone MIC to the DSP 7 or the speaker SP, and outputs the audio signal from the DSP 7 to the speaker SP.

The user input unit INP may include a shutter button, a mode selection button, a function selection button, a zoom button, a direction movement button, and the like. The user input unit INP is operated by the user to generate a command for performing each function according to the user's instruction.

The microcontroller 12 controls the lens driver 10, whereby the zoom motor M _Z , the focus motor M _F , and the aperture motor M _A are zoom lenses in the optical system OPS, The focus lens and the aperture are driven respectively. The light emitting unit LAMP driven by the microcontroller 12 may include a self-timer lamp, an auto-focus lamp, a flash standby lamp, and the like. On the other hand, the microcontroller 12 drives the flash 15 by controlling the operation of the flash controller 11 in accordance with the signal from the flash-light amount sensor 16.

The function of the microcontroller 12 may be implemented in one chip with the DSP 7.

The digital camera to which the present invention can be applied does not have to include all the components of FIG. 1, and those skilled in the art may delete some of the components, add another component, or modify some components according to the specification. It will be appreciated that the functionality of the various components may be implemented in combination.

2 is a view showing an example of the back of the digital camera as shown in FIG. 2 as an example of a digital image processing apparatus to which the present invention may be applied.

At the rear of the digital camera of Fig. 2, the viewfinder 100, the autofocus lamp 101, the flash status lamp 102, the mode dial 103, the wide-angle zoom button 104, the telephoto zoom button 105, 5 Function button 106, speaker 107, external output terminal 108, DC power input terminal 109, playback mode button 110, LCD monitor 111, display the currently set shooting information on the monitor or LCD monitor An LCD button 112, a manual focus button 113, a pause button 114 and the like are provided to turn off / turn on.

The LCD monitor 111 displays an OSD indicating the current shooting mode and status of the digital camera.

The five-function button 106 has a menu entry / OK button and up, down, left, and right buttons at the center. When the menu is displayed on the monitor, the up, down, left, and right directional buttons can function as special function buttons instead of directional movement.

In the present invention, the change of the zoom magnification is performed by pressing the wide-angle zoom button 104 and the telephoto zoom button 105.

The various function buttons shown in FIG. 2 may be provided to perform two or more complex functions in addition to the functions shown in the names.

3 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a digital image processing apparatus according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, and includes an image capturing unit 200, a control unit 202, and a display unit 204.

The imaging unit 200 photoelectrically converts light from the subject into an electrical image signal.

The controller 202 inspects the ambient brightness from the electrical image signal photoelectrically converted through the imaging unit 200 and adjusts the brightness of the display signal according to the inspection result.

The display unit 204 displays a signal whose brightness is adjusted.

For example, when the digital image processing apparatus of the present invention is implemented as the digital camera of FIG. 1, the imaging unit 200 may be provided as the photoelectric conversion unit OEC and the CDS-ADC device 1 of FIG. 1. In addition, the control unit 202 may be provided as the DSP 7, the DRAM 4, and the EEPROM 5. In addition, the display unit 204 may be provided as the LCD driver 14 and the color LCD panel 17 (111 of FIG. 2).

The imaging unit 200 includes a light receiving surface for receiving light through respective color filter mosaics for each pixel sensor regularly arranged in a two-dimensional region having a predetermined size, and photoelectric conversion of light incident to the pixel sensors as photoelectric conversion. An electronic circuit which outputs is provided. The color filter mosaic provided on the light receiving surface may be provided as, for example, an RGB (Red, Green, Blue) primary color filter, a Ye / Cy / G / Mg (Yellow, Cyan, Green, Magenta) complementary color filter. Only light of a color corresponding to the color filter corresponding to each pixel is transmitted, and the photodiode of the pixel reacts to output a photoelectrically converted electrical image signal.

In particular, when the RGB primary color filter mosaic is employed in the imaging unit 200, the controller 202 divides the photoelectrically converted electrical image signal into a red signal (R), a green signal (G), and a blue signal (B). The ambient brightness (Y) can be calculated and quantified by the following equation (1).

The R, G, and B values may be average values obtained by dividing all pixel signal values of each color by the number of pixels of each color.

The controller 202 classifies the inspected ambient brightness into two or more stages, and changes the display luminance to a preset adjustment value according to each stage. As the ambient brightness (Y) is classified into several levels, more detailed brightness adjustment is possible.

When the display unit 204 is provided with an LCD driver and a color LCD monitor, the controller 202 may adjust display brightness by adjusting a screen brightness control register value of the LCD driver. For example, the LCD driving unit of the common electrode driving method may adjust the display brightness by adjusting the V _COM register value. This will be described later.

4 is a flowchart illustrating a display method of a digital image processing apparatus according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

First, the ambient brightness input through the image pickup device is digitized (S100). The numerical value of the ambient brightness can be implemented by, for example, Equation 1.

The digitized brightness is classified into a predetermined number of grades (S102).

The display brightness is set according to the grade (S104).

FIG. 5 is an embodiment specifically implementing steps S102 and S104 of FIG. 4.

First, the ambient brightness input through the image pickup device is digitized (S100).

The ambient brightness is classified into three classes of 4LV or less (S102-1), 5LV to 15LV (S102-2), and 16LV or more (S102-3).

The display brightness is set to high brightness (S104-1), normal brightness (S104-2), and low brightness (S104-3) according to the class of ambient brightness classified.

The OSD color reference table according to the class of ambient brightness may be configured by the criteria shown in Table 3 below.

Rating Ambient brightness LCD brightness LCD Register Settings Remarks One 4LV or less High brightness R02 → 5a15h Register 2 (R02) sets the V _COM voltage 2 5LV to 15LV Normal brightness R02 → 6217h 3 16LV or more Low brightness R02 → 6218h

For example, if the luminance shown in the preview of the current monitor is calculated to be 14LV (S100), the ambient brightness class is classified into two classes (S102-2), and accordingly, address 2 of the LCD register (R02) is It is automatically set to 6217h (S104-2) so that the LCD is displayed at normal brightness.

The above embodiments have been described with reference to a digital camera as an example of a digital image processing apparatus to which the present invention can be applied, but are not limited thereto. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the present invention is applicable to mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and the like, capable of taking images and having display monitors. In addition, the present invention can be applied to a portable multimedia player (PMP), which has recently been in the spotlight. PMP is a portable, next-generation multimedia player with complex functions such as music playback, broadcast reception, games, electronic dictionary, video playback, and digital camera such as MP3.

The best embodiments have been disclosed in the drawings and specification above. Although specific terms have been used herein, they are used only for the purpose of describing the present invention and are not used to limit the scope of the present invention as defined in the meaning or claims. Therefore, those skilled in the art will understand that various modifications and equivalent other embodiments are possible from this. Therefore, the true technical protection scope of the present invention will be defined by the technical spirit of the appended claims.

As described above, the digital image processing apparatus of the present invention improves the visibility of the user by adjusting the brightness of the display according to the ambient brightness input through the image pickup device.

The invention is not limited to the examples described above and represented in the drawings. Those skilled in the art taught by the above-described embodiments, many modifications to the above-described embodiments are possible by substitution, erasure, merging, etc. within the scope and object of the present invention described in the following claims.

Claims (4)

A light receiving surface for receiving light through each color filter mosaic for each pixel sensor regularly arranged in a two-dimensional area of a predetermined size, and an electronic circuit for outputting light incident on the pixel sensors as a photoelectrically converted electrical image signal. An imaging unit provided; A control unit for dividing the electrical image signal output through the color filter mosaic into an RGB signal, inspecting the ambient brightness Y from the RGB signal, and adjusting and outputting a display brightness signal according to the inspection result; And And a display unit for displaying an image according to the adjusted brightness signal. delete The method of claim 1, The imaging unit includes an RGB (Red, Green, Blue) color filter mosaic and outputs R (Red) signal, G (Green) signal, B (blue) signal as the photoelectrically converted electrical image signal, The control unit calculates the ambient brightness (Y)

Digital image processing apparatus characterized in that the calculation. Dividing an electrical image signal output from an image pickup device having a color filter mosaic into an RGB signal, and inspecting and digitizing an ambient brightness Y from the RGB signal; Classifying the digitized brightness into at least two grades; And And setting the display brightness differentially according to the grade.

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