KR20150083164A - Method for recognizing injection direction of postal matter - Google Patents

Abstract

Disclosed is a method for recognizing a postal matter image in a right direction. The method comprises: a step of obtaining a postal matter image by photographing a postal matter put through a postal matter input part; a step of extracting text characteristics including a corner point of a text, an edge direction of the text, a barcode, and a standardized postal matter mark from the obtained postal matter image using an image-based text recognition technology and recognizing the rotation direction of the postal matter image based on the extracted text characteristics; and a step of revising the postal matter image by rotating the postal matter image in the recognized rotation direction as a standard direction which a follow-up system performing the follow-up procedure of a device can recognize.

Description

[0001] METHOD FOR RECOGNIZING INJECTION DIRECTION OF POSTAL MATTER [0002]

The present invention relates to a method of recognizing a feeding direction of a mail, and more particularly, to a method of recognizing a feeding direction of a mail using a mail image.

At present, the Korea Friendship System introduces a letter sorting machine and a sequential sorting machine in the national postal concentration center and the delivering country, and automatically classifies the mail sorting work which was carried out in the past by hand. This sorting machine and the automatic sorting machine are equipped with automatic sorting processing. The automatic sorting processor recognizes the address string written in the mail and classifies the mail into the division box corresponding to the recognized result. The introduction of such a device significantly reduced manpower and time costs and efficiency of work compared to the past when manual processing of all processes was performed. However, it takes a relatively long time and manpower to align the mail in the right direction in the process of inputting the mail into the automatic classification processor.

Currently, the automatic division processor used by the post office recognizes the postal images of the mail and obtains the address information and the information necessary for automatic identification. At this time, the recognition unit that recognizes the address information by inputting the postal image is in a state in which recognition can not be performed unless the direction and conditions of the postal image are matched. For this reason, if the input direction of the mail item is different from the requirement of the recognition unit in the automatic division processor, it is dismissed, the mail item is manually processed, or the user inputs the mail again. Also, if the unloading direction is different from the unmanned device, the mail item should be taken out from the input unit of the apparatus, and the mail item should be adjusted again.

Recently, unmanned postal mail boxes and postal mail receivers have been under study and plans to install and operate the devices in the future. When the customer puts the mail into the device, if the input direction is not suitable for the recognition system, the input section is opened with the voice message "Please put the mail again" and the customer needs to turn the mail again There is. Also, in the automatic vending machine, the postal matter is automatically inputted through the robot arm or the automatic inlet device. Therefore, in order to automatically recognize the address information attached or written to the postal matter, it is necessary to recognize the direction of the postal matter.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method of recognizing a feeding direction of postal matter.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of recognizing an input direction of a postal matter, comprising the steps of capturing a postal matter input through a postal matter input unit and obtaining an image of the postal matter, Extracting a text feature including at least one of a point, an edge direction of the text, a bar code, and a standardized display feature of a mail item using an image-based text recognition technique, and determining a rotation direction of the mail image based on the extracted text feature And correcting the mail image by rotating the recognized rotation direction in a reference direction recognizable by a subsequent system performing a subsequent procedure of the apparatus.

According to another aspect of the present invention,

According to the present invention, it is possible to recognize the direction of a postal matter without manual operation for aligning the input direction of the postal matter before inputting the postal matter into the automatic sorting processor using the postal image, and automatically rotate the image direction so as to be suitable for the character recognition system , An automatic mail processor such as an unmanned postal machine or a parcel separator, and the like.

1 is a block diagram schematically showing an internal configuration of a system for recognizing a feeding direction of a postal matter according to an embodiment of the present invention.
FIGS. 2 to 5 are diagrams for explaining a process of recognizing a rotation direction of a mail image according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a method of recognizing a feeding direction of mail according to an embodiment of the present invention.

In the present invention, an apparatus capable of recognizing the feeding direction of mail items for automatic processing of mail items is proposed. This method does not require manual sorting of the mail in the same direction when the mail is input to the letter separator or the line separator, and it is not necessary to re-take out the wrong mail with the wrong direction input from the unmanned postal apparatus.

According to the present invention, even when confirming the information of the postal matter, the image of the postal matter in the correct direction can be checked regardless of the direction of the input. The method of recognizing the input direction of such mail can be usefully applied to an automatic sorting apparatus for a large amount of mail such as a letter separator and a sequential separator, and can be usefully applied to an unmanned mail apparatus for user convenience. It can also be applied to applications that correctly recognize the shipping information attached to the parcel separator.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will be more apparent from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which: FIG.

Image-based text recognition technology

There are various image-based text recognition techniques. For example, an OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technique can be applied to image information to acquire image-based text from image information. Here, the OCR technique is a technique for extracting character information from optical information. Various techniques such as pattern matching, structure analysis, feature matching, and stroke analysis can be applied for this purpose. Among them, pattern recognizing method is a technique of automatically recognizing printed or handwritten characters as a pattern recognition area and converting them into codes that can be understood by a computer, so that the input operation of the computer can be performed directly without using the keyboard. A device for general text recognition consists of a photoelectric conversion device, a recognition processing device, a storage device, and an output device. The photoelectric conversion device converts the characters on the ground to a voltage waveform, and the storage device stores an operation control program for controlling the recognition processing device and data expressing the recognized shape in a specific form. In addition, as an image-based text recognition technology, each pixel value of a postal image may be analyzed to extract a feature vector corresponding to the text, and the extracted feature vector may be compared with a previously registered feature vector to recognize the text .

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the preferred embodiments of the present invention with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, the present invention can be implemented in various different forms, and is not limited to the embodiments described. In order to clearly describe the present invention, parts that are not related to the description are omitted, and the same reference numerals in the drawings denote the same members.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS In the entire specification, when a section includes a constituent element, it does not exclude other constituent elements, but may include other constituent elements, unless specifically stated otherwise. Also, terms such as ... part, ..., module, block, etc., described in the specification mean a unit for processing at least one function or operation, which can be implemented by hardware or software or a combination of hardware and software have.

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

1 is a block diagram schematically showing an internal configuration of a system for recognizing a feeding direction of a postal matter according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 1, a system 300 for recognizing a feeding direction of mail according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a mail input direction recognizing apparatus 100 and an automatic sorting apparatus 200.

The apparatus 100 is configured to correct the mail image so that the mail image can be recognized in the correct direction irrespective of the direction in which the mail image is obtained. In order to do this, the image obtaining unit 110, A recognition unit 130 and a direction correction unit 150. [

The image acquiring unit 110 acquires an image of a mail item for the mail item 10 input through the mail item input port, and photographs the mail item based on a line scanner method or a charge-coupled device (CCD) method. Here, the mail input port is a portion in which the mail is sucked before the mail is conveyed through the belt in the letter sorter or the forward sorter, and the mail is inputted to the automatic sorting apparatus 200 one by one. Unmanned mailboxes, It means the inlet to put one by one.

Based on the image-based text recognition technique described above, the direction recognizing unit 130 extracts the characteristics of the text included in the mail image and extracts the mail using the feature of the extracted text, 200 in a direction different from a direction recognizable by the user. The direction recognizing unit 130 may output the recognized result as a numerical value of at least one of a direction value indicating a rotation direction and an angle value indicating a degree of rotation. Here, the feature of the text to be recognized in the present invention may be at least one of a corner point of text written in a mail, an edge direction of text, a bar code, and a standardized display feature that can be searched at fixed positions of mail items. Accordingly, the text to be recognized in the present invention is not limited to letters or numbers, but may be a comprehensive concept including all kinds of visual information that can give a specific meaning to a mail item as symbols, codes, or combinations thereof. .

The direction correcting unit 150 receives the result recognized by the image direction recognizing unit 130 and when the postal matter is rotated in a direction different from a direction recognizable by the automatic classification processing apparatus 200, The mail item is rotated in a direction opposite to the other direction so that the mail item can be recognized by the automatic sorting apparatus 200. For this, the direction correcting unit 150 rotates and corrects the postal image based on the direction value and the angle value recognized by the direction recognizing unit 130, and outputs the corrected postal image to the automatic classification processing apparatus ( 200). For example, the direction correcting unit 150 calculates a difference between a direction value input from the image direction recognizing unit 130 and a reference direction value that can be recognized by the automatic classification processing apparatus 200, If the value is negative, the mail image is rotated counterclockwise if the value is positive in the clockwise direction. In this case, the rotation angle may be determined according to a difference between an angle value input from the image direction recognition unit 130 and a reference angle value recognizable by the automatic classification processing apparatus 200.

As described above, the postal matter image corrected by the postal matter feeding direction recognizing apparatus 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention recognizes the direction of the postal matter image even when the postal matter is rotated and rotates, Due to the failure of reading the mail image of the automatic optical reader, it is possible to eliminate the inconvenience of manually adjusting the direction again and inputting it again.

Meanwhile, since the automatic classification processing apparatus 200 is not a major technical feature of the present invention, it is unnecessary to obscure the gist of the present invention and a detailed description thereof will be omitted. However, the automatic classification processing apparatus 200 is an electromechanical device that classifies mail items having the same destination address to which mail is sent, recognizes the information of mail items and classifies them into predetermined division boxes, And automatically registers it in the reception database and the reception process of the mail.

FIGS. 2 to 5 are views for explaining a process of recognizing a rotation direction of a mail image according to an embodiment of the present invention.

In one embodiment of the present invention, four text features are largely used to recognize the rotation of the mail image from the text features extracted from the mail image.

The first text feature used to recognize the rotation of the mail image is a feature associated with the corner point of the text appearing in the mail image. Here, the corner point can be defined as the pixel coordinates constituting the corner area of the character. For example, the letter "two letters " described in the mail image of Fig. 2 is divided into a consonant consisting of 'o' and 'c' and a vowel composed of 'ㅑ' and 'ㅐ'. The corner point of the consonant 'o' may be defined as the pixel coordinates of the edge of the rectangular area, assuming rectangular areas 24A and 24B surrounding the consonant 'o'. In FIG. 2, pixel coordinate pairs appearing on the four sides of the edge are shown. On the other hand, in the vowels 'ㅑ' and 'ㅐ', the corner point can be defined as the pixel coordinates of the portion where the stroke of the straight line is bent. That is, as shown in the case of the vowels 'ㅑ' and 'ㅐ', two pairs of pixel coordinates can be defined as corner points. On the other hand, if the consonant is represented by a straight line like 'c', the pixel coordinates of the bent portion may be defined as a corner point, as in the case of the vowel. Thus, when a corner point is detected in the text written in the mail, the upper part 22 and the lower part 24 of the mail item are recognized based on the detected position and frequency of the corner point, and the rotation of the mail image is recognized. For example, as shown in FIG. 2, when corner points are detected in the text, corner points are detected on the upper right corner points and corner points are detected on the lower edge (caller area).

The second text feature, which is used to recognize the rotation of the mail image, is the histogram feature associated with the edge orientation that appears in the mail image. Specifically, edge direction information of a text such as a character is used. For example, if edge directionality of a Chinese character such as FIG. 3A is analyzed by using an image-based text recognition technology, And the graphs of the oblique lines can be expressed in a visualized graph as shown in FIG. 3 (B). From the edge direction information, it is possible to determine the rotation direction and the rotation angle of the postal image.

The third text feature, which is used to recognize the rotation of the mail image, is a feature associated with the bar code that appears in the mail image. By using the image-based text recognition technology, the direction of rotation of the postal image can be detected by extracting the area of the barcode 42 as shown in FIG. Since the standard for printing barcodes by country is slightly different, it is usually printed on the lower side, so that the direction and rotation degree of the mail image can be determined to the position where the barcode is printed.

The fourth text feature used to recognize the rotation of the mail image is a feature associated with the standardized display information that can be searched at a fixed location of the mail. For example, as shown in FIG. 5, a text feature such as a box, a circle, or the like can be detected at a fixed position in the postal code entry box 51, the postage stamp area 53, It is possible to recognize whether the mail image is rotated or not.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a method of recognizing a feeding direction of mail according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Referring to FIG. 6, in step S610, a process of acquiring an image of a mail item taken through a mail input port by a CCD or a line scanner method is performed.

In S620, when the mail image is acquired, the process of extracting the text features described in Figs. 2 to 5 and recognizing the rotation direction of the mail image based on the extracted text feature is performed. Here, the extracted text features include at least one of a corner point of the text, an edge direction of the text, a barcode, and a standardized display feature that can be searched at a fixed position of the mail item.

In step S630, the postal matter image is corrected by rotating the postal matter image at a predetermined angle in the clockwise direction or the counterclockwise direction so as to be recognized by the automatic sorting processor based on the recognized result, for example, the rotation direction and the rotation angle.

Thereafter, in step S640, the corrected postal matter image is transmitted to a succeeding system such as an automatic sorting processor, and a subsequent process corresponding to the corrected postal matter image is performed in the succeeding system.

As described above, the smart energy management apparatus and method for controlling power consumption according to the present invention are not limited to the configuration and method of the embodiments described above, but the embodiments can be modified variously All or some of the embodiments may be selectively combined.

Claims (1)

A method of correcting a postal matter image so as to recognize a postal matter image in a correct direction irrespective of an insertion direction of a postal matter image obtained when a mail item is inserted,
Capturing an input mail through the mail input unit and obtaining an image of the mail;
Extracting a text feature including at least one of a corner point of the text, an edge direction of the text, a bar code, and a standardized display characteristic of the mail item in the obtained mail image using an image-based text recognition technique, Recognizing a rotation direction of the mail image based on the rotation direction of the mail image; And
A step of correcting the mail image by rotating the recognized rotation direction in a reference direction recognizable by a subsequent system performing a subsequent procedure of the apparatus
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