WO2011013625A1

WO2011013625A1 - Golf practicing device

Info

Publication number: WO2011013625A1
Application number: PCT/JP2010/062534
Authority: WO
Inventors: 裕司杉森; 元彦東口; 啓文荒木; 彩乃森山; 哲夫糟谷
Original assignee: 株式会社セガ
Priority date: 2009-07-30
Filing date: 2010-07-26
Publication date: 2011-02-03
Also published as: CN102470269A; CN102470269B; JP5515490B2; JP2011030669A

Abstract

A moving picture of a player when hitting a ball with a golf club is captured by a digital video camera (16) for the front side, and the moving picture is stored endlessly in a ring buffer (26) for the front side. The movement of the hit ball is detected by a Doppler sensor (14) and the ball speed is measured by a ball speed measuring unit (24b). A processing time taken to measure the ball speed is measured by a processing time measuring unit (24a) and a delay time after the occurrence of a trigger is calculated on the basis of the processing time, and thus the picture of the swing is extracted with reference to the picture at the time of the impact.

Description

Golf practice equipment

The present invention relates to a golf practice apparatus for practicing golf.

It is provided in a golf shop, a driving range, etc., and the player's swing image is determined based on the time when the ball is hit (impact) by detecting the hitting sound or detecting the behavior of the golf club using an optical sensor. Is known, and a golf swing recording / storing system for presenting it to a player is known (see Patent Document 1).

Also known are a Doppler sensor provided at a golf shop, a driving range, etc., for measuring a swing speed when a player swings a golf club, and a head speed measuring device using the Doppler sensor (see Patent Document 2).

JP 2003-088604 A JP 2009-109194 A

However, a conventional golf practice apparatus having a function of recording and storing a swing image needs to be equipped with a special device to determine the impact time, and the speed at which the ball hit by the golf club flies (ball Speed) and swing speed, additional equipment is required, and the equipment configuration has become large and complex.

An object of the present invention is to provide a golf practice device capable of extracting and displaying an image at the time of impact with a simple device configuration while performing ball speed measurement and swing image recording and storage. .

A golf practice apparatus according to an aspect of the present invention includes a photographing unit that photographs a moving image when a player hits a ball with a golf club, a storage unit that stores a moving image photographed by the photographing unit in an endless manner, and the storage A golf practice apparatus having a display means for displaying a moving image stored in the means; a ball speed measuring means for measuring the speed of a ball hit by the golf club; and the ball speed measuring means for measuring the speed of the ball. From the moving image stored in the storage means, based on the processing time timing means for timing the processing time spent to perform, the time when the ball speed measuring means was able to measure the speed of the ball and the processing time, A moving image extracting means for extracting an image at impact together with moving images for a predetermined time before and after the impact; The moving image and displaying by said display means.

In the golf practice apparatus according to one aspect of the present invention, it is preferable that the moving image extracting unit corrects the processing time according to the ball speed measured by the ball speed measuring unit.

In the golf practice apparatus according to one aspect of the present invention, the display unit projects an image on a screen provided in a direction in which a player hits a ball with a golf club, and the ball speed measuring unit is on the back side of the screen. It is preferable to have a Doppler sensor which is provided and the antenna faces at a position where the ball is hit.

As described above, according to the present invention, the ball speed measuring means for measuring the speed of the ball hit by the golf club, and the processing time for measuring the processing time spent by the ball speed measuring means for measuring the ball speed. Based on the time measuring means and the time when the ball speed measuring means can measure the speed of the ball and the processing time, the image at the time of impact is extracted from the moving image stored in the storage means together with the moving image of the predetermined time before and after the moving image. Moving image extraction means for displaying the moving image extracted by the moving image extraction means on the display means, so that it is easy to measure the ball speed and record and store the swing image. An image at impact can be extracted and displayed in the device configuration.

It is a figure which shows the external appearance of the golf practice apparatus by one Embodiment of this invention. 1 is a plan view, a side view, and a front view of a golf practice apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. 1 is a block diagram showing an electrical configuration of a golf practice apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is a flowchart of the swing image extraction process performed with the golf practice apparatus by one Embodiment of this invention.

Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. 1 and 2 are schematic views schematically showing an example of the overall configuration of a golf practice apparatus 10 according to the present invention. FIG. 1 is an external perspective view, FIG. 2A is a plan view, and FIG. ) Is a side view, and FIG. 2C is a front view.

First, an outline of a golf practice apparatus according to the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. The golf practice apparatus 10 according to the present invention simulates golf play using the actual golf shot detection data by the player 1, performs video shooting and playback display of the player's swing, and is used for the player's golf practice. is there.

In the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, when the player 1 uses the real ball 3 and the club 2 and shots the ball toward the golf course projected on the screen 11 in front of the user, The movement of the shot ball is detected by a sensor, which will be described later, and various data such as the ball flying speed and distance, the club head speed, etc. are measured. A virtual sphere) is simulated to fly, and their data and video are displayed on the screen 11.

The game room 20 in which the player 1 plays golf is partitioned by a net, a hard transparent panel, or a plate in the present example, and is formed in a rectangular parallelepiped shape. The floor surface of the game room 20 is a cushioning material that absorbs an impact. It consists of Further, the wall surface on both sides of the screen 11 and the wall surface on the door side are covered with a cushion material or a golf net 21 as shown in FIG. 2A in order to prevent the ball from bouncing off due to a miss shot or the like. Yes.

In the closed space of the game room 20, as shown in FIG. 2A, the player 1 standing in the vicinity of the shot position of the ball 3 in the game room 20 as well as the screen 11 as a device for the golf practice apparatus. A projector (display means) 15 for projecting an image of a viewed golf course or the like on the screen 11, a main housing 13 having a touch panel 12 for receiving operation input, and movement of the ball 3 shot by the player 1 are detected. The Doppler sensor 14 is disposed. Further, a front digital video camera (photographing means) 16 and a rear digital video camera (photographing means) 17 are arranged toward the player 1. These devices are electrically connected to each other by a cable (not shown). As a digital video camera, a camera equipped with an image sensor such as a CMOS or a CCD may be used as appropriate as long as the captured image can be converted into an electrical signal. Further, the combination is not limited to the front side and the rear side, and only one of them or a combination that captures an image of the player from the other direction may be combined.

A control unit that controls the operation of the entire golf practice apparatus, the execution of a golf simulation process, and the like is installed inside the main housing 13. Further, as an additional configuration, a coin processing unit including a coin identification device or the like for performing identification processing or counting processing of coins (coins or medals) inserted from the insertion slot in the casing of the operation box or another casing. It can be installed. In the game room 20, a speaker 18 for outputting a sound effect during play such as a sound when the player 1 shots the ball 3 is installed at a predetermined position in the room.

Next, the electrical configuration of the golf practice apparatus 10 of this embodiment will be described with reference to FIG. The golf practice apparatus 10 is used as a CPU 30 that executes programs, controls the entire system, calculates coordinates for image display, and the like, and a buffer memory that stores programs and data necessary for the CPU 30 to perform processing. A system memory (RAM) 32 is commonly connected by a bus line and is connected to a bus arbiter 34. The bus arbiter 34 controls the flow of programs and data with each block of the golf practice apparatus 10 and devices connected to the outside.

A program data storage medium (including an optical disk or optical disk drive for driving a CD-ROM or the like as a recording medium) 36 in which a play program and data (including video data and music data) are stored, and the golf practice apparatus 10 are activated A boot rom 38 in which a program and data for storing the data are stored is connected to the bus arbiter 34.

Further, a front ring buffer 26 for storing images captured by the front digital video camera 16 and a rear ring buffer 27 for storing images captured by the rear digital video camera 17 are connected to the bus arbiter 34. Yes.

In order to generate a display image such as a three-dimensional CG, polygon data (vertex data) having three-dimensional local coordinate data constituting an object to be displayed or NURBS (Non Uniform Rational B-Spline) in the system memory 32. Data (curved surface and control point data) is stored, and this is arranged in the world coordinate system of the three-dimensional virtual space by the CPU 30 and the geometry processor (not shown) to convert the local coordinates into the world coordinate system.

Furthermore, the viewpoint coordinates generated as the player operates or plays are set in the world coordinate system, and the object in the field of view as viewed from the viewpoint in the predetermined viewing direction and angle of view is set to the viewpoint coordinates as the origin. The coordinates of the converted object are transmitted to the rendering processor 40.

Video (MOVIE) data read from the program data storage medium 36, the front ring buffer 26, and the rear ring buffer 27 is reproduced via the bus arbiter 34, and an image is displayed according to the player's operation and play progress. Are connected to a rendering processor 40 that generates the image and a graphic memory 42 that stores graphic data and the like necessary for the rendering processor 40 to generate an image.

The rendering processor 40 first applies interpolation processing such as light source processing or texture data stored in the graphic memory 42 to the object to detail the surface of the object with respect to the coordinates of the object sent. Further, the rendering processor 40 projects an object (polygon) from a three-dimensional solid object onto a two-dimensional plane (screen) and converts it into two-dimensional coordinate data (screen coordinate system). A two-dimensional image is generated and output so as to display preferentially from polygons close to the viewpoint coordinates. The image signal output from the rendering processor 40 is converted from a digital signal to an analog signal by the video DAC 44 and projected onto the screen 11 by the projector 15.

Sound data read from the program data storage medium 36, the front ring buffer 26, and the rear ring buffer 27 are reproduced via the bus arbiter 34, and sound effects and sounds are generated in accordance with the operation and play progress by the player. The sound processor 46 is connected to a sound memory 48 for storing sound data and the like necessary for generating sound effects and sounds by the sound processor 46. The audio signal output from the sound processor 46 is converted from a digital signal to an analog signal by the audio DAC 50 and output from the speaker 18.

A communication interface 52 is connected to the bus arbiter 34. The communication interface 52 is connected to an external network such as a telephone line via a LAN adapter 54. If necessary, the golf practice device 10 is connected to the Internet via a LAN adapter 54, and can communicate with other information processing devices, network servers, and the like. As the communication interface 52 and the LAN adapter 54, a terminal adapter (TA) or router that uses a telephone line, a cable modem that uses a cable TV line, a mobile phone or a PHS, a wireless communication means, or an optical fiber is used. A communication method such as an optical fiber communication unit may be used as appropriate.

A peripheral I / F 60 is connected to the bus arbiter 34. Various peripheral devices can be connected via the peripheral I / F 60.

A peripheral digital video camera 16, a rear digital video camera 17, and an RF card reader / writer 16 are connected to the peripheral I / F 60.

The Doppler sensor 14 is further connected to the peripheral 1 / F 60 via the sensor control unit 24. The sensor control unit 24 includes a processing time timer (processing time timer) 24a and a ball speed measuring unit (ball speed measuring unit) 24b. The ball speed measuring unit 24 b measures the ball speed based on the detection signal of the Doppler sensor 14. The processing time timer 24a measures the processing time required for measuring the ball speed in the ball speed measuring unit 24b. Further, the head speed of the golf club, the trajectory of the ball, and the like are measured by each measurement unit (not shown), and the measured values are input to the CPU 30.

The touch panel 12 is connected to the peripheral 1 / F60, and the golf practice apparatus 10 is operated in accordance with the player's touch operation on the touch panel 12.

It should be noted that the hardware configuration of the golf practice apparatus 10 as described above is merely an example, and the present invention can be applied to any computer system that includes a display device. The program of the present invention is not only supplied to the computer system through an external storage medium such as a memory card, but may be supplied to the computer system through a wired or wireless communication line. May be recorded in advance in the sexual storage device.

Next, details such as the installation position and function of the Doppler sensor 14 in the golf practice apparatus 10 of this embodiment will be described.

In the present embodiment, the Doppler sensor 14 emits a microwave output from a dielectric oscillator from an antenna, reflects the movement of a person or an object from a frequency shift of the microwave reflected from the person or the object and incident on the antenna. It is a sensor to detect.

The Doppler sensor 14 is provided on the back side of the screen 11 provided in the direction in which the player hits the ball with the golf club, and the antenna is directed to the position where the ball is hit, and the golf club head speed, ball speed, ball It is used to measure various values such as flight distance and trajectory.

When the player hits the ball with the golf club, the movement of the head of the golf club and the movement of the hit ball are sampled by the Doppler sensor 14 in a predetermined cycle for a predetermined time as the respective position information and movement information. Each piece of information (data) is input to the sensor control unit 24.

The ball speed measuring unit 24b measures the hit ball speed based on the position information and motion information of the plurality of balls input to the sensor control unit 24. At this time, since each data is sampled at a constant cycle, the number of each data differs depending on the ball speed. That is, when the ball speed is high, the ball passes through the detection range of the Doppler sensor 14 in a short time, so the number of samples sampled in a fixed cycle is reduced. Conversely, when the ball speed is low, the ball is Since the detection range stays for a long time, the number of samples is increased. Further, since the ball speed measuring unit 24b calculates the ball speed based on each sampled data, the processing time required for the measurement increases when the number of each data is large, and conversely, the processing time required for the measurement decreases when the number is small. Less.

The processing time counter 24a measures the time taken for the sensor controller 24 to measure various values such as flight distance and trajectory in addition to the ball speed measuring unit 24b measuring the ball speed. The timed value is input to the CPU 30 and used when extracting the swing image, as will be described later.

When the golf practice apparatus 10 of the present embodiment is activated, the images captured by the front digital video camera 16 are sequentially stored in the front ring buffer 26, and the images captured by the rear digital video camera 17 are stored in the rear ring buffer 27. Stored sequentially.

When the image is captured by the front digital video camera 16, new images captured by the front digital video camera 16 are sequentially applied to the oldest captured image of the front ring buffer 26 when the new image is overwritten. The update is stored in the ring buffer 26, and the image captured by the front digital video camera 16 is stored endlessly for a preset period.

Similarly, when an image is captured by the rear digital video camera 17, a new captured image by the rear digital video camera 17 is overwritten on the oldest captured image in the rear ring buffer 27 when a new image is acquired. The back side ring buffer 27 is sequentially updated and stored, and images captured by the back side digital video camera 17 are stored endlessly for a preset period.

The setting of the period stored in the front ring buffer 26 and the rear ring buffer 27 is set so as to store, for example, a captured image of 4 seconds according to the storage capacity.

In response to the player hitting the ball, the CPU 30 generates a trigger signal for the front ring buffer 26 and the rear ring buffer 27 and stops storing new captured images in each ring buffer based on the trigger signal. A video image of the player's optimal batting play is extracted and played back for player practice. That is, the CPU 30 functions as a moving image extraction unit.

In this embodiment, after a trigger signal is generated, storage of a new captured image in each ring buffer is stopped after a predetermined time delay. This delay time is determined based on the processing time counted by the processing time counting unit 24a. In other words, the point in time when the ball is hit is the point of time that is back from the end of the captured image by the sum of the processing time and the delay time. Therefore, by setting the sum of the processing time and the delay time to be constant, for example, 1 second, it is possible to extract an image at a time point that goes back 1 second from the end of the captured image as an impact image.

In addition to the processing time, it has been clarified through experiments that the timing until the Doppler sensor 14 first detects the ball and the error in the processing time occur according to the ball speed. By correcting the processing time by multiplying the coefficient, it is possible to extract an impact image at a more accurate point of impact. In this case, the coefficient corresponding to the ball speed differs depending on the characteristics of the equipment in the configuration of the golf practice apparatus, and a value obtained through experiments or the like may be set as appropriate.

The outline of the swing image extraction process executed using the golf practice apparatus 10 of the present embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. Note that general processing such as power-on and application termination processing before and after the swing image extraction processing is omitted.

First, imaging by the front digital video camera 16 and the rear digital video camera 17 is started, and an image captured by the front digital video camera 16 is stored in the front ring buffer 26 and an image captured by the rear digital video camera 17 is captured. Storage is started in the rear ring buffer 26 (step S01).

When the captured image is stored in each ring buffer in an endless manner, when the player moves the ball by shooting the ball with the golf club, the Doppler sensor 14 detects the moving ball (step S02).

In response to the detection of the ball, the sensor control unit 24 starts measuring various values such as the ball speed, the head speed, the flight distance, the trajectory, the back spin and the side spin of the ball (step S03).

When the sensor control unit 24 starts measuring various values including the ball speed, the processing time counting unit 24a starts measuring the processing time Ts (step S04).

In the data processing, the ball speed measuring unit 24b measures the hit ball speed based on the position information and motion information of the plurality of balls input to the sensor control unit 24 (step S05). At this time, each data is data sampled at a predetermined cycle in a predetermined time, and the number of the data varies depending on the ball speed.

When all the sampled data is processed by each measuring unit including the ball speed measuring unit 24b, various values are calculated and the measurement ends (step S06).

In response to the completion of the data processing, the time counting by the processing time counting unit 24a ends, and the processing time Ts is determined. Then, the determined value of the processing time Ts is input to the CPU 30 (step S07).

The CPU 30 determines whether or not the input processing time Ts exceeds a preset threshold value Ta (step S08). The threshold value Ta serves as a reference for determining whether or not to correct the processing time according to the ball speed, which will be processed later, and is corrected when the processing time Ta is equal to or less than the threshold value Ta. First, correction is performed when the processing time Ta exceeds the threshold Ta. This is because, as the correction according to the ball speed differs depending on the characteristics of the equipment in the configuration of the golf practice apparatus, the threshold value Ta was obtained by an experiment or the like, if necessary resulting from the characteristics of the equipment. What is necessary is just to set a value suitably. Depending on the characteristics of the equipment, it may be necessary to correct the processing time according to the ball speed, or it may be necessary to make corrections. In such cases, determination based on the threshold Ta is unnecessary. become.

When the processing time Ts is equal to or less than the threshold value Ta, the CPU 30 calculates the delay time F as a constant B (step S09). In the present embodiment, the time (frame) in which one captured image (one frame) is stored is used as the unit of the delay time F. Further, the constant B may be set as appropriate by experiment or the like, similarly to the threshold value Ta. If correction of the processing time according to the ball speed is indispensable according to the characteristics of the device, the determination based on the threshold Ta is unnecessary and the processing in step S09 is also unnecessary.

When the processing time Ts exceeds the threshold Ta, the CPU 30 calculates the delay time F using the following equation (step S10).

F [frame] = 60−a × (Ts / 16 [msec])
Here, a is a coefficient determined according to the ball speed, and the processing time Ts is corrected by multiplying this coefficient. The coefficient a is a value based on the characteristics of the device, as with the threshold value Ta and the constant B, and may be set as appropriate through experiments or the like. Further, when the coefficient a is determined from the ball speed, it may be determined by an appropriate method such as calculating at any time or referring to a data table stored in an appropriate memory.

In the present embodiment, since a device that captures 60 frames per second is used, the

values

60 and 16 are used in the above formula for calculating the delay time F, but the present invention is not limited to this. For example, when a device that captures 30 frames per second is used, 30 may be used instead of 60, and 33 may be used instead of 16.

When the delay time F is determined, the CPU 30 generates a trigger signal (step S11).

The CPU 30 ends the update storage of new captured images in the front ring buffer 26 and the rear ring buffer 27 after the delay time F from the reference time with the trigger signal as the reference time (step S12).

The CPU 30 extracts the swing images for a total of 4 seconds stored in the front ring buffer 26 and the rear ring buffer 27 (step S13). At this time, since the delay time F after the trigger occurrence time is determined based on the processing time Ts as described above, the swing image of 3 seconds before and 1 second after is extracted based on the image at the time of impact. It will be. That is, an image at the time of impact can be extracted from the time series of the entire swing image. The swing image is reproduced and displayed on the screen 11 as a video image according to the operation of the player.

Since the swing image can be extracted based on the image at the time of impact, for example, the player's swing image and the image of the model swing by another person are arranged and reproduced and displayed so that the timing at the time of impact is matched. You can also.

Further, the present invention is not limited to the above embodiment, and various modifications can be made.

For example, in the above-described embodiment, a so-called arcade type golf practice device provided in a golf shop, a golf practice field, or the like has been described as an example, but a golf practice device using a home game device, a personal computer, a mobile phone, or the like. It can also be applied to.

Further, in the above embodiment, the present invention is applied to a golf practice device used for a player's golf practice when the player hits the ball with a club. However, in other sports, for example, baseball, the player practices a ball with a bat. Alternatively, the present invention may be applied to an apparatus for hitting practice in which a player hits a ball with a racket in tennis, and for hitting practice in which a player hits a ball with a racket in table tennis.

The present invention is useful for providing a golf practice device capable of extracting and displaying an image at the time of impact with a simple device configuration while performing ball speed measurement and swing image recording and storage. .

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 ... Golf practice apparatus 11 ... Screen 14 ... Doppler sensor 15 ... Projector (display means)
16. Digital video camera for front (photographing means)
17 ... Backside digital video camera (photographing means)
24 ... sensor control unit 24a ... processing time timer (processing time timer)
24b ... Ball speed measuring unit (ball speed measuring means)
26. Front ring buffer (storage means)
27 ... Ring buffer for storage (storage means)
30 ... CPU (moving image extracting means)
34 ... Bus arbiter 36 ... Program data storage medium

Claims

Photographing means for photographing a moving image when a player hits a ball with a golf club;
Storage means for storing a moving image photographed by the photographing means in an endless manner;
A golf practice apparatus comprising: display means for displaying a moving image stored in the storage means;
Ball speed measuring means for measuring the speed of a ball hit by the golf club;
A processing time measuring means for measuring the processing time spent by the ball speed measuring means to measure the speed of the ball;
Based on the time point when the ball speed measuring means can measure the speed of the ball and the processing time, an image at the time of impact is extracted from the moving images stored in the storage means together with moving images of a predetermined time before and after the moving image. A moving image extraction means;
A golf practice apparatus characterized in that the moving image extracted by the moving image extraction means is displayed by the display means.
The golf practice apparatus according to claim 1,
The golf practice apparatus, wherein the moving image extraction unit corrects the processing time in accordance with a ball speed measured by the ball speed measurement unit.
In the golf practice apparatus according to claim 1 or 2,
The display means projects an image on a screen provided in a direction in which a player hits a ball with a golf club,
The golf practice apparatus, wherein the ball speed measuring means includes a Doppler sensor provided on a back side of the screen and having an antenna facing a position where the ball is hit.