Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

Panasonic Corporation

Minoru Kawabata

Atsuhisa Kageyama

Masahiro Takeshima

Hiroko Sugimoto

When a certain period of time has elapsed since a direction retrieval unit received a control signal from an appliance controller, the direction retrieval unit instructs the microwave transmitter to transmit microwaves, and then instructs the microwave transmitter to perform scanning of the microwaves. When a notification signal receiver receives a notification signal from a remote controller, the direction retrieval unit instructs the microwave transmitter to stop the scanning of the microwaves. After this, the direction retrieval unit instructs a power controller to raise a power level of the microwaves. The direction retrieval unit determines whether or not the notification signal receiver receives from the notification signal transmitter of the remote controller at regular time intervals charging-in-progress signals indicating that charging is in progress and whether or not the notification signal receiver receives from the notification signal transmitter a charging-complete signal indicating that the charging is completed.

Communication system using directional control of electomagnetic wave power transmission

A false contour correcting apparatus is capable of removing a false contour in an image based on a digital image signal while avoiding such a side effect caused by false contour correction where noises negatively effecting the display occur on a screen. Therefore, in the false contour correcting apparatus according, a double bit change detection circuit detects as a double bit change a signal value change which is twice a minimum quantization unit in a digital image signal, and outputs a double bit change detection signal representing the position of the double bit change. A signal correction circuit corrects the double bit change in the digital image signal into two one-bit changes on the basis of the double bit change detection signal. Consequently, a false contour corresponding to a portion where the double bit change exists is removed.

False contour correcting apparatus and method

The tone of video signals is corrected without degrading the tone of certain image features, such as a human face. A gain controller operates and outputs an adjustment value using a histogram output produced by a histogram generator. An average value of picture levels on a screen is detected by an average picture level detector. A histogram correction circuit calculates a look-up table, and a video signal correction circuit corrects the tone of the video signals using the look-up table.

Image quality correction circuit for video signals

In a video signal character converting device, a sampling window signal generator generates a signal for sampling an input video signal &ldquo;a&rdquo;. A video scene amplitude discrimination circuit samples the video signal in response to the sampling signal, detects a change in image level either field by field or frame by frame based on an integrated value for every duration of vertical scanning, and outputs a resetting pulse when the change in picture level exceeds a predetermined level. A video scene periodicity discrimination circuit measures a time interval between two successive resetting pulses, and outputs a control signal if the time interval is shorter than a predetermined period. A video scene conversion circuit converts a video scene in response to the control signal. The video signal character detecting device of the present invention determines as to whether or not the input video signal has video images that present an adverse effect mentally and physically to viewers, by observing an image level and periodicity of the video signal in this manner. The device is thus able to output video images by converting them into a harmless level with a process of reducing contrast or blanking, if it determines the video images harmful.

Video signal character converting device and method of the same

A histogram generator creates a histogram to detect the characteristics of video signals. The histogram generator allows for a reduction in problems of instability caused by noise that may exist in other histogram generators. A width is allocated to thresholds used in creating the histogram, and signal values are counted after weighting those falling near a threshold.

Histogram generator

Aiming to improve color reproducibility of a red part having high color saturation, a gamma compensation apparatus of the present invention is composed of a bending point setting block,and a gamma compensation block,and bending point setting block,is composed of a high APL detection circuit,inputting an average picture level of an input luminance signal and for detecting and taking out a signal component higher than a designated level; a gain controller,for gain controlling the detected signal at the high APL picture detection circuit; and an adder,for adding a designated offset to the output of gain controller,, and gamma compensation block,is composed of a slice circuit,inputting a color difference signal (R-Y) and the output of bending point setting block,and taking out a color difference signal component higher than the output signal level of bending point setting block,; a gain controller,for adjusting the output level of slice circuit,; and a subtracter,for subtracting the output of gain controller,from the input color difference signal (R-Y) and outputting a gamma compensated color difference signal (R-Y)&prime;.

Gamma compensation apparatus

Red color saturation is increased and red color with higher purity can be reproduced by composing: a red color detection circuit 1 for detecting a red color signal having higher purity by inputting color differential signals (R-Y) and (B-Y) modulated by color subcarrier, subtracting the absolute value of the (B-Y) signal from the positive polarity component of the (R-Y) signal and removing the negative part of the subtracted signal; Y signal compensation block including: first gain controller 50b for controlling the output signal amplitude of red color detection circuit 1 and a subtracter 50a for subtracting the output signal of first gain controller 50b from a luminance signal Y; an (R-Y) signal compensation block including: second gain controller 51b for controlling the output signal amplitude of red color detection circuit 1 and an adder 51a for adding the output signal of second gain controller 51b and the input (R-Y) signal; and a (B-Y) signal compensation block including: third gain controller 52b for controlling the output signal amplitude of red color detection circuit 1, a polarity inverter 52c for inverting the output signal polarity of third gain controller 52b, a switch circuit 52d for selecting either input signal or output signal of polarity inverter 52c, a polarity discriminater 52e for discriminating the polarity of the input (B-Y) signal and controlling switch circuit 52d and an adder 52e for adding the output signal of switch circuit 52d and the input (B-Y) signal.

Pure red color detection circuit and color compensation circuit using

A histogram operating unit comprises: histogram generator which receives input video signals, and creates a histogram of input video signals, a first limiter for receiving a histogram generated by the histogram generator and an externally set first limit level, and restricting the frequency of the histogram created by the histogram generator to within a specified level, and outputting a restricted histogram, a first totaling circuit for calculating the number of samples of video signals produced by the first limiter, second totaling circuit for calculating the number of samples of the input video signals, a first subtractor for subtracting the output of the first totaling circuit from the output of the second totaling circuit, and a corrected histogram generator which receives the output of the first limiter and the output of the first subtractor, and creates the corrected histogram.

Histogram operating unit for video signals

A picture information detecting apparatus includes a picture area signal output circuit to detect a picture area excluding black band portions from the input video signal to produce a picture area signal to designate the picture area from which picture information is detected. Also included is a picture information detecting circuit for detecting picture information from the input video signal in the designated area. A picture quality compensating circuit is also provided for compensating the video input signal using the detected picture information to produce the gradation compensated video signal. An EDTV 2 discriminating circuit may also be included to determine if the video input signal is an EDTV 2 signal.

Picture information detecting apparatus for a video signal

A gradation compensating apparatus comprises a skin color detecting circuit for detecting a skin color signal from an inputted color difference signal, a compensation amount controlling circuit for controlling the signal level by the skin color detecting signal as a compensating signal, an APL detecting circuit for detecting an APL level from an inputted luminance signal and for outputting the detected APL level as an APL voltage, an APL controlling circuit for controlling the compensating signal level by the APL voltage, an output circuit for outputting a compensating output voltage by controlling the compensating signal with an inputted dc voltage, and a CRT driving circuit for controlling the brightness of the picture by using the compensating output voltage as a cutoff reference voltage.

Growing community of inventors

Takatsuki, Japan

Minoru Kawabata