Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd.

Other

Yasuhachi Hamamoto

Takashi Urano

Etsuko Sugimoto

Satoko Kobayashi

Hideo Kodama

Yukio Mori

Seiji Okada

Hiroaki Yoshida

Masahiro Yokohata

Satoru Takeuchi

Koichi Tsuchikane

Yasunori Tsuji

Yuki Asukabe

An image-taking apparatus generates an output image from a photographed image obtained by photographing and displays this output image on a display screen of a display section. The image-taking apparatus includes a recognition processing section for recognizing a specific subject (facial region of a person, or a facial component such as eyes) included in the photographed image. Referring to results of this recognition, the image-taking apparatus evaluates the dimension of the specific subject in each photographed image. If the dimension evaluated is relatively large, a relatively small magnification ratio to be employed upon the generation of the output image from the photographed image is provided. If the dimension evaluated is relatively small, a relatively large magnification ratio to be employed upon the generation of the output image from the photographed image is provided. As a result, the dimension of the specific subject in the output image is kept substantially constant.

Image-taking apparatus and output image generation method

An image processing apparatus includes an image processing circuit. The image processing circuit is configured by an image processing portion for performing an image process on a first image so as to generate a third image, an image composing portion for composing the first image and the third image, and an addition-ratio calculating portion for calculating a degree of composition of a composing process between the first image and the third image by the image composing portion based on a difference signal from a difference calculating portion.

Image processing apparatus and photographing apparatus

Based on, for example, the image at the start of a movie, a thumbnail image is tentatively generated and is stored in a header file. If a predetermined triggering condition is fulfilled during movie shooting, a thumbnail image is generated from the frame image at the timing that the triggering condition is fulfilled, and the thumbnail image existing in the header file is replaced with the newly generated thumbnail image. The triggering condition is fulfilled, for example, if, after zooming-in, the angle of view has been kept fixed for a predetermined period or longer, or if the focus has been kept locked for a predetermined period.

Thumbnail generating apparatus and image shooting apparatus

A noise reduction device comprises a first signal reading-out unit for reading out a video signal of a target pixel for which a noise reduction is performed; a second signal reading-out unit for reading out video signals of external peripheral pixels arranged around internal peripheral pixels arranged at positions closest to the target pixel, the external peripheral pixels being arranged at positions closest to the target pixel in radial directions from the target pixel and outputting the same color signals as the video signal of the target pixel; a selection controller for judging presence of a correlation between the video signal of the target pixel and a video signal of each of the external peripheral pixel based on a relation between a signal value of the video signal of the target pixel and a signal value of the video signal of each of the external peripheral pixels; a signal calculator for calculating the signal value of the video signal of the target pixel by use of the signal values of the video signals of the external peripheral pixels; and a selector for selecting the signal value of the video signal of the target pixel determined by the signal calculator when it is judged by the selection controller that the number of the video signals of the external peripheral pixels having correlations with the video signal of the target pixel is large.

Noise reduction device, noise reduction method and image capturing device

A method is disclosed, for encoding a signal with a three dimensional image sequence using a series of left and right images. Each image in the left image series is a picture formed by non-interlaced or interlaced scanned left line images, and each image in the right image series is a picture formed by non-interlaced or interlaced scanned right line images. The left line images contained in the left picture are merged with the right line images contained in the right picture to produce an alternately arranged left and right line merged picture. The merged picture is encoded using an MPEG-2 compliant encoder.

Three-dimensional image coding by merger of left and right images

A decoding start controller is capable of appropriately decoding pictures up to the final picture, even if the amount of the data stored in a bit-stream buffer is reduced, as a result of partial storage of the data in an internal local buffer. Further, the decoding start controller is capable of decoding extremely short bit-stream data. If completion information, which is sent from an input side of the bit-stream data and represents completion of input of the bit-stream data, is detected, a decoding start instruction signal is output to a variable-length decoder regardless of a value of VBV occupancy. In short, when the amount of the data stored in the bit-stream buffer connected to the decoder having the decoding start controller, is equal or greater than the value of VBV occupancy, the decoding start instruction signal will usually be sent to the variable-length decoder: namely, so-called decoding start control operation based on value of VBV occupancy. If the completion information is detected, the decoding start control operation based on the value of VBV occupancy is interrupted, and the decoding start instruction signal is output.

Decoding start controller, decoder, and decoding system

A method and apparatus for adaptively selecting a coding mode for video encoding systems using the techniques of predictive coding, interpolative coding, motion compensation, discrete cosine transformation (DCT), adaptive quantization, or variable length coding. In one system, a value related to an amount of total code, which is composed of current video code and its coding parameters for each of the above coding modes, is determined, respectively, and a coding mode corresponding to the smallest value is selected. Then, the encoding is performed using the selected coding mode.

Method and apparatus for adaptively selecting a coding mode for video

A motion vector detecting circuit and a motion video compressing system are disclosed. The detecting circuit detect a vector which direct from a spatial location of a current macroblock to a spatial location of a reference macroblock. The detecting circuit includes a first extracting circuit, a second extracting circuit and a searching circuit. The first extracting circuit extracts upper bits from each pixel data of the current macroblock. The second extracting circuit extracts upper bits from each pixel data of the reference frame. The searching circuit searches the upper-bits-extracted reference frame for a macroblock having the strongest correlation with the current macroblock by comparing the upper-bits-extracted current macroblock with the upper-bits-extracted reference frame and outputs the spatial location of the reference macroblock. The motion video compressing system includes the motion vector detecting circuit, a transform-coding circuit, a subtracter, a comparator and a controller. The transform-coding circuit codes inputted data into compressed. The subtracter calculates a difference between each pixel data of the current macroblock and each corresponding pixel data of the reference macroblock directed by the motion vector. The comparator compares an amount of data being obtained by the transform-coding the current macroblock with an amount of data being obtained by the transform-coding the differential macroblock. The controller controls the transform-coding circuit such that the transform-coding circuit outputs which of the compressed current macroblock and the compressed differential macroblock has a smaller amount of data.

Growing community of inventors

Kawaguchi, Japan

Yasuhachi Hamamoto