System with motion triggered processing
First Claim
1. A document image capture system, comprising:
- an input for receiving an image from a camera;
at least one image buffer for storing data representing an image frame;
a motion detector coupled to said at least one image buffer for processing said image to detect motion between frames of said image;
an image processor coupled to said at least one image buffer for processing an image therein to extract document information from the image; and
a control device responsive to the output from said motion detector for controlling said image processor to begin processing when said motion detector detects said image has become stationary after movement.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A document image capture (scanning) system and control method are described for scanning and processing document images received live from a camera. A motion detector detects image motion between two image frames. When the image is stationary, image processing (such as OCR) is carried out automatically and made available to the operator. In one form, when movement is detected, the image processing results are discarded until the image is newly stationary, whereupon new image processing is carried out on the new image. In another form, the degree of movement is evaluated; if the movement is small, then at least some of the previous image processing results are re-used by re-mapping on to the new image.
32 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A document image capture system, comprising:
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an input for receiving an image from a camera;
at least one image buffer for storing data representing an image frame;
a motion detector coupled to said at least one image buffer for processing said image to detect motion between frames of said image;
an image processor coupled to said at least one image buffer for processing an image therein to extract document information from the image; and
a control device responsive to the output from said motion detector for controlling said image processor to begin processing when said motion detector detects said image has become stationary after movement. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
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9. A method for automatically controlling a document image capture system that communicates with a camera that produces a sequence of live images, said method comprising:
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defining a live operating mode and a frozen operating mode;
transitioning from the live operating mode to the frozen operating mode once an image from said sequential frames is frozen;
processing the frozen image while in the frozen mode in accordance with a selected image processing operation; and
concurrently while in the frozen mode, monitoring a current live image from the sequence of live images to detect motion in the frozen image;
wherein processing results from the selected image processing operation are made available for further use when processing completes and a transition between the frozen mode to the live operating mode has not taken place;
the frozen operating mode transitioning to the live operating mode once motion between the frozen image and the current live image is detected. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. A method for automatically controlling a document image capture system that communicates with a camera providing a sequence of images, said method comprising:
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performing first image analysis of a first image from the sequence of images to extract document information therefrom;
performing second image analysis of said first image and a second subsequent image to detect motion between said first image to said second subsequent image, and to detect a mapping correlation between said first image and said second subsequent image; and
mapping said extracted document information from said first image to said second subsequent image, to represent extracted document information corresponding to said second subsequent image;
wherein said second image analysis comprises determining whether said motion in said image from said first image to said second subsequent image exceeds a motion threshold, and mapping said extracted document information only if said motion does not exceed said motion threshold; and
wherein said first image analysis is performed on said second subsequent image if said motion exceeds said threshold. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20)
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Specification