Image reading apparatus

• US 20040179734A1
• Filed: 03/04/2004
• Published: 09/16/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 03/14/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: PFU Limited (Fujitsu Limited)
• Original Assignee: PFU Limited (Fujitsu Limited)
• Inventors: Okubo, Nobuyuki
• Granted Patent: US 7,327,881 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/182
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/2445 Alphabet recognition, e.g. Latin, Kanji or Katakana

Abstract

A labeling process unit groups a continuous black pixel area as one group in the binary image data read by an image input device, and extracts the group bounding rectangle information about the group. A row extracting process unit extracts row rectangle information from the position information about the extracted group bounding rectangle. An overlap integrating process unit determines the overlap between the group bounding rectangles contained in the extracted row rectangle, and performs an overlap integrating process of integrating overlapping groups into one group. The ratio of the number of group bounding rectangles contained in the row rectangle before performing the overlap integrating process to the number of the group bounding rectangles contained in the row rectangle after performing the overlap integrating process is obtained, and the language of the characters written in the original is determined based on the difference in ratio.

Claims

1. An image reading apparatus for reading an image which contains character information, the apparatus comprising:

labeling process unit to group a continuous black pixel area forming characters contained in a read black and white monochrome image of two gray levels, and extracting group bounding rectangle information about a grouped continuous black pixel area;

overlap integrating process unit to determine overlap between grouped group bounding rectangles, and integrating overlapping group bounding rectangles; and

language determining process unit to obtain a ratio of the number of group bounding rectangles integrated in an overlap integrating process to the number of group bounding rectangles before the overlap integrating process, and determining a language from a characteristic of the overlap integration ratio.

2. The image reading apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising:

row extracting process unit to extract row rectangle information from position information about a group bounding rectangle of the continuous black pixel area extracted and grouped by the labeling process unit when a document includes graphics and pictures,

wherein the overlap integrating process and the language determining process are performed on a group bounding rectangle contained in a row rectangle extracted by the row extracting process unit.

3. The image reading apparatus according to claim 2, further comprising:

binarizing process unit to binarize multi-valued image data when an image read by an image input device is multi-valued image such as a color image, a multilevel gray scale image, etc.

4. The image reading apparatus according to claim 3, further comprising:

statistical determination process unit to perform a language determining process of determining a language from the overlap integration ratio on a plurality of rows contained in an original, and determining in a statistical process a language determined as a language of characters contained in most rows as a language of characters contained in the original.

5. The image reading apparatus according to claim 2, further comprising:

statistical determination process unit to perform a language determining process of determining a language from the overlap integration ratio on a plurality of rows contained in an original, and determining in a statistical process a language determined as a language of characters contained in most rows as a language of characters contained in the original.

6. The image reading apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising:

binarizing process unit to binarize multi-valued image data when an image read by an image input device is multi-valued image such as a color image, a multilevel gray scale image, etc.

7. The image reading apparatus according to claim 6, further comprising:

statistical determination process unit to perform a language determining process of determining a language from the overlap integration ratio on a plurality of rows contained in an original, and determining in a statistical process a language determined as a language of characters contained in most rows as a language of characters contained in the original.