Assembling multiple medical images into a single film image

• US 20080118141A1
• Filed: 11/14/2007
• Published: 05/22/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Codonics Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Codonics Incorporated
• Inventors: Audino, Jeremy, Sommer, Erica, Harley, Christopher
• Granted Patent: US 8,565,552 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/132
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30004 Biomedical image processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 3/4038 Image mosaicing, e.g. composing plane images from plane sub-images

Abstract

A printer receives a plurality of image sections and corresponding image headers from the host as an image concatenation command. The plurality of image sections store the plurality of image sections in a print queue. The printer creates a virtual canvas representing a full image size. The printer determines how many lines of uniform data are present in a top border and a bottom border of the plurality of image sections. A variable formatting module of the printer crops a bottom border of a first image section to create a cropped first image section and a top border of a last image section to create a cropped last image section. The variable formatting module creates a first image frame in the virtual canvas corresponding to the first image section minus the bottom border and a last image frame corresponding to the last image section minus the top border.

Claims

1. A method of image concatenation, comprising:

receiving an image concatenation command from a host device to instruct the printer to receive a plurality of image sections;

receiving the plurality of image sections and corresponding image headers from the host associated with the image concatenation command and storing the plurality of image sections in a print queue;

creating a virtual canvas representing a full image size after receiving the image concatenation command; and

determining how many lines of uniform data are present in at a top section and a bottom section of the plurality of image sections which identifies a top border and a bottom border for each of the plurality of image sections.

2. The method of claim 1, further including cropping a bottom border of a first image section to create a cropped first image section and a top border of a last image section to create a cropped last image section.

3. The method of claim 1, further including creating a first image frame in the virtual canvas corresponding to the first image section minus the bottom border and a last image frame corresponding to the last image section minus the top border.

4. The method of claim 3, further including:

placing the first image section into first image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the first image section and eliminates the bottom border, and

placing the last image section into the last image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the last image section and eliminates the top border of the last image section.

5. The method of claim 4, further including printing a concatenated image which represents the virtual canvas including the first image frame and the last image frame.

6. The method of claim 2, further including

creating a first image frame in the virtual canvas corresponding to the first image section minus the bottom border, a second image frame in the virtual canvas corresponding to the second image section minus a top border and a bottom border, and a last image frame corresponding to the last image section minus the top border.

7. The method of claim 6, further including

placing the first image section into the first image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the first image section and eliminates the bottom border,

placing the second image section into the second image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the second image section and eliminates the top border and bottom border of the second image section;

and

placing the last image section into the last image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the last image section and eliminates the top border of the last image section.

8. The method of claim 7, further including printing a concatenated image which represents the virtual canvas including at least the first image frame, the second image frame and the last image frame.

9. An imaging printer, comprising:

a print controller to receive image sections and corresponding headers representing a total concatenated image to be printed;

a print queue manager to store the image sections and corresponding headers until all of the image sections are received; and

a multi-variable format module to determine a number of uniform lines that are present at a top section and a bottom section of each of the image sections in order to identify a top border and a bottom border of each of the image sections.

10. The imaging printer of claim 9, wherein the multi-format module generates a virtual canvas and creates an image frame for each of the image sections, the first image frame for the first image section having a size equal to the first image section minus a bottom border and the last image frame for the last image section having a size equal to the last image section minus the top border.

11. The imaging printer of claim 10, wherein the multi-format module places the first image section in the first image frame which effectively crops out the bottom border of the first image section to create a first cropped image section and places the last image section in the last image frame which effectively crops out the top border of the last image section to create a last cropped image section.

12. The imaging printer of claim 11, wherein the multi-format module issues a print command which results in a concatenated image representative of the virtual canvas being printed onto long media.

13. The imaging printer of claim 9, wherein the multi-format module generates a virtual canvas and creates an image frame for each of the image sections, a first image frame for the first image piece having a size equal to the first image section minus a bottom border, a second image frame having a size equal to the second image section minus a top border and a bottom border, and a last image frame for the last image piece having a size equal to the last image section minus the top border.

14. The imaging printer of claim 13, wherein the multi-format module places the first image section in the first image frame which effectively crops out the bottom border of the first image section to create a first cropped image section, places the second image section in the second image frame which effectively crops out the top border and the bottom border of the second image section to create a second cropped image section, and places the last image section in the last image frame which effectively crops out the top border of the last image section to create a last cropped image section.

15. The imaging printer of claim 14, wherein the multi-format module issues a print command which results in a concatenated image representative of the virtual canvas being printed onto long media and the concatenated image includes at least the first cropped image section, the second cropped image section and the last cropped image section .

16. A program code storage device, comprising:

a computer-readable medium;

computer-readable program code, stored on the computer-readable medium, the computer-readable program code having instructions, which when executed cause a printer to;

receive a concatenation command from a host device to instruct the printer to receive a plurality of image sections;

receive the plurality of image sections and corresponding image headers from the host corresponding to the image concatenation command and storing the plurality of image sections in a print queue;

create a virtual canvas representing a full image size after receiving the image concatenation command; and

determine how many lines of uniform data are present in at a top section and a bottom section of each the plurality of image sections which identifies a top border and a bottom border for each of the plurality of image sections.

17. The program code storage device of claim 16, including instructions which when executed cause the printer to crop a bottom border of a first image section to create a cropped first image section and a top border of a last image section to create a cropped last image section.

18. The program code storage device of claim 16, including instructions which when executed cause the printer to create a first image frame in the virtual canvas corresponding to the first image section minus the bottom border and a last image frame corresponding to the last image section minus the top border.

19. The program code storage device of claim 18, including instructions which when executed cause the printer to:

place the first image section into first image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the first image section and eliminates the bottom border, and

place the last image section into the last image frame in the virtual canvas which effectively crops lines of uniform data from the last image section and eliminates the top border of the last image section.

20. The program code storage device of claim 19, including instructions which when executed cause the printer to print a concatenated image which represents the virtual canvas including the first image frame and the last image frame.