APPARATUS, AND ASSOCIATED METHOD, FOR FORMING PANORAMIC IMAGE

• US 20120268554A1
• Filed: 04/22/2011
• Published: 10/25/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2011
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Original Assignee: Research In Motion Limited (Blackberry Limited)
• Inventors: Hong, Sung Ho, Gilbert-Schachter, Cliel, Daigle, Joshua Lucien
• Application Number:
  US13/092,637
• Publication Number:
  US 20120268554A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 348/36
• CPC Class Codes: G03B 37/04 with cameras or projectors providing touching or overlapping fields of view
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/698 for achieving an enlarged field of view, e.g. panoramic image capture
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/2624 for obtaining an image which is composed of whole input images, e.g. splitscreen

Abstract

An apparatus, and an associated method, for forming a panoramic image at a camera. Motion indicia is obtained by one or more sensors. The motion indicia is utilized by a camera controller to cause a panoramic image creator to create a segmented, panoramic image using image frames that permit the creation of the panoramic image of the desired configuration.

Claims

1. An apparatus for facilitating formation at a camera of a panoramic image of a desired image configuration, said apparatus comprising:

a detector configured to detect selection of the desired image configuration; and

a controller configured to control the formation of the panoramic image of the desired configuration utilizing detected motion indicia related to the camera.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 further comprising a sensor configured to detect the motion indicia related to the camera.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein said sensor comprises an accelerometer.

4. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein said sensor comprises a magnetometer.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said controller is configured to determine a motion parameter responsive to a motion indicia indicative of detected motion of the camera.

6. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the motion indicia comprises an acceleration indication.

7. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the motion indicia further comprises a camera orientation.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said controller is configured to control formation of a segmented, panoramic image.

9. The apparatus of claim 8 wherein said controller is configured to cause blending together of a set of captured images to form a segmented, panoramic image with adjacent captured images of the set having overlapping fields of view.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 wherein the motion parameter determined by said controller is configured to associate information indicia with the captured images.

11. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said controller is configured to select when to capture image frames that form the panoramic image.

12. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said controller is configured to select positioning of the camera at which to capture image frames to form the panoramic image.

19. The method of claim 11 wherein the panoramic image comprises a segmented panoramic image.

20. The method of claim 19 wherein said controlling comprises controlling the panoramic image to cause blending together a set of captured image frames to form the segmented panoramic image with adjacent sensed images of the set having overlapping fields of view.

13. A method for facilitating formation, at a camera, of a panoramic image of a desired image configuration, said method comprising:

detecting selection of the desired image configuration; and

controlling the formation of the panoramic image of the desired configuration utilizing detect motion indicia related to the camera.

14. The method of claim 13 further comprising detecting the motion indicia related to the camera.

15. The method of claim 13 wherein said detecting the motion indicia comprises detecting the motion indicia with an accelerometer.

16. The method of claim 13 wherein said detecting the motion indicia comprises detecting the motion indicia with a magnetometer.

17. The method of claim 13 wherein the motion indicia comprises an acceleration indication.

18. The method of claim 13 wherein the motion indicia further comprises a camera orientation.