System and method for recognizing visual indicia
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A method for identifying visual indicia on a surface comprising the steps of:
- capturing a visual image of a scope-of-view window containing the visual indicia as a digital image;
isolating the visual indicia on the digital image;
converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives;
said step of converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives comprising the steps of;
determining an intensity trough value for the digital image;
dividing the scope-of-view window into a predetermined number of token windows;
determining the number of qualified pixels having an intensity value above said trough value in each token window; and
comparing the number of qualified pixels in each token window to a predetermined threshold value and assigning a primitive value of "1" for each token window having more qualified pixels in the token window than a predetermined threshold value and assigning "0" for each token window having less qualified pixels than the predetermined threshold value; and
comparing the image primitives to a plurality of sets of grammar primitives each corresponding to known visual indicia to find the known visual indicia that is most similar to the visual indicia of the visual image.
3 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A method involves capturing visual indicia as a digital image, isolating the visual indicia on the digital image, converting the visual indicia to image primitives, identifying and presenting the visual indicia. An apparatus contains a camera for capturing a visual image, a video-to-digital converter, and a computer with a processor, appropriate memory, and software.
-
Citations
9 Claims
-
1. A method for identifying visual indicia on a surface comprising the steps of:
-
capturing a visual image of a scope-of-view window containing the visual indicia as a digital image; isolating the visual indicia on the digital image; converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives; said step of converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives comprising the steps of; determining an intensity trough value for the digital image; dividing the scope-of-view window into a predetermined number of token windows; determining the number of qualified pixels having an intensity value above said trough value in each token window; and comparing the number of qualified pixels in each token window to a predetermined threshold value and assigning a primitive value of "1" for each token window having more qualified pixels in the token window than a predetermined threshold value and assigning "0" for each token window having less qualified pixels than the predetermined threshold value; and comparing the image primitives to a plurality of sets of grammar primitives each corresponding to known visual indicia to find the known visual indicia that is most similar to the visual indicia of the visual image. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
-
-
6. A method for identifying visual indicia on a surface comprising the steps of:
-
capturing a visual image of a scope-of-view window containing the visual indicia as a digital image; isolating the visual indicia on the digital image; converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives; said step of converting the isolated visual indicia on the digital image to image primitives comprises the steps of; determining an intensity trough value for the digital image; performing a skew adjustment; dividing the scope-of-view window into a predetermined number of token windows; determining the number of qualified pixels having an intensity value above said trough value in each token window; and comparing the number of qualified pixels in each token window to a predetermined threshold value and assigning a primitive value of "1" for each token window having more qualified pixels in the token window than the predetermined threshold value and assigning "0" for each token window having less qualified pixels than the predetermined threshold value; and comparing the image primitives to a plurality of sets of grammar primitives each corresponding to known visual indicia to find the known visual indicia that is most similar to the visual indicia of the visual image.
-
-
7. A method of identifying visual characters against a noisy background on a a surface comprising the steps of:
-
capturing a video image of a scope-of-view window containing the characters; converting the video image to a digital image by using a video-to-digital converter; isolating the visual characters on the digital image; converting the visual characters to image primitives comprising the steps of; determining an intensity trough value for the digital image; dividing each visual character into a predetermined number of token windows; determining the number of qualified pixels having an intensity value above said trough value in each token window; and comparing the number of qualified pixels in each token window to a predetermined threshold value and assigning a primitive value of "1" for each token window having more qualified pixels in the token window than the predetermined threshold value and assigning "0" for each token window having less qualified pixels than the predetermined threshold value; and comparing the image primitives for each character to a plurality of sets of grammar primitives in a grammar database containing known characters to determine the known character whose grammar primitives are least different from the image primitives of each character; and identifying each visual character with the known character whose grammar primitives were least different from the image primitives. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9)
-
Specification