Digital photographing apparatus and method using face recognition function

• US 8,786,760 B2
• Filed: 08/06/2008
• Issued: 07/22/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/30/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: Yu, Hyun-sik, Son, Sang-ryoon, Park, Byeong-chan
• Primary Examiner(s): DAGNEW, MEKONNEN D
• Application Number:
  US12/221,727
• Publication Number:
  US 20090059061A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,176 Days
• Field of Search: 348/347, 348/345, 382/107, 382/103, 382/118, 382/254
• US Class Current: 348/345
• CPC Class Codes: G03B 13/36 Autofocus systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/161 Detection; Localisation; Normalisation
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/61 based on recognised objects
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/611 where the recognised objects include parts of the human body
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/635 Region indicators; Field of view indicators
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/675 comprising setting of focusing regions

Abstract

A digital photographing apparatus and method using a face recognition function for obtaining an image in which a plurality of faces are focused by setting AF areas in the plurality of recognized faces and photographing the faces in a bracket mode based on the set AF areas. The digital photographing apparatus includes: a face recognition unit detecting face information from a real image; an AF region setting unit setting a plurality of AF areas based on the detected face information; and a control unit operating so that an image is captured by adjusting focuses of the set plurality of AF areas.

Claims

1. A digital photographing apparatus comprising:

an image sensing unit to sense an image of a scene;

a face recognition unit to detect a plurality of faces in the image of the scene;

an autofocus area setting unit to set a plurality of focus areas for the image of the scene, wherein the plurality of focus areas respectively corresponds to the plurality of faces detected in the image of the scene, and the plurality of focus areas comprises at least a first focus area and a second focus area; and

a control unit, in response to a single input of a shutter signal, to

automatically adjust focus for the first focus area and control the image sensing unit to automatically capture a first still image that corresponds to the first focus area, and

automatically adjust focus for the second focus area and control the image sensing unit to automatically capture a second still image that corresponds to the second focus area.

2. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 1, wherein the autofocus area setting unit is configured to set a same number of focus areas as a number of faces in the image.

3. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 1, further comprising:

a range finding unit to measure the distance between each face and the digital photographing apparatus, wherein

assigning the plurality of faces to focus groups based on their distances from the digital photographing apparatus.

4. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 1, wherein the image comprises a live image.

5. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 1 wherein the image comprises a still image.

6. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 4, further comprising:

a range finding unit to measure a distance between each of the plurality of faces and the digital photographing apparatus.

7. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 6, wherein the control unit is configured to adjust the focus of each focus area based on the distance measured by the range finding unit.

8. The digital photographing apparatus as claimed in claim 1 further comprising a display unit to display the image of the scene and the plurality of focus areas on the image displayed on a display screen of the display unit, wherein the plurality of still images collectively cover the scene including the plurality of focus areas, and wherein each of the plurality of still images contains at least a part of a respective focus area of the plurality of focus areas.

9. A digital photographing apparatus comprising:

a face recognition unit to detect face information in an image, the face information corresponding to a plurality of faces in the image;

an autofocus area setting unit to set a plurality of focus areas based on the face information, to assign at least two focus areas to a focus area group, and to set at least a first focus area group and a second focus area group; and

a control unit, in response to a single input of a shutter signal, to

automatically adjust focus for the first focus area group and automatically capture a first still image that corresponds to the first focus area group, and

automatically adjust focus for the second focus area group and automatically capture a second still image that corresponds to the second focus area group.

10. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 9, wherein each face has eyebrows and each focus area includes faces with similar distances between the eyebrows.

11. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 10, further comprising:

a range finding unit to measure a distance between exactly one face in the focus area group and the digital photographing apparatus.

12. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 9, further comprising:

a range finding unit to measure a distance between a face in the focus area group and the digital photographing apparatus, wherein

the control unit is configured to adjust the focus of the focus area group based on the distance measured by the range finding unit.

13. The digital photographing apparatus of claim 9, wherein focus areas including faces at similar distances from the digital photographing apparatus are assigned to a same focus area group.

14. A method of operating a digital photographing apparatus comprising:

detecting face information corresponding to a plurality of faces in an image;

setting a plurality of focus areas based on the detected face information, wherein the plurality of focus areas comprises at least a first focus area and a second focus area;

in response to a single input of a shutter signal;

automatically adjusting focus for the first focus area and automatically capturing a first still image that corresponds to the first focus area; and

automatically adjusting focus for the second focus are and automatically capturing a second still image that corresponds to the second focus area.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein each face has eyebrows and focus areas including faces having similar distances between the eyebrows are grouped together.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein focus areas including faces at similar distances from the digital photographing apparatus are grouped together.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein each focus area includes exactly one face.

18. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed, cause a processor to at least carry out the method of claim 14.

19. A method of operating a digital photographing apparatus comprising:

detecting face information in a live image, the face information corresponding to a plurality of human faces;

setting a plurality of focus areas based on the face information and assigning each focus area to a focus area group;

setting at least a first focus area group and a second focus area group;

in response to a single input of a shutter signal;

automatically adjusting focus for the first focus area group and automatically capturing a first still image that corresponds to the first focus area group; and

automatically adjusting focus for the second focus area group and capturing a second still image that corresponds to the second focus area group.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein each face has eyebrows and focus areas including faces with similar distances between the eyebrows are assigned to the same focus area group.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the focus of each focus area group is adjusted based on a distance between a face in one of the focus areas in the focus area group and the digital photographing apparatus.