Camera unit incorporating program script scanner

• US 8,936,196 B2
• Filed: 12/11/2012
• Issued: 01/20/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 07/15/1997
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Silverbrook, Kia, Walmsley, Simon Robert
• Primary Examiner(s): Frech, Karl D
• Application Number:
  US13/711,385
• Publication Number:
  US 20130186953A1
• Time in Patent Office: 770 Days
• Field of Search: 235/375, 235/380, 235/382, 235/475, 235/472.01
• US Class Current: 235/478
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 11/0005 Curl smoothing, i.e. smoothing down corrugated printing material, e.g. by pressing means acting on wrinkled printing material
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/14427 Structure of ink jet print heads with thermal bend detached actuators
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1623 bonding and adhesion
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1626 etching
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1628 dry etching
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1629 wet etching
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1631 photolithography
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1632 machining
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1635 dividing the wafer into individual chips
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1637 molding
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1642 thin film formation by CVD [chemical vapor deposition]
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1645 thin film formation by spincoating
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1646 thin film formation by sputtering
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/1648 Production of print heads with thermal bend detached actuators
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/16585 for paper-width or non-reciprocating print heads
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/17513 Inner structure
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2/17596 Ink pumps, ink valves
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2002/041 Electromagnetic transducer
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2002/14491 Electrical connection
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 2202/21 Line printing
• CPC Class Codes: B82Y 30/00 : Nanotechnology for materials or surface science, e.g. nanocomposites
• CPC Class Codes: G03B 29/00 : Combinations of cameras, projectors or photographic printing apparatus with non-photographic non-optical apparatus, e.g. clocks or weapons; Cameras having the shape of other objects combinations with flash apparatus G03B15/03
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1626 : with a single-body enclosure integrating a flat display, e.g. Personal Digital Assistants [PDAs]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0866 : for peripheral storage systems, e.g. disk cache
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/79 : in semiconductor storage media, e.g. directly-addressable memories
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/86 : Secure or tamper-resistant housings
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/2022 : Flash memory
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2129 : Authenticate client device independently of the user
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 1/121 : by printing code marks applying code marks to labels B65C9/46; marking or coding completed packages B65B61/26
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 13/00 : Conveying record carriers from one station to another, e.g. from stack to punching mechanism conveying record carriers combined with another operation, e.g. with reading G06K17/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 19/00 : Record carriers for use with machines and with at least a part designed to carry digital markings
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 19/06 : characterised by the kind of the digital marking, e.g. shape, nature, code
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 19/06037 : multi-dimensional coding
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10 : by electromagnetic radiation, e.g. optical sensing; by corpuscular radiation
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10722 : Photodetector array or CCD scanning
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/14 : using light without selection of wavelength, e.g. sensing reflected white light G06K7/10831 - G06K7/1097 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/1417 : 2D bar codes
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/20 : Processor architectures; Processor configuration, e.g. pipelining
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 3/02 : Affine transformations for image registration G06T3/147; for image mosaicing G06T3/4038
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2310/0281 : Arrangement of scan or data electrode driver circuits at the periphery of a panel not inherent to a split matrix structure
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 11/56 : using storage elements with more than two stable states represented by steps, e.g. of voltage, current, phase, frequency
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00278 : with a printing apparatus, e.g. a laser beam printer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00355 : Mark-sheet input sensing record carriers G06K7/00; character recognition G06V30/10; document-oriented image-based pattern recognition G06V30/40
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/0044 : for image preview or review, e.g. to help the user position a sheet
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00968 : by scanning marks on a sheet mark-sheet input means H04N1/00355; sensing record carriers G06K7/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/2112 : using still video cameras
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/2154 : the still video camera incorporating a hardcopy reproducing device, e.g. a printer
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/2307 : Circuits or arrangements for the control thereof, e.g. using a programmed control device, according to a measured quantity H04N1/27, H04N1/29 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32122 : in a separate device, e.g. in a memory or on a display separate from image data
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32133 : on the same paper sheet, e.g. a facsimile page header
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2101/00 : Still video cameras
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/0008 : Connection or combination of a still picture apparatus with another apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/0084 : Digital still camera
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3222 : of processing required or performed, e.g. forwarding, urgent or confidential handling
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3242 : of processing required or performed, e.g. for reproduction or before recording H04N2201/3256 and subgroups take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3269 : of machine readable codes or marks, e.g. bar codes or glyphs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3276 : of a customised additional information profile, e.g. a profile specific to a user ID
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/328 : Processing of the additional information
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 23/00 : Cameras or camera modules comprising electronic image sensors; Control thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/2628 : Alteration of picture size, shape, position or orientation, e.g. zooming, rotation, rolling, perspective, translation
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 1/14 : Structural association of two or more printed circuits providing electric connection to or between printed circuits H05K1/11, H01R12/00
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 1/189 : characterised by the use of a flexible or folded printed circuit H05K3/326 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 : Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A camera unit includes a display for displaying an image to be captured; an image sensor for digitally capturing the displayed image; a card reader having a linear scanner for scanning a surface of a removable card to sense a plurality of dots printed on the surface of the removable card, the plurality of dots representing a bit pattern encoding a program script; a card interface for receiving a signal from the card reader indicative of the sensed plurality of dots printed on the surface of the card, and decoding the sensed plurality of dots into the program script; and a printer configured to print a distorted image on print media, the distorted image being a version of the captured image distorted in accordance with the program script. The card reader comprises a moulding housing therewithin a plurality of light sources, the moulding being transparent to light from the light sources and shaped to focus the light on the removable card.

Claims

1. An image processing system on a chip device, the system on a chip device comprising:

a central processing unit (CPU);

a plurality of interconnected parallel processing units configured to receive individualized instructions from the CPU for execution;

a memory interface communicatively coupled to an external memory and at least one of the parallel processing units, the memory interface being configured to facilitate communication between the at least one of the parallel processing units and the memory;

an image sensor interface communicatively coupled to an external image sensor and the parallel processing units, the image sensor interface being configured to facilitate communication between the parallel processing units and the image sensor; and

wherein the image sensor interface receives image data and the parallel processing units perform image processing on the image data in accordance with instructions the parallel processing units received from the CPU.

2. The system on a chip device of claim 1, wherein the image sensor interface provides the image data to the parallel processing units, and the parallel processing units format the image data and write the formatted image data to the memory over the memory interface.

3. The system on a chip device of claim 2, further comprising an input buffer common to the parallel processing units and configured to receive the image data from the image sensor interface and provide the image data to the parallel processing units.

4. The system on a chip device of claim 1, wherein the image sensor interface defines a state machine that is configured to provide the external image sensor with control information generated by the parallel processing units.

5. The system on a chip device of claim 1, wherein the external image sensor is separate from the parallel processing units.

6. The system on a chip device of claim 5, wherein the external image sensor is separate from the system on a chip.

7. The system on a chip device of claim 1, wherein the external image sensor is in the form of a charged coupled device (CCD), a CMOS based image sensor, or an active pixel sensor (APS).

8. The system on a chip of claim 7, wherein the image sensor interface includes an analog/digital converter (ADC) to convert an analog signal generated by the external image sensor into a digital signal and to covert a digital signal carrying control information generated by the parallel processing units into a suitable analog signal that is readable by the external image sensor.

9. A method of sensing and processing image data relating to an image sensed by an image sensor, the method comprising:

receiving image data at an image sensor interface configured to facilitate communication between a plurality of parallel processing units and an image sensor;

sending the image data to an input buffer intermediate the image sensor interface and the plurality of parallel processing units;

reading the image data from the input buffer by at least one of the plurality of parallel processing units over a bus interface, the bus interface being disposed between the input buffer and the plurality of processing units;

processing the image data by at least one of the plurality of parallel processing units; and

writing the processed image data to a memory.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the step of writing the processed image data comprises:

sending the processed image data to data cache separate from the plurality of parallel processing units;

reading the processed image data from the data cache by a memory interface; and

writing the processed image data to an external memory.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the image sensor interface, the plurality of parallel processing units, the input buffer, the data cache, and the memory interface are integrated as a system-on-a-chip.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the image sensor and the memory are external of the image sensor interface, the plurality of parallel processing units, the input buffer, the data cache, and the memory interface.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the image sensor and the memory are external of the system-on-a-chip.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

converting an analog signal carrying the image data generated by the image sensor to a digital signal carrying the image data by an analog/digital converter (ADC) of the image sensor interface; and

converting a digital signal carrying control information generated by the plurality of parallel processing units into a suitable analog signal that is readable by the image sensor.

15. The method of claim 9, further comprising sending control information from a state machine of the image sensor interface to the image sensor.

16. The method of claim 9, wherein the image sensor is in the form of a CMOS-based image sensor, an active pixel sensor (APS), or a charged coupled device (CCD).