Abstract: In a system for file managing image data of an electronic camera, so long as the image data is recorded by the same image pickup apparatus, a peculiar file name which is not overlapped is generated and in order to prevent that a plurality of files of the same name exist, when an electronic camera is connected to a main body of a computer, a storage device in the electronic camera is examined from a host application of the computer, and when a file of a file name including numerical values exceeding a predetermined value is found, a message is displayed for the user in a manner such that after all of the files having the file names which had automatically been formed were transferred to the computer, all of the contents in the storage device are deleted or formatted.

Abstract: Transfer history information of images to other apparatus is read out from a storing medium, reference is made to the transfer history information at the time of transferring images to other apparatuses or capturing images from other apparatuses, and images not transferred to other apparatus can be transferred or captured in batch fashion, thereby solving the problem in the conventionally-known art for displaying or recognizing transferred images, in that selecting all images not transferred yet at the time of making selection of the images to be transferred on a display screen has been extremely troublesome in the event that the number of images to select is great and that this increases with the number of images.

Abstract: The invention provides fuel supply pump that can improve the durability of a fuel inlet valve and stably pressure-feed high pressure fuel of a large flow rate. In the fuel inlet valve according to the invention, a valve piston includes, in its outer surface in the vicinity of an end portion on an opposite side of a collar portion, a groove portion to which a fastener for fixing the valve piston and a spring seat locks. The spring seat includes an open portion into which the valve piston is inserted and includes, along an edge of the open portion, a step portion to which the fastener locks. The valve piston is inserted into the open portion of the spring seat, and the fastener is thereafter caused to lock to the groove portion of the valve piston. The spring seat is energized by a spring to cause the fastener to lock to the step portion, whereby the spring seat is fixed to the valve piston.

Abstract: An information processing apparatus includes a first obtaining unit, a second obtaining unit and a display control unit. The first obtaining unit obtains, from an electronic device connected to the information processing apparatus, image data stored in a memory medium connected to the electronic device. The second obtaining unit obtains in advance reduced image data corresponding to the image data before obtainment of the image data by the first obtaining unit. The display control unit updates reduced image data displayed on a display unit, obtained by the second obtaining unit, in accordance with a display condition designated by a user. When the display condition is changed while the first obtaining unit is executing obtainment of image data, the first obtaining unit changes an obtainment order of image data based on the changed display condition.

Abstract: An image management apparatus includes: a narrowing-down reproduction unit for reproducing an image having particular attribute information; an attribute modification unit for modifying attribute information of the image under narrowing-down reproduction; an attribute modified image information storing unit configured to store information indicating the image which no longer contains the particular attribute information because of the modification performed on the attribute information by the attribute modification unit; and a control unit for performing control so as to regard the image indicated with the information stored in the attribute modified image information storing unit as a narrowing-down reproduction target image during the same narrowing-down reproduction as that at the time of modifying the attributes by said attribute modification unit, thereby enabling browsing of images including an image of which the attributes have been modified in a narrowing-down state, using a smaller storage area.

Abstract: An image synthesization method, whereby a plurality of images, each of which has a partially overlapping image area, are synthesized to create a single synthetic image, comprises a determination step of inputting a plurality of image data sets that correspond to the plurality of images that are input, and of determining whether or not an image in the partially overlapping image area of each of images that are indicated by the plurality of image data sets includes mainly characters an image processing step of performing, for the plurality of image data sets that are input, image processing in consonance with a result of a determination performed at the determination step and an image synthesization step of synthesizing images that are indicated by the resultant plurality of image data, for which the image processing has been performed at the image processing step. With this arrangement, a plurality of images can be easily and effectively synthesized.

Abstract: An object of this invention is to shorten the response time of an electronic apparatus such as an electronic camera capable of communicating with an information processing apparatus such as a computer, and improve the usability of the information processing apparatus when the information processing apparatus requests data stored in the storage medium of the electronic apparatus. For this purpose, in an electronic apparatus which has a main storage device and an auxiliary storage device, is connected to an external apparatus, and can transmit/receive data to/from the external apparatus, data to be requested by the external apparatus is loaded in advance from the auxiliary storage device to the main storage device before the external apparatus requests the data after connection to the external apparatus is established.

Abstract: A fuel feed pump is provided that has a fuel flow-rate regulating valve, on the inlet side. The fuel flow-rate regulating valve includes a housing with a fuel inlet port and a fuel outlet port, a valve mechanism for controlling the flow rate of the fuel from the inlet port to the outlet port, and a regulating mechanism for regulating a backpressure to control the position of a needle valve of the valve mechanism in response to a system pressure, to thereby control the flow rate by controlling the fuel flow through an opening provided in a valve chamber. This arrangement makes it difficult for contamination to accumulate, and also enables a low-cost implementation.

Abstract: An image synthesization method, whereby a plurality of images, each of which has a partially overlapping image area, are synthesized to create a single synthetic image, comprises a determination step of inputting a plurality of image data sets that correspond to the plurality of images that are input, and of determining whether or not an image in the partially overlapping image area of each of images that are indicated by the plurality of image data sets includes mainly characters an image processing step of performing, for the plurality of image data sets that are input, image processing in consonance with a result of a determination performed at the determination step and an image synthesization step of synthesizing images that are indicated by the resultant plurality of image data, for which the image processing has been performed at the image processing step. With this arrangement, a plurality of images can be easily and effectively synthesized.

Abstract: An image synthesization method, whereby a plurality of images, each of which has a partially overlapping image area, are synthesized to create a single synthetic image, comprises a determination step of inputting a plurality of image data sets that correspond to the plurality of images that are input, and of determining whether or not an image in the partially overlapping image area of each of images that are indicated by the plurality of image data sets includes mainly characters an image processing step of performing, for the plurality of image data sets that are input, image processing in consonance with a result of a determination performed at the determination step and an image synthesization step of synthesizing images that are indicated by the resultant plurality of image data, for which the image processing has been performed at the image processing step. With this arrangement, a plurality of images can be easily and effectively synthesized.

Abstract: A method and an apparatus for generating X-rays in which continuous X-rays can be generated by irradiating a focused laser in the air using a liquid as a target, thereby generating plasma. A high concentration electrolyte aqueous solution, such as CsCl and RbCl, is circulated by means of a pump (2) and the surface of a jet of high concentration electrolyte aqueous solution injected from a glass nozzle (3) is exposed to an irradiation of focused femtosecond laser pulse (6) via an objective lens (7), thereby generating X-ray pulses.

Abstract: When a shutter button of an electronic camera is depressed, the electronic camera photographs a subject and the photographed image data is stored into a main storage device of the electronic camera. Upon receiving a photography command from a computer connected to the electronic camera, a check is made to determine whether the main storage device of the electronic camera still holds image data to be processed. If the main storage device still holds image data to be processed, then an error signal is sent to a device from which the photography command is issued. If the main storage device does not hold image data to be processed, then the electronic camera photographs a subject and the photographed image is stored into the main storage device. Then, a notice of normal termination is sent to a device from which the photography command is issued.

Abstract: An image processing system includes a playback unit for playing back an image recorded on a recording medium, a communication unit for transmitting the image played back by the playback unit to an external information processing system via a transmission pathway, an operation unit including a plurality of operation keys, and a control unit for switching a transmission mode among a plurality of modes including a first mode in which transmission of the image according to an operation of the operation unit is enabled and a second mode in which transmission of the image according to an operation of the operation unit is disabled. The control unit changes the transmission mode to the first mode according to a predetermined operation of the operation unit in the second mode.

Abstract: In a system for file managing image data of an electronic camera, so long as the image data is recorded by the same image pickup apparatus, a peculiar file name which is not overlapped is generated and in order to prevent that a plurality of files of the same name exist, when an electronic camera is connected to a main body of a computer, a storage device in the electronic camera is examined from a host application of the computer, and when a file of a file name including numerical values exceeding a predetermined value is found, a message is displayed for the user in a manner such that after all of the files having the file names which had automatically been formed were transferred to the computer, all of the contents in the storage device are deleted or formatted.

Abstract: A fuel feed pump is provided that has a fuel flow-rate regulating valve, on the inlet side. The fuel flow-rate regulating valve includes a housing with a fuel inlet port and a fuel outlet port, a valve mechanism for controlling the flow rate of the fuel from the inlet port to the outlet port, and a regulating mechanism for regulating a backpressure to control the position of a needle valve of the valve mechanism in response to a system pressure, to thereby control the flow rate by controlling the fuel flow through an opening provided in a valve chamber. This arrangement makes it difficult for contamination to accumulate, and also enables a low-cost implementation.

Abstract: A method and an apparatus for generating X-rays in which continuous X-rays can be generated by irradiating a focused laser in the air using a liquid as a target, thereby generating plasma. A high concentration electrolyte aqueous solution, such as CsCl and RbCl, is circulated by means of a pump (2) and the surface of a jet of high concentration electrolyte aqueous solution injected from a glass nozzle (3) is exposed to an irradiation of focused femtosecond laser pulse (6) via an objective lens (7), thereby generating X-ray pulses.

Abstract: This invention relates to an image processing method for precisely and automatically recognizing a specific image extraction region to be divided from an input image, and extracting the specific image extraction region. Thresholding is done for intensity differences of edge data obtained from the input data to extract difference edge data. A main extraction region is estimated from the outermost contour line extracted based on the extraction result of the difference edge data. Thresholding or the like is done in units of pixels of the input image to extract an initial region. Extraction region determination processing is done for extracting an accurate target region by combining the main extraction region and initial region.

Abstract: There is disclosed an image extraction method for extracting, from a subject image that records both the background and the object to be extracted, image data of the object using a mask. An initial mask used for extracting the subject region is generated on the basis of difference data between the subject image and the background image that records the background alone, the region of the initial mask is grown on the basis of the similarity between the features of a first region and its neighboring second region in the subject image corresponding to the initial mask, and the image data of the object is extracted from the first image on the basis of the grown mask region.

Abstract: An image synthesization method, whereby a plurality of images, each of which has a partially overlapping image area, are synthesized to create a single synthetic image, comprises a determination step of inputting a plurality of image data sets that correspond to the plurality of images that are input, and of determining whether or not an image in the partially overlapping image area of each of images that are indicated by the plurality of image data sets includes mainly characters an image processing step of performing, for the plurality of image data sets that are input, image processing in consonance with a result of a determination performed at the determination step and an image synthesization step of synthesizing images that are indicated by the resultant plurality of image data, for which the image processing has been performed at the image processing step. With this arrangement, a plurality of images can be easily and effectively synthesized.

Abstract: There is disclosed an image extraction method for extracting, from a subject image that records both the background and the object to be extracted, image data of the object using a mask. An initial mask used for extracting the subject region is generated on the basis of difference data between the subject image and the background image that records the background alone, the region of the initial mask is grown on the basis of the similarity between the features of a first region and its neighboring second region in the subject image corresponding to the initial mask, and the image data of the object is extracted from the first image on the basis of the grown mask region.