Abstract: A batch processing method for enhancing an appearance of a face located in a digital image, where the image is one of a large number of images that are being processed through a batch process, comprises the steps of: (a) providing a script file that identifies one or more original digital images that have been selected for enhancement, wherein the script file includes an instruction for the location of each original digital image; (b) using the instructions in the script file, acquiring an original digital image containing one or more faces; (c) detecting a location of facial feature points in the one or more faces, said facial feature points including points identifying salient features including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, and hair; (d) using the location of the facial feature points to segment the face into different regions, said different regions including one or more of skin, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, neck and hair regions; (e) determining one or more facially relevant character

Abstract: Video frames of original video data are sampled with arbitrary time interval and size, and thumbnail frames are obtained. As thumbnail information concerning these frames, information on frame number of the original video frame corresponding each of the thumbnail frames and size of each thumbnail frame are described. Further, scene change information on the original video frames or intra-frame frame change value information are described altogether as additional information, and temporal/spatial thumbnail meta-data is obtained. The meta-data is associated with original video data, and a database is constructed. Then, the meta-data is employed, thereby performing typical frame display of original video data or variable speed reproduction. In this manner, even with a device with its low CPU capability, typical frame display or variable speed reproduction is performed for compressed and encoded video data such as MPEG-2, and the contents of video is checked, and retrieval is easily performed.

Abstract: The invention relates to a facsimile device and a facsimile device monitoring system. The result of a transmission can be promptly informed to the user. When an error occurs, the file of the memory transmission can be simply erased, or the address and the transmission property of the memory transmission file can be changed. The facsimile device monitoring system is constructed with the monitoring software and featured in that, when there exists a file of a communication error, the alarm message is displayed on the displaying panel of the personal computer, the (memory transmission) file can be deleted from the personal computer, and the address and/or the transmission property of the (memory transmission) file can be changed.

Abstract: Upon reception of a work sensing command from a robot controller, an image processing unit obtains a two-dimensional image of thee whole work pallet including a work, with a CCD camera (a first sensor means). A line of sight is calculated based on the work position on the sensed two-dimensional image. The robot controller determines the destination of movement of the robot such that a crossing line LC of slit beams LB1, LB2 of a laser sensor (a second sensor means) can agree with the calculated line of eight. The image processing unit operates the laser sensor so as to surely irradiate the laser slit beams LB1, LB2 to the target work, permitting the laser sensor to sense the three-dimensional positional and orientation of the target work.

Abstract: A method is provided for enhancing two-dimensional range images rendered from three-dimensional STIL data. Briefly, the rendered range image data is modified to compensate for jitter effects associated with the STIL camera system, has background portions of the resulting data modified to compensate for CCD array effects and range intensity roll-off associated with the STIL camera system, has a “salt and pepper” noise reduction routine applied thereto, and has a histogram clip routine applied thereto.

Abstract: A method is provided for enhancing two-dimensional contrast images rendered from three-dimensional STIL data. Briefly, the rendered contrast image data is scaled based on a mean intensity value of all pixels of data therein, stretched to a predetermined dynamic range, modified to compensate for jitter and CCD array effects associated with the STIL camera system, normalized using an exponential decay function that describes contrast intensity roll-off associated therewith, and has a histogram clip routine applied thereto.

Abstract: A semiconductor processing device includes a processing section to process a semiconductor substrate in accordance with job information which is used to process the semiconductor substrate. An imaging section takes an image of a processed portion of the semiconductor substrate for each time of processing by the processing section. An image-processing section converts any one and another of the images to image data which are different from each other in data volume, and associates a result of processing from the processing section, the job information and the image data with each other in each processing. An input/output section outputs at least the result of processing and the image data.

Abstract: In a face image recording apparatus, a camera photographs the face of a person a plurality of number of times, a processor extracts at least one high-quality image from the plurality of images photographed by the camera, and this high-quality image extracted by the processor is recorded in a memory.

Abstract: An interactive system provides a video program signal and generates interactive content data to be associated with at least one object within a frame of the video program. The interactive content data is embedded with the object and the object is tracked through a sequence of frames and the interactive content data is embedded into each one of the frames. The program frames with the embedded data are multiplexed with video and audio signals and may be broadcast. A receiver identifies an object of interest and the embedded data associated with the object is retrieved. The embedded data may be used for e-commerce.

Abstract: A plurality of iris images of a person to be authenticated in which the positions of extraneous light reflection are respectively different are captured by using an image capturing device. Iris codes, that is, features for authentication, are respectively extracted from the plural iris images, and the plural iris codes thus extracted are respectively compared with a registered iris code, so as to generate a plurality of comparison results. The plural comparison results are integrated to obtain an ultimate comparison score, which is used for the authentication.

Abstract: A memory is provided for storing a plurality of data sets, each data set corresponding to an image of a location within a medical body of interest. Each image contains a number of features which correspond to data points that have been collected when creating an image of the medical body. The data points thus correspond to a measured parameter within the medical body. A visual display is provided of the image having a varying color scale for different regions of interest within the body. Medical personnel are able to select various regions of interest within the image for which further study is desired. In addition, within the region of interest the medical personnel may select a particular feature representing data corresponding to medical information within the body for which further study is desired and have the computer perform an analysis to compare to or locate other tissue of the same type elsewhere in the data sets.

Abstract: In order to simply generate an accurate three-dimensional shape model, the generating method has the step (#1) of arranging a three-dimensional shape model in an initial state in a virtual space, the step (#2) of projecting points on the three-dimensional shape model onto photographed images and specifying pixels on the respective photographed images corresponding to the points, the step (#3) of evaluating scattering of pixel values of the respective pixels on the photographed images corresponding to the points on the three-dimensional shape model, and the step (#4) of deforming the three-dimensional shape model so that the scattering of the pixel values of the respective pixels becomes small.

Abstract: A fingerprint sensing system includes an image sensor, a rate sensor and a sensor circuit. The image sensor includes a linear array of capacitive sensors for capacitive sensing of ridge peaks and ridge valleys of a fingerprint on a swiped finger. The rate sensor senses the speed of the finger as it is swiped across the image sensor. The sensor circuit supplies image drive signals to the image sensor and detects image signals in response to the drive signals. The sensor circuit supplies rate drive signals to the rate sensor and detects rate signals in response to the rate drive signals. The sensor circuit further coordinates the image signals and the rate signals to provide a fingerprint image. The image sensor may be configured as an image pickup plate and multiple image drive plates formed on a substrate, such as a flexible printed circuit board or other flexible substrate which may conform to the shape of the finger.

Abstract: A face recognition system and process for identifying a person depicted in an input image and their face pose. This system and process entails locating and extracting face regions belonging to known people from a set of model images, and determining the face pose for each of the face regions extracted. All the extracted face regions are preprocessed by normalizing, cropping, categorizing and finally abstracting them. More specifically, the images are normalized and cropped to show only a persons face, categorized according to the face pose of the depicted person's face by assigning them to one of a series of face pose ranges, and abstracted preferably via an eigenface approach.

Abstract: System and method for determining the presence of an object of interest in a target image. Regions of a target image may be located that match an object of interest, e.g., in a template image, with respect to various information, e.g., luminance, color and/or other types of boundary information. The invention includes improved methods for mapping point sequences (e.g., pixel sequences) or curves to new point sets or curves for curve matching. The method determines the presence of an object of interest in a target image despite of or using various types of topological transformations of the object of interest in the target image. One or more mapping operators are determined based on template curves and/or example target curves. Pattern matching is performed on one or more target images using the mapping operator(s) to generate pattern matching results, and the pattern matching results output.

Abstract: An information presentation system includes a template matching unit which performs template matching between input information and a template group stored, a plurality of associated information search units which search for associated information on the basis of a matching result of the template matching unit, an information processing unit which processes output information in accordance with the input information, the matching result of the template matching unit, and a search result of the associated information search units, an output unit which outputs the information processed by the information processing unit, a template selection unit which causes a user to select a template group, and a template supply unit which transmits, to the template storage unit, the template group selected by the template selection unit from predetermined template groups. The template supply unit is arranged independently of the plurality of associated information search units.

Abstract: A novel method for synchronizing the lips of a sketched face to an input voice. The lip synchronization system and method approach is to use training video as much as possible when the input voice is similar to the training voice sequences. Initially, face sequences are clustered from video segments, then by making use of sub-sequence Hidden Markov Models, a correlation between speech signals and face shape sequences is built. From this re-use of video, the discontinuity between two consecutive output faces is decreased and accurate and realistic synthesized animations are obtained. The lip synchronization system and method can synthesize faces from input audio in real-time without noticeable delay. Since acoustic feature data calculated from audio is directly used to drive the system without considering its phonemic representation, the method can adapt to any kind of voice, language or sound.

Abstract: A semi-automatic reconstruction method of 3-D building models using building outline segments is introduced. The core technology of the present invention is called the “Split-Merge-Shape” algorithm. The Split and Merge processes sequentially reconstruct the topology between any roof-edges of the buildings and then reform them as enclosed regions. The Shape process uses height information and consecutive-coplanar analysis to determine the shapes and heights of the roofs. After generating polyhedral building models, prismatic building models can also be generated by using a semi-automatic procedure. An existing digital topographic map of buildings can be directly used to reconstruct their 3-D models without any excess stereo-measurements. In addition to cost reduction, high efficiency, high quality, and minimization of manual operations, the integration of photogrammetric mapping with 3-D building modeling in one procedure is possible, which is the most cost-effective approach for 3-D mapping.

Abstract: A face recognition system and process for identifying a person depicted in an input image and their face pose. This system and process entails locating and extracting face regions belonging to known people from a set of model images, and determining the face pose for each of the face regions extracted. All the extracted face regions are preprocessed by normalizing, cropping, categorizing and finally abstracting them. More specifically, the images are normalized and cropped to show only a persons face, categorized according to the face pose of the depicted person's face by assigning them to one of a series of face pose ranges, and abstracted preferably via an eigenface approach.

Abstract: The present invention relates to an apparatus, method, software algorithm and system for evaluating plants for conditions or characteristics. In one aspect, the method can include imaging at least a portion of the plant and evaluating the image for discriminating condition(s) or characteristic(s) of interest. In one example, soybean roots are imaged and the image is evaluated to discriminate between soybean cyst nematode (SCN) cysts and the plant roots to count the number of SCN cysts for the plant. In another embodiment, a plant is illuminated by a ultra-violet radiation selected to cause photo-induced fluorescence of a target, e.g. SCN cysts. The fluorescence emitted is collected and analyzed to discriminate between the target and the remainder of the plant.