Patents by Inventor Tetsuji Makino

Tetsuji Makino has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 8472747
    Abstract: An image composition device includes an obtaining section configured to obtain a downward-taken background image and a foreground image to be composed with the background image, a specification section configured to specify a position at which the foreground image is composed, in the background image obtained by the obtaining section, a composition section configured to compose the foreground image at the position in the background image which is specified by the specification section, to generate a composed image, and an image processing section configured to execute a smoothing process with a process intensity controlled based on the position, on the composed image.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 20, 2010
    Date of Patent: June 25, 2013
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Masaaki Sasaki, Tetsuji Makino
  • Patent number: 8441554
    Abstract: An image capturing apparatus includes: a first image capturing unit that captures a subject existing image; a first nonflatness calculating unit that calculates nonflatness of a peripheral portion of the subject existing image; a first determination unit that determines whether the nonflatness of the peripheral portion of the subject existing image is higher than a threshold value; a background generating unit that generates an extracting background image from the peripheral portion of the subject existing image when the first determination unit determines that the nonflatness is not higher than the threshold value, the extracting background image serving to extract a subject region containing the subject in the subject existing image; and a subject extracting unit that extracts the subject region from the subject existing image based on difference information of each corresponding pixel between the extracting background image and the subject existing image.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 4, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 14, 2013
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji Makino
  • Publication number: 20130050241
    Abstract: An image creation method, includes: first obtaining a subject image including a subject region; second obtaining skeleton information related to a skeleton of a subject in the subject image obtained by the first obtaining; specifying, based on the skeleton information obtained by the second obtaining, color information of a contour portion of the subject region; and creating a back-side-image, based on the color information of the contour portion of the subject region specified by the specifying, by drawing a subject correspondent region of the back-side image showing a back side of the subject in a pseudo manner.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 22, 2012
    Publication date: February 28, 2013
    Applicant: CASIO COMPUTER CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Masayuki HIROHAMA, Masaaki Sasaki, Shinichi Matsui, Tetsuji Makino, Mitsuyasu Nakajima
  • Patent number: 8345110
    Abstract: The image processing apparatus is provided with a subject movement data creation unit that detects the movement of subjects in a plurality of partitioned blocks that partition a screen area of moving images, and creates subject movement data that specifies a partitioned block where there is movement in the subject and the movement of the subject in that partitioned block; a still image acquisition unit that acquires still images; and a still image processor that causes the image of the still image blocks corresponding to the partitioned blocks specified by the subject movement data to move in accordance with the movement of the subject specified by the subject movement data, on the still image acquired by the still image acquisition unit using the subject movement data created by the subject movement data creation unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 4, 2010
    Date of Patent: January 1, 2013
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji Makino
  • Patent number: 8345119
    Abstract: A method includes specifying an image area which is contained in the subject-present image taken and in which nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value, determining whether or not a range of the specified image area in the subject-present image in which the nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value is greater than or equal to a predetermined range, generating an extraction background image used to extract a subject area in the subject-present image containing the subject, from the image area when the range of the image area in which the nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value is determined to be greater than or equal to the predetermined range, and extracting the subject area from the subject-present image based on information on a difference between each pixel in the extraction background image and a corresponding pixel in the subject-present image.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 20, 2010
    Date of Patent: January 1, 2013
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsuji Makino, Jun Hosoda
  • Publication number: 20120307146
    Abstract: A moving image reproducer includes a generation section, a calculation section, a determination section, a correction section and a control section. The generation section generates an interpolation frame image interpolating between two adjacent frame images among a plurality of frame images. The calculation section sequentially calculates a progress level of a predetermined musical piece between the two adjacent frame images reproduced in synchronization with the predetermined musical piece. The determination section determines whether the progress level has varied along with a change in a tempo of the predetermined musical piece defined in the tempo information. The correction section corrects the progress level so as to reduce the variation in the progress level along with the change in the tempo if the progress level is determined to have varied. The control section controls the generation section to generate an interpolation frame image corresponding to the corrected progress level.
    Type: Application
    Filed: June 1, 2012
    Publication date: December 6, 2012
    Applicant: CASIO COMPUTER CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Masatoshi WATANUKI, Tetsuji MAKINO, Masaaki SASAKI, Hyuta TANAKA, Michihiro NIHEI, Katsunori ISHII
  • Publication number: 20120237186
    Abstract: A moving image generating method, a moving image generating apparatus and a storage medium for generating a moving image from a still image. According to one application, a moving image generating method uses a moving image generating apparatus which stores in advance a plurality of pieces of movement information showing movements of a plurality of movable points. The method includes, an obtaining step which obtains a still image; a setting step which sets a plurality of movement control points in the still image; a frame image generating step which moves the plurality of control points based on movements of movement information and deforms the still image to generate a plurality of frame images; and a moving image generating step which generates a moving image from a plurality of frames.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 30, 2012
    Publication date: September 20, 2012
    Applicant: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsuji MAKINO, Mitsuyasu Nakajima, Masayuki Hirohama, Akira Hamada, Yasushi Maeno, Satoru Kakegawa, Katsunori Ishii, Yoshihiro Teshima, Masatoshi Watanuki, Hyuta Tanaka, Michihiro Nihei, Masaaki Sasaki, Shinichi Matsui
  • Patent number: 8248480
    Abstract: An imaging apparatus includes: an imaging section configured to acquire a plurality of images that are consecutively taken in time series by an imaging device; a reference region setting section configured to employ one of the images acquired by the imaging section as a reference image and to set a region of the reference image as reference region, the region having high-frequency components; and an image processing section configured to combine the images including the reference image by positioning the images so as to overlap subject portions in each images, the subject portions being defined in the reference region set by the reference region setting section.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 25, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 21, 2012
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kazuhisa Matsunaga, Kouichi Nakagomi, Tetsuji Makino
  • Patent number: 8040379
    Abstract: As shown in FIG. 2B, a photographing area is divided into a plurality of blocks. The block at the center of the photographing area is defined as an observation block 31, and the blocks at the periphery of the photographing area are defined as background blocks 32. When the number of background blocks 32 having the largest number of identical motion vectors is larger than a threshold m, when the scalar quantity of the motion vectors of these background blocks 32 with the largest number is larger than a threshold v, and when the scalar quantity of the motion vector of the observation block 31 is smaller than a threshold vc, the digital camera 1 judges that the user is performing a follow shot and there is no blurring of the observed photographic subject, and performs an automatic shooting.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 27, 2008
    Date of Patent: October 18, 2011
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsuji Makino, Shinichi Matsui
  • Patent number: 8023743
    Abstract: When a user instructs photographing by operating an operating unit, an image captured by an image sensor is stored as a photographed image in a memory. When a mode for performing color fading correction is set, the CPU instructs an image processing device to extract, from the photographed image, areas in which there are photographic print images which are supposed to bring about color fading. The image processing device generates a binary image by detecting edges of the photographed image, erases edges contacting an outermost edge of the photographed image, and extracts the areas based on the binary image from which some of the edges are erased.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 7, 2006
    Date of Patent: September 20, 2011
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsuji Makino, Yoshihiro Teshima
  • Patent number: 7995102
    Abstract: An imaging apparatus includes: an imaging section configured to output a first set of digital images; a section generating a plurality of sets of one-dimensional data from each of digital images respectively based on an object movement direction representing a movement direction of a moving object; a section configured to detect object regions for each of the digital images respectively based on the respective sets of the one-dimensional data; a section configured to select a second set of digital images from among the first set based on the object regions; a section configured to generate a background image from the second set of digital images; and a section configured to generate a stroboscopic image by combining the background image and a plurality of object images corresponding to the object regions of the second set of digital images.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 11, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 9, 2011
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji Makino
  • Publication number: 20110158551
    Abstract: An image composition device includes an obtaining section configured to obtain a downward-taken background image and a foreground image to be composed with the background image, a specification section configured to specify a position at which the foreground image is composed, in the background image obtained by the obtaining section, a composition section configured to compose the foreground image at the position in the background image which is specified by the specification section, to generate a composed image, and an image processing section configured to execute a smoothing process with a process intensity controlled based on the position, on the composed image.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 20, 2010
    Publication date: June 30, 2011
    Applicant: CASIO COMPUTER CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Masaaki Sasaki, Tetsuji Makino
  • Publication number: 20110157424
    Abstract: A method includes specifying an image area which is contained in the subject-present image taken and in which nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value, determining whether or not a range of the specified image area in the subject-present image in which the nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value is greater than or equal to a predetermined range, generating an extraction background image used to extract a subject area in the subject-present image containing the subject, from the image area when the range of the image area in which the nonflatness is less than or equal to a predetermined value is determined to be greater than or equal to the predetermined range, and extracting the subject area from the subject-present image based on information on a difference between each pixel in the extraction background image and a corresponding pixel in the subject-present image.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 20, 2010
    Publication date: June 30, 2011
    Applicant: CASIO COMPUTER CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Tetsuji Makino, Jun Hosoda
  • Publication number: 20110109754
    Abstract: An image capture apparatus includes: an image capturing unit; a first image capture controller configured to control the image capturing unit to capture a set of a plurality of images while changing exposure time for each of the images; a second image capture controller configured to obtain a plurality of sets of the images; an addition combination section configured to perform image alignment on the images contained in each of the sets and to perform addition combination on the aligned images to generate a combined image; a combination controller configured to control the addition combination section to perform the image alignment and the addition combination for each of the sets to obtain a plurality of combined images; a selector configured to evaluate the combined images and to select one of the combined images most highly evaluated as a selected image; and a storage configured to store the selected image.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 10, 2010
    Publication date: May 12, 2011
    Applicant: CASIO COMPUTER CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Kazuhisa MATSUNAGA, Masaru Onozawa, Kouichi Nakagomi, Tetsuji Makino
  • Patent number: 7869651
    Abstract: When a user instructs photographing by operating an operating unit, an image captured by an image sensor is stored as a photographed image in a memory. When a mode for performing color fading correction is set, the CPU instructs an image processing device to extract, from the photographed image, an area which is supposed to bring about color fading. The image processing device generates a binary image by detecting edges of the area.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 7, 2006
    Date of Patent: January 11, 2011
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji Makino
  • Publication number: 20100225777
    Abstract: The image processing apparatus is provided with a subject movement data creation unit that detects the movement of subjects in a plurality of partitioned blocks that partition a screen area of moving images, and creates subject movement data that specifies a partitioned block where there is movement in the subject and the movement of the subject in that partitioned block; a still image acquisition unit that acquires still images; and a still image processor that causes the image of the still image blocks corresponding to the partitioned blocks specified by the subject movement data to move in accordance with the movement of the subject specified by the subject movement data, on the still image acquired by the still image acquisition unit using the subject movement data created by the subject movement data creation unit.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 4, 2010
    Publication date: September 9, 2010
    Applicant: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji Makino
  • Publication number: 20100225787
    Abstract: An image capturing apparatus includes: a first image capturing unit that captures a subject existing image; a first nonflatness calculating unit that calculates nonflatness of a peripheral portion of the subject existing image; a first determination unit that determines whether the nonflatness of the peripheral portion of the subject existing image is higher than a threshold value; a background generating unit that generates an extracting background image from the peripheral portion of the subject existing image when the first determination unit determines that the nonflatness is not higher than the threshold value, the extracting background image serving to extract a subject region containing the subject in the subject existing image; and a subject extracting unit that extracts the subject region from the subject existing image based on difference information of each corresponding pixel between the extracting background image and the subject existing image.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 4, 2010
    Publication date: September 9, 2010
    Applicant: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Tetsuji MAKINO
  • Patent number: 7791655
    Abstract: A photographing unit photographs an object “n” times respectively with exposure times T1(1) to T1(n) to generate “n” sheets of images of the same object per an exposure time T1, where “n” is a whole number and the exposure times T1(1) to T1(n) are obtained by dividing the exposure time T1 by the whole number of “n”, a displacement correcting unit (32a, 32b) calculates a correction value for correcting displacement of the images, and a limb-darkening compensating unit (32d) corrects a position of a limb-darkening characteristic component of each of the images, using the correction value. Meanwhile, the limb-darkening characteristic components of the images whose positions have been corrected are combined to generate a limb-darkening characteristic component for compensation. Limb darkening in a combined image is compensated for, using the limb-darkening characteristic component for compensation, whereby a time required for performing a limb-darkening compensating process is decreased.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 5, 2007
    Date of Patent: September 7, 2010
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsuji Makino, Keiichi Sakurai
  • Publication number: 20100149210
    Abstract: An image capturing apparatus includes: a first image capturing unit configured to capture a subject-including image including a subject image under a first capturing condition; a second image capturing unit configured to capture a background image under a second capturing condition that is substantially the same with the first capturing condition; a positioning unit configured to perform positioning of the subject-including image and the background image; a difference generating unit configured to generate differential information indicating difference between each corresponding pair of pixels in the subject-including image and in the background image as positioned by the positioning unit; and a subject extracting unit configured to extract a subject region including the subject image from the subject-including image based on the differential information generated by the difference generating unit.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 14, 2009
    Publication date: June 17, 2010
    Applicant: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kazuhisa MATSUNAGA, Tetsuji Makino, Masaaki Sasaki
  • Patent number: 7619663
    Abstract: A digital camera acquires the image of an original including an original from a shot image acquired by shooting. The digital camera reduces the image of the original and corrects distortion of the reduced image which is originated from the characteristic of a lens. As the digital camera performs distortion correction on the reduced image, the number of arithmetic operations in distortion correction is reduced, making distortion correction simpler. The digital camera acquires a rectangle defined by the contour of the original, extracts the image of the original to acquire an original image before reduction, and acquires an associated projection-transformed image by affine transformation. The digital camera acquires pixel positions of the original image using an affine parameter, and acquires pixel positions of the image before distortion correction using a relational expression of distortion correction performed on the reduced image.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 17, 2005
    Date of Patent: November 17, 2009
    Assignee: Casio Computer Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Keiichi Sakurai, Tetsuji Makino