Patents by Inventor Yukio Kadowaki

Yukio Kadowaki 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).

  • Publication number: 20110187452
    Abstract: A sound and music playback device includes: an output amplifier; a power supply circuit that supplies electric power to the output amplifier; and an output signal level judging circuit; wherein an output voltage value of the power supply circuit is changed based on a level of a sound and music signal to be outputted.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 26, 2011
    Publication date: August 4, 2011
    Applicant: RICOH COMPANY, LTD.
    Inventors: Yukihiro Imai, Yukio Kadowaki, Koichi Hagino, Shunsei Tanaka
  • Patent number: 7720089
    Abstract: A compact serial communication device is disclosed that is formed from simplified circuits on a master side and a slave side and does not need a synchronous signal and a switching unit for switching transmission and reception operations, and is able to reduce load of the slave side. The master transmission/reception circuit outputs a serial data signal DATA to a transmission path with the serial data signal DATA being generated by superposing a low level superposition pulse on a clock signal, when the clock signal is at the high level, according to an output data signal to be output to the slave transmission/reception circuits; the slave transmission/reception circuits superposes a high level superposition pulse on the serial data signal DATA input from the transmission path according to an output data signal to be output to the master transmission/reception circuit when the clock signal is at the low level.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 28, 2005
    Date of Patent: May 18, 2010
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7609897
    Abstract: An image decoder comprises a code decompression/decoding unit that decodes code data produced through compression and encoding of image data, a power supply state detection unit that detects a current state of a power supply of the image decoder, and a controller that controls the code decompression/decoding unit based on the current state of the power supply so as to reduce power consumption in performing decompression and decoding of the code data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 8, 2008
    Date of Patent: October 27, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Shogo Oneda, Keiichi Suzuki, Yukio Kadowaki, Yutaka Sano, Tooru Suino, Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda
  • Patent number: 7574062
    Abstract: An image processing apparatus includes a coding part that performs coding on image data based on the result of decomposing the image data into bit planes block by block, and a quantization part that reduces the values of the image data of a predetermined block to be compressed at an increased rate. The quantization part is provided at an earlier stage than the coding part.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 3, 2003
    Date of Patent: August 11, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Yutaka Sato, Yukio Kadowaki, Kazuhiro Miyazaki
  • Patent number: 7542611
    Abstract: In an image processing apparatus, first code data including multiple sets of code data in which image data of multiple static images are compressed and encoded, are synthesized. The first code data are converted into second code data that are compressed and encoded to be a single code data sequence where a motion image aligns the static images in chronological order as consecutive frames. In addition, the second code data may be converted into the first code data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 2, 2003
    Date of Patent: June 2, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda, Keiichi Suzuki, Yutaka Sano, Tooru Suino, Yukio Kadowaki, Shogo Oneda
  • Patent number: 7539345
    Abstract: A method of processing image information in which the image information is encoded by the bit plane and compressed by truncating one or more of the bit planes. Since the index parameter indexing the effect of the truncation on the quality of the image information is generated before the truncation, one can determine the bit planes to be truncated based on the index parameter without decoding the image information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 28, 2003
    Date of Patent: May 26, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7512281
    Abstract: An image processing apparatus divides data related to an image into bit-planes and performs a coding process on data of each of the bit-planes. The image processing apparatus includes a multi-layer generation part that divides codes obtained by the coding process into a plurality of layers sequentially from the codes corresponding to higher bit-planes such that the amount of the codes of each of the layers is equal to or less than a predetermined value. A code generation part generates coded data in units of the codes divided into the layers by the multi-layer generation part.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 29, 2004
    Date of Patent: March 31, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7505629
    Abstract: An image processing method generates TAG information based on inclusion information which indicates an existence of significant data in code blocks for each of sub-bands, according to JPEG2000 standard. The image processing method accepts the inclusion information of the code blocks in a predetermined sequence in units of code blocks amounting to a number which is smaller than a number of code blocks of sub-bands in all levels, and immediately generates and outputs TAG information corresponding to the accepted inclusion information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 23, 2004
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7502488
    Abstract: An image processing apparatus includes a wavelet transform unit that performs compression encoding in a hierarchical manner by performing discrete wavelet transform on pixel values for each of one or more rectangular regions dividing image data. A digital watermark obtaining unit obtains digital watermark data to be embedded into wavelet coefficients generated by the wavelet transform unit. A characteristics extracting unit extracts characteristics of the wavelet coefficients for each of the rectangular regions. An embedding specification determination unit determines an embedding specification of the digital watermark data with respect to the wavelet coefficients in accordance with the characteristics of the wavelet coefficients for each of the rectangular regions that are extracted by the characteristics extracting unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 15, 2004
    Date of Patent: March 10, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Yasushi Abe, Takahiro Yagishita, Yukio Kadowaki, Takayuki Nishimura
  • Patent number: 7492951
    Abstract: An image processing apparatus is provided with an image expansion unit to expand an image compressed code and to output an expanded image data, the image compressed code is obtained by compressing a master image data, and a picture quality judging unit to judge a relative picture quality of the expanded image data with respect to a picture quality of the master image data, based on the image compressed code, and to generate picture quality information indicating the relative picture quality.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 14, 2003
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Takahiro Yagishita, Yukio Kadowaki, Yasushi Abe, Takayuki Nishimura
  • Patent number: 7477787
    Abstract: An image compression device is disclosed that is capable of quickly compressing image data to a target value by a simple configuration while maintaining quality of a reproduced image as much as possible. The image compression device includes an encoding part, a code reduction part, and a processing part. The encoding part performs a frequency analysis for original image data, encodes the coefficients generated by the frequency analysis first unit by first unit, and generates a series of codes. The code reduction part reduces the amount of the codes of each of the first units. The processing part divides the coefficients or the codes of each of the first units into second units, and increases the amount of codes to be reduced in the code reduction part for each of the second units according to values of the coefficients or the codes of each of the second units.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 23, 2004
    Date of Patent: January 13, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7474792
    Abstract: In an image processing apparatus, using distortion amount information showing how much a decoded image is degraded from an original image when data are eliminated from the data sequence is read from a code sequence in which the original image is compressed and encoded, an occurrence of an error in each unit of the code sequence is detected. A distortion amount of the decoded image against the original image is calculated when the code sequence is decoded after the data are eliminated from the code sequence by using the distortion amount information concerning the data in which the error is detected. Then, the decoding of the code sequence is cancelled based on a calculation result.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 2, 2003
    Date of Patent: January 6, 2009
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Yukio Kadowaki, Shogo Oneda, Tooru Suino, Keiichi Suzuki, Yutaka Sano, Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda
  • Patent number: 7440630
    Abstract: An apparatus for compressing an image, comprising: a coding unit configured to generate code data by encoding data derived from image data; a memory unit which stores truncation data items identified by respective data sequence numbers, wherein a truncation data item specifies a way in which code data is removed from the generated code data, such that the larger the data sequence number, the higher a quality of a reproduced image obtained by decoding the generated code data after the removal of code data, or such that the larger the data sequence number, the lower the quality of the reproduced image; and a rate control unit configured to identify a data sequence number of a truncation data item that provides a code data parameter substantially equal to a desired value, said code data parameter being responsive to an amount of code data removal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 24, 2004
    Date of Patent: October 21, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Publication number: 20080212884
    Abstract: An image decoder comprises a code decompression/decoding unit that decodes code data produced through compression and encoding of image data, a power supply state detection unit that detects a current state of a power supply of the image decoder, and a controller that controls the code decompression/decoding unit based on the current state of the power supply so as to reduce power consumption in performing decompression and decoding of the code data.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 8, 2008
    Publication date: September 4, 2008
    Inventors: Shogo Oneda, Keiichi Suzuki, Yukio Kadowaki, Yutaka Sano, Tooru Suino, Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda
  • Patent number: 7386176
    Abstract: An image sending apparatus is provided, in which the image sending apparatus comprises an analyzing syntax of code sequence data, a generation unit generating another code sequence data from the code sequence data by using the analysis result, a unit to measure the load of the generation unit; a unit to generate a parameter corresponding to the load, wherein the generation unit generates the another code sequence data by using the parameter such that the data amount of the another code sequence data to be sent is adjusted according to the load.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 14, 2003
    Date of Patent: June 10, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Shogo Oneda, Keiichi Suzuki, Yukio Kadowaki, Yutaka Sano, Tooru Suino, Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda
  • Patent number: 7372999
    Abstract: An image decoder comprises a code decompression/decoding unit that decodes code data produced through compression and encoding of image data, a power supply state detection unit that detects a current state of a power supply of the image decoder, and a controller that controls the code decompression/decoding unit based on the current state of the power supply so as to reduce power consumption in performing decompression and decoding of the code data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 9, 2003
    Date of Patent: May 13, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Shogo Oneda, Keiichi Suzuki, Yukio Kadowaki, Yutaka Sano, Tooru Suino, Takanori Yano, Minoru Fukuda
  • Patent number: 7366815
    Abstract: A serial communication system is provided which performs serial communication between host and slave apparatus using half-duplex channel communication with a serial data signal generated by superimposing a data signal on a clock signal. The host apparatus transmits through a transmission path an identification signal generated by superimposing on the clock signal identification data for specifying a slave apparatus to be requested, after transmitting through the transmission path a preamble signal generated by superimposing successively repeated data on the clock signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2005
    Date of Patent: April 29, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7349579
    Abstract: The present invention provides an image processing device, an image processing method, and an image reading method, by which encoded data can be easily generated from sub-sampled image data, without a complicated circuit or an increase in the data amount. A one-dimensional wavelet transform in a predetermined direction is omitted in stage 1, where components 1 and 2 of input image data have been sub-sampled. When coefficient data generated through such a two-dimensional wavelet transform are to be encoded, sub-bands that are not contained in the coefficient data in comparison with the coefficient data of a component 0 should be considered to have been truncated.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 20, 2002
    Date of Patent: March 25, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventors: Yukio Kadowaki, Mitsutaka Iwasaki, Yutaka Sato, Kazuhiro Miyazaki
  • Patent number: 7321693
    Abstract: An image processing apparatus and an image processing method are disclosed for generating coded data having a desired data size at a high speed. The image processing apparatus includes a coding part, two memories, a setting part and a data size adjustment part. The coding part partitions a wavelet coefficient of image data into bit-planes and generates coded data of the image data through entropy coding on the wavelet coefficient for each of the bit-planes. The data size adjustment part adjusts a size of the coded data such that the size falls within an acceptable range including the target size set by the setting part by sequentially discarding a portion of the coded data in a least significant order based on the size of the coded data portion corresponding to each of the bit-planes.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 27, 2003
    Date of Patent: January 22, 2008
    Assignee: Ricoh Company, Ltd.
    Inventor: Yukio Kadowaki
  • Patent number: 7313284
    Abstract: An image coding apparatus compressing and encoding image data, includes a frequency converging unit to perform frequency conversion on the image data; a bit-plane encoding unit to perform bit-plane encoding on coefficients obtained from the frequency converting unit; and a code discarding unit to discard codes obtained from the bit-plane encoding unit until a present code amount becomes a predetermined code amount. The code discarding unit includes a first discarding unit to perform the discarding operation on a basis of a first code unit; and a second discarding unit to further perform the discarding operation on a basis of a second code unit that is smaller than the first code unit, if necessary, after the discarding operation on the basis of the first code unit is performed by the first discarding unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 24, 2004
    Date of Patent: December 25, 2007
    Assignee: Ricoh Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tooru Suino, Hiroyuki Sakuyama, Yukio Kadowaki