Intelligent detection of text on a page
US6289122A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Apr 15, 1999 |
| Grant date | Sep 11, 2001 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Apr 15, 2019 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06V30/413
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A technique for segmenting an image into text areas and non-text areas in which an image is stored with the following information per pixel: gray scale intensity (4 bits) and an indication of whether the pixel is neutral or color (1 bit). The image, e.g. a scanned RGB image, is converted to 0-15 levels of intensity and has a neutral/color indication bit assigned to each pixel. The technique proceeds in three phases as follows: Tile the image by square blocks, e.g. 6.times.6 or 8.times.8 for 600 dpi images, and store information about each block in a buffer; sweep the buffer left to right three tile rows at a time and make a preliminary decision for every tile-block in the middle row; examine the decision made in the previous step in a context block, e.g. a 3.times.3 block, and make revisions if necessary.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.