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EP1478169A2 Expired / Lapsed EP ⏱️ 0.0 years remaining

Image-capturing apparatus and image processing apparatus

Assignee: Nikon Corp
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Filing: 2004-05-14
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Granted: —
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Expires: 2024-05-14
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Abstract

Abstract An image-capturing apparatus, includes: an image-capturing unit that captures an image of a subject through an optical system; and a control unit that outputs images captured at the image-capturing unit as image data files, and: the control unit outputs the image data files in a format that allows an image data file containing a normal image to be distinguished from an image data file containing a reference image to be used to correct an image defect in the normal image. An image processing apparatus, includes: an input unit to which an image data file output from the image-capturing apparatus is input; an identifying unit that identifies the image data file as a file containing the reference image or a file containing the normal image; and a correction unit that corrects an image defect in the image identified as the normal image based upon the image identified as the reference image.

Inventors

  • 👤 Hideo Hoshuyama
  • 👤 Keita Kimura

Bibliographic Details

Application Number —
Jurisdiction EP
Data Source google_patents
Last Synchronized 2026-11-09 15:16
CPC Classifications
H; H04; H04N; H04N1/00; H04N1/32; H04N1/32101; H04N1/32128; H04N1/40; H04N1/409; H04N1/4097; H04N2201/00; H04N2201/32; H04N2201/3201; H04N2201/3225; H04N2201/3242; H04N2201/328

Claims Analysis

Total Claims: 11
Claim 1
Independent Claim 79 words
An image-capturing apparatus, comprising: an image-capturing unit that captures an image of a subject through an optical system; and a control unit that outputs images captured at the image-capturing unit as image data files, wherein: the control unit outputs the image data files in a format that allows an image data file containing a normal image to be distinguished froman image data file containing a reference image to be used to correct an image defect in the normal image.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim 52 words
An image-capturing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a mode setting unit that sets a reference image acquisitionmode in which the reference image is to be obtained, wherein: the control unit designates an image captured by the image-capturing unit when the reference image acquisition mode is set as the reference image.
Claim 3
Dependent Claim 37 words
An image-capturing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 through 2, wherein: the control unit appends different extensions to the image data file containing the normal image and the image data file containing the reference image.
Claim 4
Dependent Claim 73 words
An image-capturing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 through 3, wherein: the image data files are each constituted of image data corresponding to pixels in the image and information related to the image; and the control unit stores information with which the image data file containing the normal image and the image data file containing the reference image can be distinguished from each other in the information related to the image.
Claim 5
Dependent Claim 109 words
An image-capturing apparatus comprising: an image-capturing unit that captures a subject image input through an optical system; a mode switching unit that selects a first mode in which a reference image is captured by the image-capturing unit or a second mode in which a normal image is captured by the image-capturing unit; an output unit that outputs the reference image and the normal image captured by the image-capturing unit as image data files to an external apparatus; and an information appending unit that appends information indicating whether an image data file output by the output unit contains the reference image or the normal image to the image data file.
Claim 6
Dependent Claim 50 words
An image-capturing apparatus according to claim 5, wherein: the information appending unit appends metadata containing information indicating either the reference image or the normal image to the image data file; and the meta data do not alter the reference image or the normal image contained in the image data file.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim 51 words
An image-capturing apparatus according to any one of claims 5 through 6, wherein: the information appending unit appends the information indicating whether the image data file contains the reference image or the normal image to the image data file by partially modifying a file name assigned to the image data file.
Claim 8
Dependent Claim 79 words
An image processing apparatus, comprising: an input unit to which an image data file output from an image-capturing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 through 4 is input; an identifying unit that identifies the image data file as a file containing the reference image or a file containing the normal image; and a correction unit that corrects an image defect in the image identified as the normal image based upon the image identified as the reference image.
Claim 9
Dependent Claim 88 words
An image processing apparatus according to claim 8, wherein: the image data files are each constituted of image data corresponding to pixels in the image and information related to the image; and the correction unit selects a specific reference image to be used to correct an image defect in a given normal image based upon the information related to the image contained in the image data file of the reference image and the information related to the image contained in the image data file of the normal image.
Claim 10
Dependent Claim 87 words
An image processing apparatus, comprising: an input unit to which an image data file output from an image-capturing apparatus according to any one of claims 5 through 7 is input; an identifying unit that identifies the image data file as a file containing the reference image or a file containing the normal image based upon the information; and an elimination unit that eliminates an effect of foreign matter present on an image-capturing optical path at the image-capturing unit from the normal image based upon the reference image.
Claim 11
Dependent Claim 27 words
A computer-readable computer program product comprising: a control program that executes a function of an image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 8 through 10.

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