Patent EP1601189A2 successfully refreshed from Google Patents.
EP1601189A2
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Autofocus system
Assignee: Fujinon Corp
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Filing: 2005-05-24
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Granted: —
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Expires: 2025-05-24
Abstract
Abstract The autofocus system of the present invention is characterized by comprising a target subject specifying device (26) which specifies a target subject to be put into focus, a tracking image pickup device (23) which captures a subject image in the shooting range of the camera, and is provided in addition to an image pickup device of the camera which captures a subject image to be recorded or regenerated, a target subject movement detection device (26) which detects a movement in the shooting range of the target subject specified by the target subject specifying device (26) according to an image signal of a subject image captured by the tracking image pickup device (23), and an AF area change device (16) which changes a range of the AF area such that the movement of the target subject detected by the target subject movement detection device (26) is tracked.
Inventors
- 👤 Tadashi Sasaki
- 👤 Kunio Yata
Bibliographic Details
Application Number
—
Jurisdiction
EP
Data Source
google_patents
Last Synchronized
2026-11-09 11:09
CPC Classifications
H; H04; H04N; H04N23/00; H04N23/60; H04N23/67; H04N23/675; H04N23/61; H04N23/63; H04N23/633; H04N23/635
Claims Analysis
Total Claims: 7
Claim 1
Independent Claim
179 words
An autofocus system which controls focus of a taking lens on a subject as a
target of autofocus in a range of an AF area in a shooting range of a camera, and
automatically puts the subject into focus, characterized by comprising: a target subject specifying device (26) which specifies a target subject to be put
into focus; a tracking image pickup device (23, 24) which captures a subject image in the
shooting range of the camera, and is provided in addition to an image pickup device of
the camera which captures a subject image to be recorded or regenerated; a target subject movement detection device (26) which detects a movement in
the shooting range of the target subject specified by the target subject specifying device
(26) according to an image signal of a subject image captured by the tracking image
pickup device (23, 24); and an AF area change device (16) which changes a range of the AF area such that
the movement of the target subject detected by the target subject movement detection
device (26) is tracked.
Claim 2
Dependent Claim
36 words
The autofocus system according to claim 1, wherein the tracking image pickup device (23, 24) comprises a frame rate change device
(24) which changes a number of frames of subject images captured in a unit time.
Claim 3
Dependent Claim
55 words
The autofocus system according to claim 2, wherein the frame rate change device (24) changes a number of frames of subject images
captured in a unit time by the tracking image pickup device (23, 24) based on the speed
of the movement of the target subject detected by the target subject movement detection
device (26).
Claim 4
Dependent Claim
30 words
The autofocus system according to claim 1, further comprising an exposure adjustment device (26) which changes brightness of the subject
image captured by the tracking image pickup device (23, 24).
Claim 5
Dependent Claim
230 words
An autofocus system which controls focus of a taking lens on a subject as a
target of autofocus in a range of an AF area in a shooting range of a camera, and
automatically puts the subject into focus, characterized by comprising: an image pickup device (124) which sequentially obtains an image of a subject
in the shooting range; a target subject specifying device (126) which specifies a target subject to be put
into focus by the autofocus; a storage device (126) which obtains an image of the target subject specified by
the target subject specifying device (126) as a reference image from the image pickup
device (124) and stores the image; a target subject detection device (126) which sequentially detects an image of
the target subject from among images sequentially obtained by the image pickup device
(124) by detecting an image matching the reference image from among the images
obtained by the image pickup device (124); an AF area change device (116) which changes a position of the AF area to track
the target subject based on a position of an image of the target subject detected by the
target subject detection device (126) in the shooting range; and an update device (126) which updates a reference image stored by the storage
device (126) by an image of the target subject detected by the target subject detection
device (126).
Claim 6
Dependent Claim
60 words
The autofocus system according to claim 5, wherein the target subject detection device (126) detects an image matching the reference
image from among images in a range obtained by limiting a range of an image obtained
by the image pickup device (124) to a part of a range including a range of an image of
the target subject detected before.
Claim 7
Dependent Claim
46 words
The autofocus system according to claim 5, wherein the target subject detection device (126) detects an image of the target subject by
obtaining a difference between two images sequentially obtained by the image pickup
device (124) when an image matching the reference image cannot be detected.
References Cited (Backward Citations)
No citation records indexed.
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