Digital camera

Title: Digital camera

Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Claims

The Patent Description & Claims data below is from USPTO Patent Application 20080284900, Digital camera.

1. A digital camera, comprising: an imaging unit that receives and images light from an object which has passed through shooting optical system; a recognition unit that recognizes a feature region of the object by using an image obtained by imaging by the imaging unit; a detection unit that detects a size of the feature region that is recognized by the recognition unit; and a control unit that predicts a distance to the object after a predetermined time according to the size of the feature region, and controls the shooting optical system so as to bring the object into focus.

2. The digital camera according to claim 1, further comprising: a distance calculation unit that calculates a distance to the object according to the size of the feature region; and a speed calculation unit that calculates a moving speed of the object according to a time change of the distance to the object, wherein the control unit predicts the distance to the object calculated by the distance calculation unit and the distance to the object according to the moving speed of the object calculated by the speed calculation unit.

3. The digital camera according to claim 2, wherein the distance calculation unit calculates the distance to the object based on position information of a lens constituting the shooting optical system, and calculates the distance to the object based on the calculated distance to the object and the size of the feature region after calculating the distance to the object based on the position information of the lens constituting the shooting optical system.

4. The digital camera according to any of claims 1-

3, wherein the control unit predicts the distance to the object at the time of imaging based on the time between a shooting execution operation and imaging by the imaging unit, and controls the shooting optical system so as to bring the object into focus at the time of imaging by the imaging unit.

5. The digital camera according to any of claims 1-

4, comprising: a registration unit that selects the feature region of the object for predicting the distance to the object, from at least one said feature regions recognized by the recognition unit, and registers feature information of the selected feature region of the object; wherein after feature information of the feature region of the object is registered, the recognition unit recognizes the feature region of the object based on the feature information of the feature region of the object.

6. The digital camera according to claim 5, further comprising: a record control unit that stores in a recording medium an image, which is obtained by imaging by the imaging unit, wherein the registration unit registers the feature information of the feature region of the object based on the image stored in the recording medium.

7. The digital camera according to claim 5 or 6, wherein the feature information of the feature region is at least one of position information of a lens constituting the shooting optical system, the distance to the object, and the size of the feature region.

8. The digital camera according to claim 4, wherein a shooting condition is modified in response to one of calculation results of the distance calculation unit and the speed calculation unit.

9. The digital camera according to claim 8, wherein the shooting condition is one of a shutter speed and ISO sensitivity.

10. The digital camera according to any of claims 1-

9,

Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Claims

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Previous Patent Application:
Automatic focus adjusting apparatus and automatic focus adjusting method, and image pickup apparatus and image pickup method
Next Patent Application:
Image processing system and camera
Industry Class:
Television

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