JP2008288744A - Surveillance camera system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a monitoring camera system including a recording device which can restore an original image by canceling privacy protection when necessary in the case of reproducing the image protected by the privacy protection. <P>SOLUTION: A monitoring camera 100 is provided with an image separation part 102 for separating a privacy protection target image to separate the privacy protection target image, an external medium 400 is connected to the recording device 300 to store the privacy protection target image, and the original image is restored by an image composition part 303. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2009,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a surveillance camera system including a recording / reproducing apparatus, and more particularly to a surveillance camera system having a privacy protection function.

In recent years, surveillance cameras have been installed on street corners, condominium entrances, in stores, etc. to prevent crimes such as theft and to record evidence of accidents and incidents. Surveillance camera systems that observe images and transitions in real time and store captured images in a recording device such as a hard disk drive have become widespread, and the information recorded in the recording device can be used for later analysis and evidence of the incident. As useful.

  On the other hand, there are cases where images that lead to infringement of privacy are included, such as the inside of a building being captured from a signboard or a window.

  As background art of the present technology, for example, there is JP-A-2005-252849 (Patent Document 1). In this publication, as a problem, “Providing a highly reliable surveillance camera system in which privacy protection settings performed on the imaging side can be easily confirmed from the outside” is provided. “To protect the privacy of the imaged side, the protected area setting unit 108 sets a protected area that is not to be monitored by the user, and converts the captured monitoring image into an image with the protected area set according to the settings. The recording / reproducing unit 106 ”is recorded.

JP 2005-252849 A

  The problem to be solved by the present invention is to make use of information captured by a surveillance camera and recorded in a recording device for subsequent analysis or evidence of an incident for use in recording evidence of an accident or incident. As described above, when the privacy protection area is completely filled, it becomes impossible to restore the portion. For this reason, there is a problem that information cannot be obtained when information is necessary, such as at the time of a crime, and information cannot be obtained.

  In order to solve the above problems, an object of the present invention includes a recording apparatus that can restore the original image by removing privacy protection as necessary when reproducing an image recorded on a recording / reproducing apparatus with privacy protection The provision of a surveillance camera system.

  In order to solve the above-described problem, an outline of one aspect of the present invention is that an image captured by a photographing apparatus is subjected to a privacy protection mask (hereinafter referred to as a mask image) and a privacy protection target image ( (Hereinafter referred to as “target image”) is recorded in the recording / reproducing apparatus independently, and the mask image and the target image reproduced independently from the recording / reproducing apparatus are combined to enable display on the monitor.

  Further, a means for ensuring security is provided in the recording / reproducing apparatus for recording the mask image and the target image.

  Specifically, in order to achieve the above object, the present invention is configured as described in the claims.

  According to the present invention, both security and privacy protection are realized.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a monitoring system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

The monitoring system according to this embodiment includes a monitoring camera 100 that captures a monitoring destination such as a street, a recording device 300 connected to the monitoring camera 100 via a network 200, an external medium 400, and a display device 500.
The monitoring camera 100 includes an imaging unit 101, an image separation unit 102, a mask processing unit 103, a microcomputer 104, a restoration information adding unit 105, and an image transmission unit 106.

  The imaging unit 101 sends data obtained by imaging the monitoring destination to the image separation unit 102 and the mask processing unit 103. The microcomputer 104 calculates the number of masks, mask size, and mask position coordinates from the mask area specified by the user operation unit of the recording apparatus 300 and stores them in the internal memory, and stores them in the image separation unit 102 and the mask processing unit 103. In addition to sending, the time is also acquired.

  The image separation unit 102 acquires the number of masks of the mask image, the image size, and the position coordinates of each mask from the microcomputer 104, and the image included in the mask area (hereinafter abbreviated as a target image) from the imaging data of the imaging unit 101 And the image data is sent to the restoration information adding unit 105.

  The mask processing unit 103 acquires the number of masks of the mask image, the image size, and the position coordinates of each mask from the microcomputer 104, and performs image processing on the imaging data of the imaging unit 101 (hereinafter referred to as a mask image and a mask image). The image data is sent to the restoration information adding unit 105.

  The restoration information adding unit 105 acquires the number of masks of the mask image, the image size, and the position coordinates of each mask from the microcomputer 104 and also acquires time information, adds them to the mask image and the target image, and adds them to the image transmission unit 106. Send.

  The image transmission unit 106 independently transmits the target image and the mask image to the recording apparatus 300 via the network 200.

  The recording apparatus 300 receives the target image and the mask image from the monitoring camera 100 by the image receiving unit 301 and records the target image on the external medium 400 and the mask image on the internal medium 302 independently. The user operation unit 307 allows the user-specified image mode selection based on the control of the mode setting unit 306, and transmits the image to the display device 500 through the data transmission unit 305.

  The user operation unit 307 instructs the mode setting unit 306 to set the mode and the image composition unit 303 to specify the image restoration time, and also instructs the microcomputer 104 of the monitoring camera 100 where to set the mask.

  The mode setting unit 306 sets the recording of the mask image on the internal media recording unit 302 or the recording of the target image on the external media 400, displays the mask image on the display device 500, or sets the mask. A composite display of an image and a target image is set, and four image mode settings of a live distribution mode, a recording live distribution mode, a recording / reproduction mode, and a restoration mode can be set based on an instruction from the user operation unit 307.

In the live distribution mode, the mask image received by the image receiving unit 301 is sent to the image transmitting unit 304 as it is. (3b)
In the recording live distribution mode, the mask image received by the image receiving unit 301 is recorded on the internal medium 302 (3c) and sent directly to the image transmitting unit 304. (3b)
In the recording / playback mode (recording), a mask image is recorded on the internal medium 302. (3c)
In the recording / playback mode (playback), the internal media 302 is played back based on information specified by the user, a mask image is read, and sent to the image transmission unit. (3d)
In the restoration mode (recording), the mask image is transmitted to the internal medium 302 and the target image is transmitted to the data transmission unit 305 and is recorded on the external medium 400. (3a) When performing live distribution at the same time, the mask image received by the image receiving unit 301 is sent to the image transmitting unit 304 as it is. (3b)
In the restoration mode (reproduction), the mask image and the target image are synthesized based on information specified by the user. A mask image read from the internal medium 302 and (3f) and a target image read from the external medium 400 are (3e), and the image composition unit 303 collates the restoration information of the mask image and the target image to perform image composition. To restore the original image and send the image to the image transmission unit 304 (3g).

  The image transmission unit 304 transmits the image data to the display device 500.

  In the live distribution mode, the recording live distribution mode, and the recording / playback mode, the target image is not stored, and only the restoration mode stores the target image. In addition to the restoration mode, the displayed image is only a mask image, and the target image cannot be handled. Further, by storing the target image in an external medium and separating it from the recording device 300, personal information can be prevented from being lost even if one of the external media or the recording device is stolen.

  In FIG. 1, the monitoring camera 100 and the recording device 300 are connected on a one-to-one basis. However, this is only an example, and monitoring may actually be performed by connecting several cameras.

  Next, the image separation unit 102 and the restoration information adding unit 105 of the monitoring camera 100 will be described in detail.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of the image separation unit 102 that separates the target image from the video captured by the imaging unit 101, and includes an image reception unit 107, a target image extraction unit 108, and an image temporary storage device 109.
When the image receiving unit 107 of the image separating unit 102 receives the image data of the imaging unit 101, the target image extracting unit 108 separates the target image based on the mask position coordinates stored in the microcomputer 104, and temporarily stores the image. Record in device 109. When there are a plurality of masks, each target image is handled separately, and each target image is recorded as one image in the temporary image storage device 109, and then all the stored target images are sequentially restored. Sent to 105.

  FIG. 3 is a block diagram of the restoration information adding unit 105, which includes an image receiving unit 110 and an information adding unit 111. When the image receiving unit 110 receives the target image from the image separating unit 102, the mask position table, the image size, and time information stored in the microcomputer 104 are acquired and added to the target image information by the information adding unit 111. The image is sent to the image transmission unit 115. On the other hand, when the image receiving unit 110 receives a mask image from the mask processing unit 103, the mask position table, the number of masks, the image size, and time information stored in the microcomputer 104 are acquired, and the information adding unit 111 receives them. The image is added to the mask image and sent to the image transmission unit 106.

  The information on the image size, time, position coordinates of the target image, or the image size, time, position coordinates, and number of masks of the mask is restoration information, and FIG. 4 shows an example of the restoration information.

  Reference numeral 201 denotes restoration information of a mask image having N masks, which includes information on the image size, the number of masks, and time, and position information on N masks. In the present invention, the mask position information is such that only two diagonal coordinates are acquired and the coordinates of the two points on the diagonal (upper left and lower right in this case) are held.

  Reference numerals 202 and 203 denote restoration information of the target image 1 and the target image N, which add image size, time, and vertex coordinates of two diagonal points.

  When the mask image and the target image are analog signals, the restoration information is added to the 21st in the vertical blank period (VBI) and transmitted from the image transmission unit 106 as shown in FIG. Similarly, when the mask image and the target image are digital signals, data compression is performed, a blank period is provided, restoration information is added, and the image is transmitted from the image transmission unit 106.

  Next, an example of the target image, the mask image, and the restoration information according to the present embodiment will be shown based on FIG. 6, FIG. 7, and FIG.

  FIG. 6 shows a state where the monitoring camera 101 is monitoring the inside of the house 116 and the house 117 and the inside thereof, and mask processing is performed so as not to show the inside of the two houses for privacy protection. There is a need. The mask position is specified in advance by the user, and the mask coordinates of the house 116 are upper left (100, 200), lower right (300, 400), and house 117 is upper left (500, 300), lower right (800, 500). ) Is set. The time is January 1, 2006, 12:15:00.

  FIG. 7 shows a mask image 118, “target image 1” 119, and “target image 2” 120 when the image shown in FIG. 6 is input to the image separation unit 102.

  FIG. 8 shows restoration information of the mask image, the target image 1, and the target image 2 of FIG. The mask image restoration information 121 includes an image size of 500 KB, two masks, a time of January 1, 2006, 12:15:00, and the coordinates of the mask 1 are in the upper left (100, 200), lower right (300 , 400) and the coordinates of the mask 2 are upper left (500, 300) and lower right (800, 500).

  The restoration information 122 of the target image 1 has an image size of 100 KB, a time of January 1, 2006, 12:15:00, and the position of the target image is the upper left (100, 200) on the mask image. It shows that it is lower right (300, 400).

  The restoration information 123 of the target image 2 is restoration information added to the target image 120. The image size is 120 KB, the time is January 1, 2006, 12:15:00, and the position of the target image is the upper left (500, 300) and lower right (800, 500) on the mask image. It is shown that.

  Next, an image composition method in the image composition unit 303 of the recording apparatus 300 of the present embodiment will be described.

  FIG. 9 is a diagram schematically showing that only time information of restoration information is stored as management information 601 and image data and restoration information are independently stored as image information 602 for each medium. In the case of the internal medium 302, the mask image and restoration information are image information, and in the case of the external medium 400, the target image and restoration information are image information.

  Also, in the internal media 302 or the external media 400, image information in a predetermined time range is searched from the image combining unit 303 from the management information 601 of each medium, and the image information address is obtained from the management information address. High speed search is realized.

  FIG. 10 is a block diagram of the image composition unit, and the image composition device 303 includes a restoration information reception unit 305 and an image restoration unit 306.

  Hereinafter, an image composition method will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. 11 taking as an example the case where the restoration mode (reproduction) is set by designating the restoration time range by the user operation unit 307.

  In step 401, authentication is performed using a password or the like for confirming whether or not the person who performed the user operation is qualified to obtain the restored image information. If the authentication fails, the process ends. If the authentication succeeds, the process proceeds to step 402.

  In step 402, the restoration information receiving unit 305 acquires the restoration time range specified by the user operation unit 307.

  In step 403, the restoration information receiving unit 305 requests the internal media 302 for image information in a time range obtained by dividing the restoration time range specified by the user operation unit 307 according to the memory capacity in the restoration information receiving unit 305. To do. The internal medium 302 acquires an address within a predetermined restoration time range based on the management information 601, searches the image information at high speed based on the obtained address, and sends the image information to the restoration information receiving unit 305. With this control, the restoration information receiving unit 305 obtains a mask image and restoration information in the designated restoration time range.

  In step 404, as in step 403, the restoration information receiving unit 305 requests the external media 400 for image information in the divided time range. The external media 400 is requested for image information in a time range divided each time according to the free space in the memory. The external medium 400 acquires an address within a predetermined restoration time range based on the management information 601, searches the image information at high speed based on the acquired address, and sends the image information to the restoration information receiving unit 305. With this control, the restoration information receiving unit 305 obtains the target image and restoration information in the designated restoration time range.

  In step 405, the image restoration unit 306 acquires time information and coordinate information from the restoration information of the mask image.

  In step 406, the image restoration unit 306 acquires time information and coordinate information from the restoration information of the target image.

  In step 407, the coincidence of the time information and coordinates of the mask image and the target image is confirmed. If the coordinates match, image composition is performed.

  FIG. 12 shows an example of combining a mask image and a target image. By combining the mask image 313 on the mask based on the coordinates of the target image 315, the combination can be realized. When an image is written to the internal media 302 or the external media 400, even if encoded in JPEG or the like, if the decoding is performed in front of the image composition unit 306, an operation such as overwriting the mask portion with the data of the target image is possible. Become.

  In step 408, it is confirmed whether image composition within a predetermined restoration time range is completed. If not completed, the process returns to step 407. If completed, the process proceeds to step 409.

  The image synthesized by the image synthesis unit 303 is sent to the image transmission unit 304 and transmitted to the display device 500.

  In restoration, it is necessary to set up a person with rights that can be restored in order to protect privacy, and for authentication, it is effective to manage authority by multiple people for further privacy protection. Can be restored only after the approval of everyone. For example, if the place to be masked is fixed, such as in a house, putting the landlord in one of the authorities provides stronger privacy protection.

  As described above, according to the present invention, normal reproduction and recording can handle only masked images, and privacy protection is enhanced by recording the target image outside the recording apparatus. When the target image information is necessary, the image from which the mask is removed can be restored to prevent information loss. That is, according to the present embodiment, stronger privacy protection and information provision can be performed, and a more advanced monitoring system service can be provided.

The block diagram which shows the structure of the monitoring system of this invention The block diagram of the image separation part in the surveillance camera of this invention The block diagram of the restoration information addition part in the surveillance camera of this invention Diagram showing examples of restoration information Schematic diagram of vertical blanking period (VBI) in display device The figure which expresses the state where the surveillance camera is monitoring the inside of two houses The figure which shows the example of the mask image which masked the inside of two houses, and a target image The figure which shows the example of the restoration information of the mask image and object image of FIG. A diagram schematically showing that only time information of restoration information is stored in the management information area and image data and restoration information are independently stored in the image information area for each medium. Block diagram of the image composition unit Flow chart for image composition when restore mode (playback) is set The figure which shows the compositing method of a mask image and a target image

Explanation of symbols

100 surveillance cameras, 101 imaging units, 102 image separation units, 103 mask processing units,
104 microcomputer 105 restoration information adding unit 106 image transmitting unit 107 image receiving unit 108 target image extracting unit 109 temporary storage device
110 image receiving unit, 111 information adding unit, 116 target object (house 1),
117 target object (house 2), 118 mask image, 119 target image 1,
120 target image 2, 200 network, 201 mask image restoration information,
202 target image 1 restoration information, 203 target image N restoration information, 300 recording device,
301 image receiving unit, 302 internal media, 303 image composition unit,
304 image transmission unit, 305 data transmission unit, 306 mode setting unit,
307 User operation unit, 400 external media, 500 image display device
600 Media configuration, 601 management information, 602 image information

Claims (4)

A monitoring camera having an imaging unit and a transmission unit for transmitting image information captured by the imaging unit, a recording medium receiving unit for recording and reproducing the image information, a recording device having a transmission unit, and an image information of the recording device A surveillance camera system comprising an image display device for displaying an image with a receiving unit,
The monitoring camera is provided with an image signal processing unit that separates a mask image that forms a mask region from an image captured by the imaging unit and a target image that is hidden by the mask region,
In the recording apparatus, an internal medium for recording and reproducing the mask image, a recording unit for recording the target image on an external medium, an image combining unit for combining the mask image and the target image, a mask image and a target image A surveillance camera system comprising a switching operation unit for switching between a composite image and the mask image.   The monitoring camera system according to claim 1, wherein an authentication procedure is performed by switching to a composite image in the switching operation unit.   3. The surveillance camera system according to claim 1, wherein the mask image and the target image transmitted from the surveillance camera to the recording apparatus are independent image signals. A monitoring camera having an imaging unit and a transmission unit that transmits image information captured by the imaging unit, a recording medium that records and reproduces the image information, a recording unit that includes a reception unit, and a transmission unit, and image information of the recording device A surveillance camera system comprising a receiving unit for receiving and an image display device for displaying an image,
The monitoring camera is provided with an image signal control unit that separates a mask image that forms a mask region from an image captured by the imaging unit and a target image that is hidden by the mask region,
A recording unit that independently records the mask image subjected to mask processing and the target image, an image combining unit that combines the mask image and the target image, a combined image of the mask image and the target image, and the mask; A surveillance camera system comprising an image switching operation unit and performing an authentication procedure by switching to the composite image.

Images