JPS6338744B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Application of the Invention] The present invention relates to an optical character reader that reads characters written with a writing instrument such as a ballpoint pen.

[Background of the invention]

When reading handwritten characters with an optical character reader, the first
As shown in the figure, character frames 2 and 3 are printed in advance on a form 1 to be used, and characters to be data are written in the character frames with a writing instrument. It is necessary for the optical character reader to print the character frame in a color that appears to have low contrast with the white background of the form (hereinafter referred to as a drop-out color). In addition, for accounting documents, etc., initial issued documents are printed in blue-based colors, correction documents are printed in red-based colors, and the type of document is identified by the printed color, so drop-out colors are used. requires a blue system and a red system. The use of blue-based and red-based colors as dropout colors can be realized by using the fact that both colors have high reflectance for light in the infrared region. In other words, when a form is irradiated with light from a light source and the reflected light from the form is received by a photodetector and converted into an electrical signal, light detection is used to reduce the contrast between blue and red printing colors. It is sufficient to pass the light incident on the device through an optical filter and control it to only the infrared region. However, in order to prevent tampering with data such as accounting documents that contain monetary data, it is common to use a ballpoint pen as a writing instrument, and many ballpoint pens (black) have low reflectance in the infrared region. Due to the use of expensive ink, if the method described above restricts the light incident on the photodetector to only the infrared region through an optical filter, the contrast of text written with a ballpoint pen will also be low. Therefore, a problem arises in that it cannot be read by an optical character reader. For this reason, conventional optical character readers have the configuration shown in FIG. 2.
To explain the photoelectric conversion section of the optical character reader in FIG. 2, a form 1 is irradiated with a light source (lamp) 10. Scanning line 11 on form 1 illuminated by light source 10
is projected onto a photodetector (for example, a one-dimensional semiconductor CCD sensor) 17 by a lens 16 through a filter 12 . The filter 12 is a filter support 14
The structure is such that the filter 13 can be replaced by moving the handle 15 attached to the filter by an operator. With this structure, when reading a form in which characters are written with a ballpoint pen and the drop-out color is blue, the filter 12 (blue filter) is positioned below the lens 16 to enable reading. Further, when reading a form in which characters are written with a ballpoint pen and the drop-out color is red, the handle 15 is moved and the filter 13 (red filter) is positioned below the lens 16, thereby making it possible to read the form.

However, in such conventional technology, depending on whether the dropout color is blue or red, the operator has to move the filter, which makes the operation complicated and can lead to erroneous operation. There is.

[Purpose of the invention]

The object of the present invention is to write data using a black ballpoint pen in a data entry frame printed in a red drop-out color, and to write data using a black ballpoint pen in a data entry frame printed in a blue drop-out color. To provide an optical character reader capable of reading data written with a black pencil or printed in black in a data entry frame printed in drop-out colors of red and blue. It is.

[Summary of the invention]

The present invention is characterized by a plurality of optical filters corresponding to the printing color of the data entry frame or the writing instrument used to enter the data, a means for storing a format program corresponding to the form, and a means for storing a format program corresponding to the form. The present invention includes means for selecting an optical filter corresponding to the printing color of the entry frame of the form or the writing instrument used to enter the data.

[Embodiments of the invention]

Hereinafter, specific examples of the present invention will be described. Third
An embodiment of the present invention is shown in the figure. The control unit 21, which is composed of a microprocessor or the like, uses a display to input data entered by the operator using keys. It is connected to the keyboard 22. It is also assumed that the control section 21 is connected to a floppy disk device 23, and a format program can be input from the floppy disk. The control unit 21 is connected to magnet drive circuits 24 and 25,
The magnets 19 and 1 are
8 can be excited. The magnets 19 and 18 can move the filter support 14 to the right or left by energizing them, respectively.
The filter support 14 supports the blue filter 12 and the red filter 13.
When the filter support 14 moves to the right, the blue filter 12 is located directly below the lens 16, and when the filter support 14 moves to the left, the red filter 13 is located directly below the lens 1.
It shall be located directly below 6. The lamp 10 emits light in the white spectrum (for example, a xenon lamp), and illuminates the form 1 to be read.
The scanning line 11 is passed through a blue filter 12 or a red filter 13 and a one-dimensional semiconductor
It is assumed that the image is projected onto the CCD sensor 17. The blue filter 12 is, for example, an optical filter that has a peak at 500 nm and passes light with a half-width of 100 nm, and the red filter 13 is an optical filter that has a peak at 600 nm, for example, and passes light with a half-width of 100 nm. As a result, the light passing through the blue filter 12 is 500 nm.
Since the light has a peak width of 100nm at half maximum, it is possible to use a blue dropout color. Similarly, the red filter 13 emits light with a peak wavelength of 600 nm and a half-width of 100 nm, so a red dropout color can be used. 1
The dimensional semiconductor CCD sensor 17 consists of a 2048-bit photodetection cell, and the output is sent to the character recognition section 20.
send to It is assumed that the character recognition section 20 is constructed using a known technique and recognizes characters on the form 1 using signals output from the one-dimensional semiconductor CCD sensor 17. It is assumed that the result recognized by the character recognition section 20 is encoded and output to the control section 21.

The operation will be explained below. FIG. 4 shows the flow programmed into the control unit 21 and the operations performed by the operator. First, in step 30, the operator turns on the power to the optical character reader. When the power is turned on, the control unit 2
Instructions for inputting each program are displayed on the display according to the program No. 1, the operator inputs the program name from the keyboard, and the control unit 21 reads the program name input from the keyboard (step 31). In step 32, according to the program of the control section 21, the control section selects a format program that matches the program name inputted from the keyboard from among the format programs stored on the floppy disk mounted on the floppy disk device 23. 21. The format program includes the form dimensions of form 1 to be read,
In addition to the information necessary for the format program of a normal optical character reader, such as the coordinates of the characters to be read on form 1, character type, number of lines, and number of digits, the dropout color specification, i.e., blue or red, is also required. It is assumed that information specifying the system is included. In step 33, the filter is moved according to the dropout color designation in the input format program. That is, if the designated dropout color is blue, the magnet 19 is excited via the magnet drive circuit 24 according to the program of the control section 21. By energizing the magnet 19, the filter support 14 moves to the right, and the blue filter 12 is positioned below the lens 16.
Further, if the dropout color is designated as red, the magnet 18 is excited via the magnet drive circuit 25 according to the program of the control section 21. By energizing the magnet 18, the filter support 14 moves to the left, and the red filter 13
is located below the lens 16. In this way, a filter suitable for the dropout color specified by the input format program is positioned below the lens 16. In step 34, the form 1 is conveyed to the photoelectric conversion section by the paper feeding mechanism (not shown in FIG. 3) according to the program of the control section 21, and the form 1 is read. After the reading is completed, it is determined in step 35 whether there is any other form to be read. For example, the judgment is on the display. The operator using the keyboard 22 makes the determination. If there is another document to be read, the process returns to step 31 again. If no other forms are read, step 3
Step 6 turns off the power to the optical character reader.

Another embodiment of the invention is shown in FIG. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 5, three types of filters are attached to the filter support 14. That is, the blue filter 12, the red filter 13, and the infrared filter 26.
It is assumed that the infrared filter 26 transmits light of 700 to 900 nm. Further, it is assumed that a pulse motor 27 moves the filter support 14 instead of the magnets 19 and 18. It is clear that such a configuration allows for the movement of three types of filters. In this case, in addition to forms with drop-out color blue on which letters are written using a black ballpoint pen, and forms with drop-out color red on which letters are written using a black ballpoint pen, black pencils or black printed letters may be used. When reading characters written with writing instruments with low reflectance in the infrared region,
By using the filter 26, it is possible to simultaneously read forms with dropout colors blue and red.

In this embodiment, up to three types of filters are used, but it is clear from the embodiment shown in FIG. 5 that it can also be used to move three or more types of filters.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As described above, according to the present invention, data is written with a black ballpoint pen in a data entry frame printed in a red color, and data is written with a black ballpoint pen in a data entry frame printed in a blue dropout color. Written data and data printed in red and blue drop-out colors It is possible to read data written in black pencil or printed in black within the entry frame.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is a diagram showing the format of a form, Fig. 2 is a block diagram showing a conventional reading unit, Fig. 3 is a block diagram of a reading unit according to an embodiment of the present invention, and Fig. 4 is an operational flowchart of the present invention. FIG. 5 is a configuration diagram of a reading section according to another embodiment of the present invention. 1... Ledger, 10... Lamp, 11... Scanning line, 12, 13, 26... Filter, 14... Filter support, 16... Lens, 17... One-dimensional semiconductor CCD sensor, 18, 19... ...Magnet,
20...Character recognition unit, 21...Control unit, 22...
Display. Keyboard, 23... Floppy disk drive device, 24, 25... Magnetic drive circuit, 27... Motor.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. The data entry frame is printed in a drop-out color of red or blue by irradiating light onto a form, and by receiving the reflected light from the form with a photodetector, data can be written in the data entry frame. An optical character reader that reads data from a form includes a filter support that holds three types of filters, a red filter, a blue filter, and an infrared filter, arranged on the optical path of reflected light from a form, and a filter support that holds the filter support for the form. A moving means for a filter support that moves in a direction perpendicular to the reflected light from the document and positions one of the three types of filters on the optical path of the reflected light from the document, the dimensions of the document to be read, and the data on the document. storage means storing a format program having information specifying the coordinates of the character, the type of character, the number of lines of data, the number of digits of data, and a filter; A format program is read from the means, and under the control of the format program, the moving means for the filter support is driven, and the filter corresponding to the drop-out color of the form to be read or the writing instrument used to write the data is moved to the form. An optical character reader characterized in that the optical character reader is positioned on the optical path of reflected light from.