JP2017129933A - Image management system and vehicle maintenance system using the same - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve the problem that when associating and capturing an image file recording a work in maintenance information of a vehicle, times and labors to search for the image file in a storage place are required for reading the image file, and especially that when there exist a plurality of maintenance vehicles, searching for a target image file becomes complicated.SOLUTION: The image management system includes: photographing a specific site of a target vehicle to generate identification information unique to the vehicle from image data of the specific site of the vehicle; searching for an image file by comparing and referring to basic information of maintenance history information and the identification information; and storing the image file with the maintenance history information. Thus, it is possible to easily create maintenance history data with an image file.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 3

Description

  The present invention relates to an image management system for managing a plurality of photographed images, and in particular, using this, the vehicle unique information from an image obtained by photographing a vehicle unique information display unit for identifying a vehicle of a maintenance target vehicle. Vehicle maintenance system provided with image processing that assists in easily storing and associating images of maintenance and repair of the vehicle by adding the vehicle-specific information thus read to the additional information of the image About.

  In the maintenance of automobile inspection, etc., in the vehicle maintenance system that creates maintenance estimates, maintenance records, bills, etc. by a PC (personal computer, the same applies hereinafter), the actual work is replaced or replaced when the maintenance records are created. Increasingly, a photograph of the state of a part is taken and the photographed image is added to a maintenance record. In order to prevent unauthorized vehicle inspections that make a declaration as if maintenance has been carried out, even though it has not actually been maintained, this is instructed by the Land Transport Bureau or to the owner of the vehicle subject to maintenance. The service is used to accurately convey the work contents by showing the state of the replaced part as an image.

  The captured image is used by being taken into a database of the vehicle maintenance system including a PC in which the vehicle maintenance system program is installed or a server connected to the PC.

  However, if you take pictures every time you proceed with the maintenance work of the vehicle, it will result in a large amount of images. Since the vehicle-specific information is not added, it takes time to specify and save the necessary images, and for those who are not familiar with PCs, it may be difficult to find the location of the images. is there.

  Patent Document 1 discloses an “automobile maintenance / inspection sheet” corresponding to the maintenance record in which images, illustrations, and the like stored in association with vehicle types prepared in the maintenance system database in advance are stored (Patent Document 1). If the images and illustrations corresponding to the maintenance target vehicle are not recorded in the database or are not appropriate, an image of the maintenance target vehicle is displayed. It describes that it is stored and used in association with unique information.

  In Patent Document 2, an estimate information of a vehicle to be repaired is created by a repair estimation program, and an image obtained by shooting the vehicle to be repaired is started by an image management program and taken into a PC, and created by a repair estimate program. It describes that the estimated information is linked with the image data by referring to and selecting the estimated information from the image management program.

Patent No. 3316457 JP-A-11-232340

  In Patent Document 1, when there is no appropriate image data of a maintenance target vehicle in the database, an image taken by an imaging unit such as a digital camera is used to obtain information on the maintenance vehicle (manufacturer, vehicle type, model, license plate, vehicle In the database along with the owner ’s name, etc., or if there is maintenance history information for the vehicle being serviced, it should be stored in association with the vehicle specific information in the history information, In creating maintenance information in this way, images are used effectively. However, there is still room for improvement in managing captured images easily.

  The image linking method in Patent Document 2 is created by a repair estimation program, repair estimate data of a vehicle to be repaired is created, an image is imported by an image management program, and then the repair estimate data is received from the image management program side. In this case, if there are multiple images of repair target vehicles, the images will be stored in advance by the image management program. After organizing, there is a problem in that it takes time to link the repair estimate data for each organized image. In addition, even when images are organized in advance by an image management program, in the conventional technique, information for managing images captured on a PC while being viewed on the PC screen is added from the keyboard or images are captured. Therefore, there is a problem in that it is necessary to manually store the data in the database, relying on the file name recorded in advance, and it takes time and effort to select and manage the images of the vehicles to be maintained.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and a first object is to enable efficient management of a plurality of captured images, and to further improve the efficiency of image management in a vehicle maintenance system. The second issue. A third problem is to provide a vehicle maintenance system that can easily capture a captured image of a maintenance location when creating vehicle maintenance information.
More specifically, when the vehicle specific information display unit of the maintenance target vehicle is photographed and the image is stored in the image folder DB2 of the PC or the server, the vehicle is obtained from the image obtained by photographing the vehicle specific information by the image recognition program. When generating the maintenance information in the maintenance system without generating the unique information and adding the vehicle information to the image and storing it, and without assigning the image to the vehicle information. The image capturing method can easily call up the image of the vehicle to be serviced, and can easily create the maintenance information with the image by storing the vehicle maintenance information and the image together with the link or the vehicle maintenance information in the server. It is to provide a maintenance system equipped with.

In order to solve at least one of the above-described problems, the present invention is an image management system for managing a plurality of images, and is a unique information photographed image obtained by photographing unique information composed of characters arranged according to a specific rule. And a captured image capturing unit that acquires an arbitrary captured image that does not include the specific information, a specific information is acquired from the specific information captured image acquired by the captured image acquisition unit, and the specific information is Provided is an image management system comprising a photographed image editing means for recording a photographed image name or additional information.
The unique information included in the photographed image is composed of character information arranged according to a certain rule. For example, character information in which a first two-digit number, a hyphen, and then a five-digit number are written, Information arranged in accordance with a certain rule, such as character information in which digits are combined in two upper and lower stages. The character information may be converted into character information by being converted into a barcode, a two-dimensional barcode, or the like.
The arbitrary photographed image is an image other than the unique photographed image, and is an image photographed so that at least the unique information is not included in the image, or even if it is included, it cannot be recognized.
The unique information photographed image and the arbitrarily photographed image can be photographed by a device equipped with an imaging unit, for example, a digital camera, a digital video camera, or a portable information terminal equipped with an image sensor.
In the image management system according to the present invention, the unique information is unique information that can identify a maintenance target vehicle that requires maintenance, and the arbitrary captured image is in the maintenance target vehicle that requires maintenance. One or two or more photographed images obtained by photographing at least one of the maintenance scenery and the maintenance target portion can be obtained.
Such an image management system can be used in a vehicle maintenance system that creates maintenance information associating maintenance information of the maintenance target vehicle that requires maintenance with a photographed image of the maintenance target vehicle. That is, the vehicle maintenance system includes an image management unit that manages an image by associating a captured image with each maintenance target vehicle, and the image management system according to the present invention can be used as the image management unit.
More preferably, a specific information display image of a vehicle to be maintained, specifically a specific information captured image of a vehicle license plate, and an arbitrary captured image of a vehicle to be maintained, a maintenance site and a maintenance landscape are displayed on a PC. Or, in the image folder DB5 of the server, the license plate recognition program scans the image and performs license plate character recognition, generates vehicle specific information from the vehicle specific information, and generates the vehicle specific information, By adding to the optional captured image, the specific information of the maintenance target vehicle entered in the maintenance record by the maintenance system without the need to sort multiple captured images in advance. The photographed image is searched, and the maintenance record and the maintenance vehicle image are associated with each other. Vehicle license plate recognition is widespread that has high accuracy enough to recognize a license plate in a moving vehicle, such as entering / exiting a parking lot, tollgate on a highway, and speed control.

  When creating a maintenance record by the maintenance system, images can be extracted using the vehicle-specific information added to the arbitrarily photographed image as a key. You can eliminate the time-consuming work of taking an optional shot image while selecting and sorting, and the shot optional shot image can definitely be aligned with the maintenance record, so maintenance points etc. Create a maintenance record that includes images of maintenance locations (arbitrary images) that can be used to create maintenance histories that include these images and to explain the details of maintenance to the owner of the maintenance target vehicle. There are merits such as being easy to do.

It is a network block diagram concerning embodiment of this invention. It is an example of the car license plate concerning the embodiment of the present invention. It is the figure which showed the process sequence in embodiment of this invention. It is an example of a liquid crystal screen of a digital camera It is an image figure which a license plate recognition program scans. It is an image figure which adds vehicle specific information to each image. This is an example when image properties are displayed on a PC. It is a hardware block diagram of a terminal or a server apparatus.

Examples of the present invention will be described below. For example, FIG. 1 includes a terminal 1 that is a PC in which a maintenance system program is installed and a plurality of terminals 3 that are connected via a LAN network depending on the user in a maintenance shop that maintains vehicles. The terminal 3 is also installed with the same program as the terminal 1. Furthermore, in this embodiment, a server device 2 connected to the terminal 1 or the terminal 3 via an Internet line or the like is provided. This server device 2 includes vehicle data DB1 such as vehicle manufacturer, vehicle type, model, year, body, mission, etc. necessary for maintenance, repair estimation, and maintenance records, and a part name, part model number, A part data DB 2 such as part price, a work man-hour information DB 3 necessary for maintenance, and a database such as an external appearance of the vehicle associated with the vehicle type and an image / illustration DB 4 of main maintenance parts are stored. The terminal 1 or the terminal 3 is installed with a license plate recognition program and an image capture editing program. Note that the license plate recognition program and the image capture editing program may be installed in a terminal different from the maintenance system. The terminal 1 or the terminal 3 is generally a desktop PC or a notebook PC, but may be a portable terminal such as a tablet PC. In the present embodiment, a computer that executes the license plate recognition program and the image capture editing program functions as a captured image editing unit.
FIG. 8 is a hardware configuration diagram of the terminal 1, the terminal 3, and the server device 2. These apparatuses have an operation unit 12, a storage unit 14, a RAM 15, and a processing control unit 16 as essential components, and optionally include an imaging unit 11, a ROM 13, a display unit 17, and a printing unit 18. be able to. An operator can input necessary information by operating an operation unit including a mouse, a keyboard, or a touch panel, and the processing control unit 16 acquires the input information and executes predetermined information processing. . Various programs are stored in the storage unit 14 or the ROM 13, and are read into the RAM 15 and executed by the processing control unit 16 during execution.

  FIG. 2 is an example of a license plate that is a vehicle specific information display section. The maintenance location of the maintenance target vehicle including the image file of the license plate 5 of the maintenance target vehicle is photographed by the digital camera 4 and the maintenance state is shown. When the necessary number of images have been taken, the image data is taken in from the image take-in editing program. To capture an image file, connect a digital camera or other photographing means to the terminal with a communication cable, or take out a memory card as a recording medium from the digital camera 4 and insert it into the memory card slot of the terminal 1 or 3 Recently, there is a digital camera that can transfer data by connecting to a PC using wireless communication. In addition, since a photographing means such as a smartphone provides a service for sharing and storing image information via a network only by photographing, they may be used.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a process of associating the image data of the maintenance object vehicle of the present invention with the maintenance information.
In step 1, the license plate 5 attached to the vehicle is photographed with the digital camera 4 to create a unique information photographed image in which the vehicle number, which is unique information, is photographed. At this time, the photograph is taken as large as possible so that the license plate is filled in the finder of the camera or the liquid crystal screen 6 of the digital camera as shown in FIG. In recent years, the character recognition accuracy of license recognition devices and license plate recognition programs has increased, so that even half of the viewfinder and LCD screen can be fully recognized, but generally OCR (optical character recognition) In the case of a reading device) and the like, the larger the character outline can be clearly identified, the higher the recognition accuracy.

  Here, let's touch on license plate recognition technology. The license plate attached to the vehicle is in what position on the plate, what size, what kind of numerical values and letters, etc. It consists of multiple types of numbers, kanji, and hiragana that indicate each information of “Serial Number”, “Transportation Bureau Code”, “Classification Number”, and “Use Code” determined by the Enforcement Regulations of the Vehicle Law. ing. That is, the character information described on the license plate is unique information composed of characters arranged according to a specific rule. Therefore there is a character in advance which position, which position is it is easy to recognize by distinguishing whether the numbers are. Regarding the recognition of license plates, it is difficult to photograph the license plate of a vehicle in the field or on the move from the front because many patent applications have been filed. The technology for developing how to photograph and accurately recognize the license plate and how to use the information of the recognized license plate is being developed every day under adverse conditions, and the police on the road The most representative practical example is the “N system” (automobile number automatic reading device) that monitors the passing of installed vehicles. In patents, for example, JP2013-89031 (Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd.) It is an example currently disclosed about the technique which performs recognition accurately. However, license plate recognition devices and programs tend to be more expensive with higher accuracy, such as increasing the resolution of the camera. The license plate recognition according to the present invention allows the photographer to take a picture while confirming the stopped vehicle, so that a stable image can be obtained. Therefore, a relatively inexpensive one is sufficient, while considering cost effectiveness. Appropriate thing should just be adopted.

  In step 2, after photographing the license plate 5, a maintenance location is photographed while a maintenance operation is performed, and an optional captured image is created by recording an image of the maintenance location. The photographing at this time differs depending on the front, side, upper surface, diagonally upside, diagonally sideways, diagonally down of the vehicle, and the illuminance at the photographing location and the color of the vehicle.

  There are few parts that require maintenance or replacement if the vehicle is new, but as the model gets older, there are more parts that require maintenance, repairs, and parts replacement, and the number of shots tends to increase. is there. At this time, the number plate 5 is photographed continuously for one vehicle and then photographed so that other vehicles and unrelated images are not included in the middle. As a result, a number (such as a file name) is assigned to an arbitrary photographed image in succession to a number (such as a file name) assigned when photographing the unique information photographed image.

  And if there are multiple vehicles to be serviced, after shooting one vehicle, take a photo of the license plate of the second vehicle to be serviced. Repeat for any maintenance target vehicles. When resuming maintenance work, such as when one vehicle is being serviced for several days and an image of another vehicle is sandwiched, the license plate must always be photographed first.

  In step 3, an image capturing / editing program is started on the terminal 1 or 3, and captured images (unique information captured image and arbitrary captured image) are captured on the terminal or the server 2. The image capturing / editing program may be attached to the PC, but the image capturing program provided by the camera maker accompanying the digital camera is stored in a preset storage area when capturing from the digital camera to the PC. Many of them have functions such as automatically creating a new file folder, for example, creating a folder for each date, and it is convenient for batch downloading of a large number of images. In order to create, a folder is generated by referring to information on the shooting date and time recorded in the additional information of the image file, which will be described later.

  In step 4, a license plate recognition program for recognizing the license plate characters from the image file taken into the terminal or the server 2 is activated. The license plate recognition program according to the present invention has a function for adding character-recognized information to the additional information of the image file.

  In step 5, the license plate recognition program scans the maintenance target vehicle image file in the folder where the image file was saved in step 3 in order from the earliest shooting order as shown in FIG. Vehicle specific information is generated from the recognized image file (unique information photographed image file). In the case of an image of only one vehicle to be repaired, after scanning up to the last image file, the scanning is terminated and vehicle-specific information is added to all image files (arbitrarily captured image files).

  Here, the additional information of the image file taken with the digital camera will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 7 shows a property for displaying additional information of an image file opened on a PC. Unless otherwise specified, image files shot with a digital camera are given a consecutive number in the shooting order as an image file name 100 and are taken in and managed in a memory unit inside the camera. Additional information, usually called Exif information, is recorded in an image file shot with a digital camera. This additional information includes the manufacturer, model, shooting date, image size, exposure time, and ISO speed of the shooting camera. This includes information related to various types of shooting, such as (sensitivity) and whether or not the flash is used. This information is information that can be easily viewed from the file properties on the PC as shown in FIG. 7. In this additional information, some items such as the title 101, the subject 102, the tag 103, and the comment 104 include It can be added and edited from the property or from an image processing program. This added / edited information can be used as a keyword for searching, extracting and organizing image data on a PC. For example, if “Travel” is entered in the title in order to create an album or the like in an album creation program on a PC, an image including the title “Travel” can be used as a keyword to be collected on the album.

  Next, when the license plate recognition program recognizes that there is vehicle-specific information from the image of the license plate of image 001 as shown in FIG. 6, vehicle-specific information is generated, and a continuous file name 100 is attached to image 001. If the vehicle-specific information is not recognized after the image 001 is sequentially scanned after the image 001, it is determined that the image is a series of images 001, and when the scan to the last image is completed, the title in the additional information of each image 101, subject 102, tag 103, comment 104, etc., by adding the vehicle specific information, it can be used to search for an image file using the vehicle specific information. Find image files easily. The item to which the unique information is added may be set in advance in the program, or may be arbitrarily set by the user after the program is installed.

  In step 6, it is determined whether there are images of a plurality of maintenance vehicles. If there is information on a plurality of vehicles, the following processing is executed. Even if images of multiple vehicles are saved, the image file names are numbered sequentially in the order of shooting, so the number recognition program scans the image data sequentially from the first license plate image as shown in step 5. If it recognizes the image file containing the second license plate information (unique information shooting image file), it determines that there are multiple vehicle images, and the image file number of the second license plate. The image file with the previous number is the last image of the first vehicle, and vehicle-specific information is assigned to each image. From the image file recognized as the second license plate, the vehicle of the second license plate Add the unique information to the additional information of the image file. In addition, if there is an image file for the third and fourth vehicle to be repaired, similarly, the image file for which the vehicle-specific information for number play is recognized is separated as a key, and the number play information is also added to the additional information in the image file. Each vehicle specific information is added. The recognition of the unique information photographed image file can be determined based on whether or not the data is acquired by reading OCR or the like. This is because an arbitrarily photographed image does not include the unique information or cannot be recognized, and therefore an error value is output upon interpretation by OCR.

  In step 7, the maintenance system program is activated on the terminal 1 or 3 to input maintenance information.

  In step 8, information such as the maintenance result is input. Before that, the maintenance system uses personal information such as the name and address of the customer (car owner) of the maintenance vehicle, and a number that is unique information of the maintenance target vehicle. Enter customer information by inputting plate information. Further, detailed information of the vehicle is created from the vehicle type information described in the vehicle verification. The actual work information will be added after the maintenance work. If the maintenance history has been saved in the past, the license plate information, which is the specific information of the vehicle to be maintained, is used as a key to search the history data and call the customer and vehicle information, vehicle maintenance estimates, maintenance records Create customer invoices and more.

  In step 9, the maintenance system is instructed to call the vehicle image, and by referring to the folder in which the target vehicle image is stored, the vehicle specific information stored in the customer information is used as a key. By comparing the vehicle-specific information added to the additional information of the file and importing the target image file into the maintenance system or associating with a link etc., maintenance information with the added image information is created and the image is attached The maintenance history information is easily completed.

  As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to save the trouble of saving in a specific file folder in advance while searching for an image file.

  In a car maintenance and repair factory, the maintenance system is used to easily create estimates, maintenance records, and invoices. ”Can reduce the work that has become a bottleneck for using maintenance systems, leading to improved service for customers of automobile maintenance and repair shops. In addition, as explained in the maintenance system, even with a deposit estimation system used when repairing an accident vehicle, etc., a photograph of the damaged part is taken and provided to an automobile insurance company for use in insurance estimation. It can be used even in the case of plating repair.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Maintenance system terminal 2 Server apparatus 3 Maintenance system terminal 4 Digital camera 5 Vehicle license plate 6 Example of preview of photographed license plate 100 File names 101 to 102 given to image file by digital camera Additional information input to image file Possible items DB1 to DB4 Main databases used by the maintenance system.

Claims (3)

An image management system for managing a plurality of images,
A captured image capturing means for acquiring a captured image of unique information composed of characters arranged in a specific rule, and an arbitrarily captured image that does not include the unique information;
Specific information is acquired from the captured information acquired by the captured image acquisition unit, and the captured image editing unit records the specific information in the name or additional information of the arbitrary captured image. Image management system. The unique information is unique information that can identify a maintenance target vehicle that requires maintenance,
The image management system according to claim 1, wherein the arbitrary photographed image is one or more photographed images obtained by photographing at least one of a maintenance scenery and a maintenance target portion in a maintenance target vehicle that requires the maintenance. A vehicle maintenance system that creates maintenance information in which maintenance information of the maintenance target vehicle requiring maintenance is associated with a photographed image of the maintenance target vehicle,
Image management means for managing the image by associating the captured image with each maintenance target vehicle,
A vehicle maintenance system, wherein the image management means is constituted by the image management system according to claim 1 or 2.

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