JPH0710106B2 - Medical image storage device - Google Patents

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus, and more particularly to a medical image storage apparatus for storing image information of a transendoscopic image.

2. Description of the Related Art Recently, a technology for digitizing image information to process and store the image information has been developed.
Since the amount of information is too large, a large-capacity memory is required, and the circuit system becomes complicated accordingly. In particular, in processing an endoscopic image, there are various demands for image color, gradation, resolution, etc. From this viewpoint, improvement of image processing is demanded.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a medical image storage device in which the amount of information is mutually distributed and stored in accordance with the required information density of the color image information with respect to the reference color information.

According to the present invention, an image data output means for outputting analog color image data including a plurality of color signals, and a gradation setting for setting a variable and arbitrary gradation for each of the plurality of color signals according to a required information density. Means for A / D converting the plurality of color signals according to the gradation set by the gradation setting means.
/ D conversion means, storage means composed of a plurality of memory planes, a plurality of memory planes of the storage means according to the gradation for each color signal set by the gradation setting means, necessary information of each color signal There is provided a medical image storage device comprising: a memory allocating means for allocating in correspondence with a density, and a means for respectively storing a color signal corresponding to each memory plane allocated by the memory allocating means. It

Embodiment In FIG. 1, an eyepiece 12 of an endoscope 11 is provided with a CCD, for example.
A TV camera 13 using an image sensor is attached. The RGB separation circuit 14 is connected to the output code of the TV camera 13.
RGB separation circuit 14 is A / D via each RGB signal line.
Connected to the input terminals of converters 15R, 15G, 15B. The output terminals of the A / D converters 15R, 15G, and 15B are data bus lines 16
It is connected to the writing section of the memory 17 via R, 16G and 16B.
The reading section of the memory 17 is connected to the input section of the D / A converters 19R, 19G, 19B via the data bus lines 18R, 18G, 18B. The output terminals of the D / A converters 19R, 19G, 19B are connected to the input terminals of the TV signal processing circuit 20. The output terminal of the TV signal processing circuit 20 is connected to the monitor 21.

The output terminal of the RGB separation circuit 14 is a sync signal separation circuit 22.
Connected to. Output terminal of sync signal separation circuit 22 is CPU23
Connected to. The program is stored in the CPU23 R
The OM 24 and the keyboard 25 are connected. Further, the CPU 23 uses the control lines 26, 27 to control the A / D converters 15R, 15G,
15B and D / A converters 19R, 19G and 19B, and further connected to the memory 17 via the address bus 28.

The light source unit 29 is connected to a connector of the endoscope 11 for introducing illumination light into the endoscope 11.

When the TV camera 13 captures a transendoscopic image in the image processing apparatus having the above configuration, the TV camera 13 outputs a color video signal. When the video signal is supplied to the RGB separation circuit 14, it is separated into three primary color R, G, B signals. R, G, B signals are
It is converted into R, G, B digital data respectively by the A / D converter. In this case, the sampling timing for A / D conversion is controlled by the CPU 26 which operates in response to the sync signal from the sync signal separation circuit 22, and each of the R, G, B signals is a 5-bit multi-valued data. Digitally converted. When multi-value digital data is input to the memory 17, this memory 17
Memorized in. As shown in FIG. 2, the memory 17 has a plurality of bit planes 17R-1, 17R-2, 17R-3, 17G-1, 17G-2, 17G assigned to R, G, B, for example, three sheets each. −3,17B−
It is composed of 1,17B-2 and 17B-3. On the other hand, the multi-valued digital data output from the A / D converters 15R, 15G, and 15B has a 5-bit configuration, so in order to store each of the R, G, and B data in the bit plane, each reference color is On the other hand, a total of 15 bit planes, 5 bit planes are required. However, the maximum gradation may not be required for all images. For example, in the case of a medical image, it may be desired to reduce or increase the gradation of a specific color image. In the case of a trans-endoscopic image, the color of the image is almost red, so the gradation of red may be reduced. Further, in a specific disease, the affected area may be stained with a stain such as methylene blue. In such a case, it is necessary to increase the gradation of the dyed portion, that is, the blue portion. At this time, five bit planes are required to store 5-bit multi-valued data, but it is rather not preferable to set the other two colors to 5 bits. Therefore,
It is preferable to change the distribution of the number of R, G, and B bits according to the color state of the image. To achieve this, the keyboard
25 designates a color whose gradation is desired to be increased, for example, blue B. CPU23 is color B specified by keyboard 25
5 bit planes for the B image data corresponding to, for example, bit planes 17R-1, 17R-2, 17R-3, 17G-
Address to allocate 3,17B-3. As a result, the 5-bit B image data is converted to the bit plane 17R-
It is stored in 3,17G-3, 17B-1, 17B-2, 17B-3. Red and green (R and G) image data whose gradation may be reduced are the corresponding remaining bit planes Bit planes 17R-1, 17R
It is stored in -2, 17G-1, 17G-2. In this case, R and G
The gradation degree for 2 corresponds to 2 bits.

The image data stored in the memory 17 as described above is read in the same manner as writing. That is, bit plane 17
R-3, 17G-3, 17B-1, 17B-2, 17B-3 are addressed for reading the B image data, bit plane 17R-
1,17R-2 is addressed for reading the R image data. Similarly, the memory planes 17G-1, 17G-2 are addressed for reading the G image data.

The R, G, B image data read from the memory 17 is input to the D / A converters 19R, 19G, 19B and converted into analog signals.
As a result, analog image signals corresponding to 2 bits are output from the D / A converters 19R and 19G, and the D / A converter 19B
Outputs an image signal corresponding to 5 bits. D / A
The analog image signals from the converters 19R, 19G, and 19B are supplied to the TV signal processing circuit 20, are subjected to signal processing, and are supplied to the monitor 21, so that a color image having a high gradation of blue is obtained.

As described above, according to the present invention, the memory planes allocated to store the plurality of reference color data of the color image information are shared with each other according to at least one required gradation degree of the reference color data. By reducing the memory capacity and emphasizing or suppressing the desired reference color, it is possible to precisely observe any specific portion of the image.

Although a TV camera is used as a means for outputting an analog color image in the embodiment, a memory device such as an electronic still camera or a disk device may be used. Further, the number of bit planes allocated is not limited to the embodiment.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block circuit diagram of a medical image storage device according to an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a memory. 11 …… Endoscope, 13 …… TV camera, 14 …… R, G, B separation circuit, 15R-15B …… A / D converter, 17 …… Memory, 17R−
1 to 17B ... bit plane, 19R to 19B ... D / A converter, 20 ... TV signal processing circuit, 21 ... monitor, 22 ... sync signal separation circuit, 23 ... CPU, 25 ... keyboard.

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continued Front Page (72) Inventor Hisayuki Harada 2-43-2 Hatagaya, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo Olympus Optical Co., Ltd. (72) Inventor Isao Hirosawa 2-43-2 Hatagaya, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo Olympus Optical Co., Ltd. (56) Reference JP-A-55-54933 (JP, A) JP-A-58-42374 (JP, A)

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An image data output means for outputting analog color image data including a plurality of color signals, and a gradation setting means for variably setting an arbitrary gradation for each of the plurality of color signals according to a required information density. An A / D conversion means for A / D converting the plurality of color signals according to the gradation set by the gradation setting means, a storage means composed of a plurality of memory planes, and the gradation setting Memory allocating means for allocating a plurality of memory planes of the memory means corresponding to the required information density of each color signal according to the gradation of each color signal set by the memory means, and the memory planes allocated by the memory allocating means. And a means for storing color signals corresponding to each of them, the medical image storage device.