IMAGE PROCESSING ON AN ITEM OF HARDWARE THAT IS OPTIMIZED WITH REGARD TO VECTOR CALCULATION AND COLOR MIXING

摘要

Algorithms for processing digitized images (digitally recorded, for example, by digital CCD or CMOS cameras, or analogally recorded by analog CCD cameras and subsequently converted in analog/digital converters) and for processing the information contained therein require, according to use, an extremely high amount of computing. Computer hardware, which is specialized for vector calculation and color mixture, so-called graphical processing units GPU (e.g. so-called 3D-accelerated graphics cards, preferably having the OpenGL standard and/or Direct X standard that are/is implemented on the hardware), and which has been developed particularly for entertainment electronics (computer games and animation) or for the depiction of three-dimensional structures (CAD), includes realizations of image processing algorithmics based on semiconductor technology. The inventive implementation of an item of hardware of the aforementioned type as an essential part of image processing enables an economically sensible realization of a computer performance required for carrying out real-time image processing. According to the invention, the GPU (also denoted, in part, as a VPU video processing unit) is not used in a conventional manner (namely for transforming artificial three-dimensional worlds into a two-dimensional view that is as realistic as possible on a display screen, but instead is used for the contrary by transforming real two-dimensional views (generally speaking: camera images) in order to determine the actual geometries prevailing in the real three-dimensional space.