| 摘要 |
<p>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To increase a processing speed and to shorten an address reading time by selecting a dictionary of a specific area from an area dictionary according to a partial data read from mail and reading the address of mail by using this selected specific area dictionary. SOLUTION: A photoelectric conversion part 1 converts image-picked-up mail to a letter image of a digital image and this image is successively processed in an address detection part 2 and a character detection part to detect a character image of an address to cut out the same. A character discrimination part 4 compares this character image with all character patterns of character discrimination dictionaries 600, 601... and several kinds of character candidates high in similarity are extracted to be arranged in a character candidate row. A word collation part 5 takes the coincidence with all address words in word collation disconaries 700, 701... from this character candidate row. In this case, a dictionary selection part 12 selects area dictionaries 9-11 for address words peculiar to areas from the reading result of a wide area dictionary 8 for head words such as names of the metropolis and districts to read the same. By this constitution, the number of dictionaries to be used is reduced to perform high speed processing.</p> |
