Remote deposit of checks can be facilitated by a financial institution. A customer's general purpose computer and image capture device may be leveraged to capture an image of a check and deliver the image to financial institution electronics. Additional data for the transaction may be collected as necessary. The transaction can be automatically accomplished utilizing the images and data thus acquired.

A binary image of an input image is generated, and a character region within the binary image and a region surrounding each character are acquired as character segmentation rectangle information. A thinning process is executed on a region within the binary image which is identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information to acquire a thinned image. An edge detected image of the region identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information is acquired. Whether each character identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information is a character to be separated from a background by the binarization process or not is determined based on a result of a logical AND of the thinned image and the edge detected image.

A binary image of an input image is generated, and a character region within the binary image and a region surrounding each character are acquired as character segmentation rectangle information. A thinning process is executed on a region within the binary image which is identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information to acquire a thinned image. An edge detected image of the region identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information is acquired. Whether each character identified based on the character segmentation rectangle information is a character to be separated from a background by the binarization process or not is determined based on a result of a logical AND of the thinned image and the edge detected image.

An image reading apparatus includes an image data obtaining unit, a foreign material position information obtaining unit, and a separation processor. The image data obtaining unit obtains image data read from a document passing over a read area. The foreign material position information obtaining unit obtains foreign material position information read from the read area in which the document is not present. The separation processor separates the image data into plural objects including a background object, detects, by using the foreign material position information, a streak image portion caused by foreign material in the read area and included in the image data, and assumes a pixel of the streak image portion to belong to the background object if the pixel is present in the background object and has a pixel value equal to or smaller than a threshold determined in accordance with a representative value of the background.

A speech setting system includes a job execution device that is capable of executing a job, and a speech setting assistance device that assists generation of the job to be executed by the job execution device based on speech information obtained from a speech, wherein the job execution device includes a first hardware processor, the first hardware processor is configured to execute the job in accordance with a parameter set for each of a plurality of setting items, and display a setting screen in which a plurality of the parameters respectively corresponding to the plurality of setting items are arranged, the speech setting assistance device includes a second hardware processor, and the second hardware processor is configured to determine the parameter corresponding to each of the plurality of setting items based on the speech information, and output speech output information for outputting the determined parameter corresponding to each of the plurality of setting items by speech in accordance with an output order that is defined based on a relative positional relationship among the plurality of the parameters arranged in the setting screen.

An image processing device includes an image reader that reads an image, a first determiner that determines whether character crushing occurs when the image is binarized, a second determiner that determines a rate of a photographic region in the image, and a controller that performs conversion into monochrome N-gradation image data based on determination results of the first and second determiners.

Remote deposit of checks can be facilitated by a financial institution. A customer's general purpose computer and image capture device may be leveraged to capture an image of a check and deliver the image to financial institution electronics. Additional data for the transaction may be collected as necessary. The transaction can be automatically accomplished utilizing the images and data thus acquired.

A digital camera processing system with software to manage taking photos with a digital camera. Camera software controls the digital camera. A downloaded software component controls the digital camera software and causes a handheld mobile device to perform operations. The operations may include instructing a user to have the digital camera take photos of a check; displaying an instruction on a display of the handheld mobile device to assist the user in having the digital camera take the photos; or assisting the user as to an orientation for taking the photos with the digital camera. The digital camera processing system may generate a log file including a bi-tonal image formatted as a TIFF image.

A digital camera processing system with software to manage taking photos with a digital camera. Camera software controls the digital camera. A downloaded software component controls the digital camera software and causes a handheld mobile device to perform operations. The operations may include instructing a user to have the digital camera take photos of a check; displaying an instruction on a display of the handheld mobile device to assist the user in having the digital camera take the photos; or assisting the user as to an orientation for taking the photos with the digital camera. The digital camera processing system may generate a log file including a bi-tonal image formatted as a TIFF image.

A digital camera processing system with software to manage taking photos with a digital camera. Camera software controls the digital camera. A downloaded software component controls the digital camera software and causes a handheld mobile device to perform operations. The operations may include instructing a user to have the digital camera take photos of a check; displaying an instruction on a display of the handheld mobile device to assist the user in having the digital camera take the photos; or assisting the user as to an orientation for taking the photos with the digital camera. The digital camera processing system may generate a log file including a bi-tonal image formatted as a TIFF image.