Antonelli, Terry, Stout & Kraus, LLP
Address reader, sorting machine such as a mail thing and character string recognition method
 An address reader method and apparatus for recognizing a receiver address on a surface of mail. In the invention an image of the surface of the mail is input and segmented into at least one character string candidate. At least one address area candidate is extracted from the image based upon the segmented character string candidate. One of the address area candidates extracted from the image is selected as a receiver address of the mail by analyzing each of the address area candidates based on predetermined position information indicating a usual position of a receiver address area, character direction information indicating a character direction of a character string appropriate for the predetermined position information, and key character string information indicating a character string most likely to exist in a receiver address. Characters in character strings of the selected address area candidate are recognized as a receiver address which is used to sort the mail. 
Hitachi, Ltd.
G Y
G06V Y10S
inventional additional
Masashi Yoh Shigeru Tatsuhiko Hiromichi
Koga Ueda Watanabe Kagehiro Fujisawa