JP3673616B2 - Gift certificate identification method and apparatus - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a gift certificate identifying method and apparatus for reading a gift certificate to be identified and identifying the type of the gift certificate based on the read image data, and in particular, efficiently identifying gift certificates having various formats. Therefore, the present invention relates to a gift certificate identification method and apparatus for performing high-speed classification and aggregation of gift certificates.
[0002]
[Prior art]
Currently, a wide variety of gift certificates (generally referred to as “gift certificates”) such as general gift certificates, gift cards, meal tickets, beer tickets, and book certificates are in circulation. It is necessary to automatically read the amount from various gift certificates and total or classify the total amount.
[0003]
For this reason, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 8-161641 describes each gift certificate information from the bundle of gift certificates described at a predetermined position of the gift certificate, and the total number and the total amount of the gift certificate for the bundle. A gift certificate totaling processing apparatus is disclosed in which each header card is read by OCR, and the result of counting the gift certificate information and the total amount of the header card are compared and verified to verify the mismatch.
[0004]
That is, in this prior art, the gift certificates are efficiently collected by reading the gift certificate information from a predetermined position of the gift certificate according to the format of the gift certificate.
[0005]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
However, in this prior art, when acquiring gift certificate information, it is assumed that the description position of the gift certificate information of each gift certificate included in one bundle is clear. Subject to restrictions.
[0006]
In other words, when the format of each gift certificate included in one bundle is unified, this prior art can read the gift certificate information from a predetermined position and perform efficient tabulation. If there is variation, gift certificate information cannot be aggregated efficiently.
[0007]
Therefore, under the present situation where various types of gift certificates having different formats have already spread in the market and gift certificates of different formats have to coexist, the scope of application of the above-mentioned conventional technology is often limited.
[0008]
For this reason, when there are gift certificates having different formats, how to efficiently count and classify the gift certificates is a very important issue.
[0009]
In particular, because the market is currently expanding and merging, there is a high possibility that popular gift certificates with different formats will be newly classified or tabulated due to the entry of foreign companies or new business alliances between companies. The significance of solving this problem is great.
[0010]
Japanese Examined Patent Publication No. 8-254589 discloses a technique for reading a plurality of types of documents having a frame, identifying a document from the frame structure of the read document data, and reading characters written in the frame. However, since this prior art is based on the premise that the document is identified by analyzing the frame structure, it cannot be applied to a gift certificate without a frame.
[0011]
Accordingly, the present invention provides a gift certificate identification method and apparatus that solves the above-described problems and efficiently identifies gift certificates having various formats, thereby enabling high-speed classification and aggregation of gift certificates. Objective.
[0012]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
In order to achieve the above object, the first invention reads a gift certificate to be identified and printed on the gift certificate in a gift certificate identification method for identifying the type of gift certificate based on the read image data. A character string region is extracted from the image data, and when the coordinate position of the extracted character string region corresponds to the coordinate position of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, characters included in the character string region are sequentially cut out, It is sequentially confirmed whether or not the extracted character string conforms to the code character string format of the reference gift certificate. If the character string conforms to the code character string format of the reference gift certificate, the gift certificate is It is characterized by identifying it as a ticket type.
[0013]
In addition, in the gift certificate identifying apparatus that reads the gift certificate to be identified and identifies the type of the gift certificate based on the read image data, the second invention is configured to store the character string area printed on the gift certificate. An extraction means for extracting from the image data, and whether or not the coordinate position of the character string area extracted by the extraction means corresponds to the coordinate position of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, and there is a corresponding reference gift certificate. In the case where the characters in the character string area are sequentially cut out, and if all of the cut out character strings match the format of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, the gift certificate is classified as the type of the reference gift certificate And determining means for determining.
[0014]
According to a third aspect of the present invention, the extracting means is connected by a first connecting means for connecting black pixels by replacing white pixels less than a predetermined run length with black pixels, and the first connecting means. When a plurality of black pixel columns positioned on the same line are in contact with the same pixel column, a second connecting means for connecting the plurality of pixel columns with black pixels and a plurality of parallel black pixel columns in contact with each other If there is a pixel shift, the character string region creating means is provided which uses the smallest rectangular region including the plurality of black pixel columns as the character string region.
[0015]
In addition, according to a fourth aspect of the present invention, the determination means sets the position data of a predetermined character string having a different format possessed by a plurality of reference gift certificates and the format data of the predetermined character string, respectively, to the type of the reference gift certificate. Corresponding to the character string area data by comparing the storage means for storing the data and the character string area data including the coordinate position of the character string area extracted by the extracting means with the position data stored in the storage means Search means for searching for a type of reference gift certificate having a character string; and a reference gift certificate that matches a format of a character string included in the character string area among the reference gift certificates searched by the search means, And specifying means for specifying based on the format data stored in the means.
[0016]
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
[0017]
FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram showing a configuration of a gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 according to the present invention.
[0018]
The gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 shown in FIG. 1 obtains a circumscribed rectangular area (hereinafter referred to as a “character string area”) including characters printed on a gift certificate to be identified, and a plurality of reference gift certificates registered in advance. A reference gift certificate that matches data on the coordinate position, width, and height of the character string area (hereinafter referred to as “character string area data”) is selected as a primary candidate.
[0019]
As shown in FIG. 2, the character string area data includes the coordinate position, height and width of the area in a coordinate system in which the upper left of the image data is the origin, the right direction is the x axis, and the lower direction is the y axis. Consists of.
[0020]
Once the primary candidate reference gift certificate is specified, the characters are cut out from the character string area of the image data and recognized one by one, and the recognized characters must conform to the preset reference gift certificate format. For example, the reference gift certificate corresponding to the gift certificate to be identified is specified by excluding the primary candidate.
[0021]
That is, since the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 is configured to identify the reference gift certificate that matches the format of the character cut out from the character string area from the primary candidates that match the character string area data of the gift certificate, A plurality of gift certificates having different formats can be identified, and gift certificates can be identified quickly and efficiently.
[0022]
As shown in FIG. 1, the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 includes an image input unit 11, a character string region extracting unit 12, a format determining unit 13, a character recognizing unit 14, a ticket type determining unit 15, and an output unit. 16
[0023]
The image input unit 11 is a processing unit that optically reads a gift certificate as a discrimination target as an image image and outputs the read image data to the character string region extraction unit 12.
[0024]
The character string region extraction unit 12 is a processing unit that extracts character string region data from the input image of the gift certificate to be identified. Specifically, the image data received from the image input unit 11 is binarized. A character string region in the horizontal direction is extracted by applying pixel connection processing, line segment connection processing, and region creation processing in the horizontal direction of the binarized image.
[0025]
In this pixel concatenation process, the binarized image is scanned in the horizontal direction to search for white pixels having a pixel value of “0”. If the run length of the white pixel is shorter than a predetermined value, The pixel connection is performed by performing a complementing process for converting the pixel into a black pixel.
[0026]
Further, in the line segment connection processing, black pixel columns that are continuous in the horizontal direction are regarded as line segments, and when two line segments located on the same line are in contact with adjacent line segments, the two Connects line segments that connect line segments.
[0027]
Also, in the area creation process, a black pixel row that is continuous in the horizontal direction is regarded as an area, and when two areas in contact with each other satisfy a predetermined condition, a circumscribed rectangle formed by the two areas is defined as a new area. Integrate.
[0028]
In the present embodiment, as this predetermined condition, for example,
a + b ≦ 4c
The inequality is adopted. Here, a is the length of one region, b is the length of the other region, and c is the length of the overlapping portion. However, if the integrated area is less than the character size, the area is not regarded as a character string, and only the area satisfying the character area is regarded as a character string area.
As described above, the character string region extraction unit 12 extracts the character string region in the horizontal direction by performing black pixel complementation, line segment complementation, and region complementation, and the position coordinates, width, and height of the character string region are extracted. The character string area data.
[0029]
Here, only the creation of the character string area data in the horizontal direction is shown, but the character string area data in the vertical direction is also created in the same manner as in the horizontal direction.
[0030]
The format determination unit 13 compares the character string region data created by the character string region extraction unit 12 with the position data and format data stored in advance, and the gift certificate to be identified has any format of a plurality of reference gift certificates. It is a processing unit that determines whether or not it matches.
[0031]
The position data is position data of code character strings composed of alphanumeric characters printed on each gift certificate, and the format data is the format of each code included in the code character string.
[0032]
Specifically, the format determination unit 13 first searches for all reference gift certificates corresponding to the character string region data extracted by the character string region extraction unit 12, and there is a corresponding reference gift certificate. First, it is confirmed whether or not the format of the code character string of the reference gift certificate allows the format of each character cut out from the character string area.
[0033]
And it repeats the matching of the character string area data sequentially until a reference gift certificate that allows all the formats of each character cut out from the character string area is found, and the type of the found reference gift certificate is the type of the gift certificate to be identified to decide.
[0034]
The character recognition unit 14 is a processing unit that recognizes a character cut out from the character string area by the format determination unit 13 using a pattern matching technique or the like, and the recognition result is output to the format determination unit 13.
[0035]
The ticket type determination unit 15 compares the type of the reference gift certificate determined by the format determination unit 13 with the attribute data and attribute value data registered in the dictionary in advance, and determines the ticket type and face value of the identification target gift certificate. Is a processing unit.
[0036]
In addition, this attribute data is data in which a face type such as a gift card, a general gift certificate, a meal ticket, or a face value such as a 500 yen ticket or a 1000 yen ticket is associated with a key position of a code character string, The attribute value data is data in which an attribute value such as a gift card, a general gift certificate, or a meal ticket is associated with a code.
[0037]
The output unit 16 is a processing unit that outputs the type of gift certificate to be identified determined by the ticket type determination unit 15 and the total of each gift certificate.
[0038]
By using the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 having the above-described configuration, it is possible to quickly and efficiently identify and classify gift certificates even when a plurality of gift certificates having different formats are to be identified.
[0039]
Next, the processing procedure of the character string area extraction unit 12 shown in FIG. 1 will be described.
[0040]
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure of the character string region extraction unit 12 shown in FIG.
[0041]
As shown in the figure, the character string region extraction unit 12 first binarizes the input image of the gift certificate received from the image input unit 11 into a binarized image composed of white pixels and black pixels ( Step 301), a horizontal pixel connection process is performed on the binarized image (Step 302).
[0042]
For example, when the binarized image shown in FIG. 4A is obtained, the binarized image is scanned in the horizontal direction, and as shown in FIG. A horizontal pixel concatenated image consisting of continuous pixel rows is created.
[0043]
When two line segments existing on the same line are adjacent to the same line segment among the black pixel columns, that is, the line segments of the horizontal pixel connection image, the horizontal line connecting the two line segments is displayed. Direction line segment connection processing is performed (step 303), and a horizontal direction line segment connection image shown in FIG. 4C is created.
[0044]
Then, when the continuous black pixels in the horizontal direction of the horizontal line segment connected image are regarded as a region, and two regions in contact with each other satisfy a predetermined condition, a circumscribed rectangle of the two regions is set as a new region. A horizontal area creation process is performed (step 304), and a horizontal area image shown in FIG. 4D is created.
[0045]
Then, based on the size of each area of the horizontal area image, horizontal character string determination processing is performed to determine whether or not the area is a character string area (step 305). For example, in the case of the horizontal region image shown in FIG. 4D, only the region 402 and the region 403 are determined as character string regions, and the region 401, the region 404, and the region 405 are not determined as character string regions. This is because the areas 401, 404, and 405 do not have a size as a character area.
[0046]
If the horizontal character string region is determined in this way, the vertical pixel connection process (step 306), the vertical line segment connection process (step 307), and the vertical direction are continued in the same manner in the vertical direction. An area creation process (step 308) and a vertical character string determination process (step 309) are performed.
[0047]
Therefore, the character string region extraction unit 12 can extract character string region data in the horizontal direction and the vertical direction.
[0048]
Next, the processing procedure of the format determination unit 13 shown in FIG. 1 will be described.
[0049]
FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure of the format determination unit 13 shown in FIG. As shown in the figure, the format determination unit 13 first checks whether or not a character string area exists (step 501). If a character string area exists, the format determination unit 13 determines whether the character string area data is present. Extraction (step 502), a reference gift certificate whose character string area data matches position data within a certain error range is searched, and the reference gift certificate obtained as a search result is set as a primary candidate (step 503).
[0050]
If there is no reference gift certificate that is the primary candidate (step 504), it is further checked whether another character string area exists (step 505), and another character string area exists. In this case, other character string area data is extracted (step 506), and the process proceeds to step 503.
[0051]
On the other hand, if there is a reference gift certificate that is a primary candidate, an image of the character string area is cut out (step 507), and characters are cut out character by character from the image (step 508).
[0052]
Each time a character is cut out, the cut out character is recognized (step 509), and the primary candidate that does not match the format data is excluded and set as a secondary candidate (step 510).
[0053]
Such character recognition is repeated for all characters (step 512). If there is no secondary candidate that satisfies the format condition, the process proceeds to step 505 (step 511). If all characters satisfy the format condition, the process is performed. finish.
[0054]
Next, the process of the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 shown in FIG. 1 will be described using a specific example. Here, a case where general gift certificates of “aaaa department store” and “bb department store” and a gift card of “cc department store” and the like are targeted for processing is shown.
[0055]
FIG. 6 (a) shows a general gift certificate for 1000 yen of aaaaaa department store. In this general gift certificate, a single line of identification data (code character string) consisting of four letters, five letters and one letter number is shown. Is attached to the upper left.
[0056]
FIG. 6B shows a general gift certificate of 500 yen for a bb department store. In this general gift certificate, a horizontal line of identification data consisting of 12-character numbers is given to the lower right.
[0057]
FIG. 6 (c) shows a gift card worth 500 yen for the cc department store. In this gift card, identification data consisting of 4 letters, 5 letters, and 1 letter connected with a hyphen is displayed vertically in the lower right corner. Is given in the direction.
[0058]
In this way, the gift certificates of aaaaaa department store, bb department store and cc department store have different formats.
[0059]
FIG. 7 is a diagram showing the character string area of the gift card of the cc department store shown in FIG. 6C. As shown in FIG. 7A, the areas 1 to 6 are character strings in the horizontal direction. Extracted as a region. Note that the region 21 and the region 22 are not extracted as character string regions because the region size is too large.
[0060]
Also, as the vertical character string regions, as shown in FIG. 7B, 14 regions of region 7 to region 20 are extracted. The reason why no other region is extracted is that the length in the vertical direction is shorter than the predetermined length.
[0061]
As described above, the character string region extraction unit 12 illustrated in FIG. 1 converts the horizontal regions 1 to 6 and the vertical regions 7 to 20 into character string regions from the gift card of the cc department store illustrated in FIG. Extract as
[0062]
The coordinate position, width, and height of the character string area 1 are (44, 22), 86, and 3, respectively, and the coordinate position, width, and height of the character string area 2 are (46, 27), respectively. ), 84 and 3, the character string region extraction unit 12 can acquire the character string region data shown in FIG.
[0063]
Next, a format determination process performed by the format determination unit 13 shown in FIG. 1 using the character recognition unit 14 will be specifically described.
[0064]
The format determination unit 13 compares the character string area data with the position data of each reference gift certificate shown in FIG. 9 stored in advance, and the reference gift certificate that matches any character string area data within a predetermined error range. Is identified as the primary candidate.
[0065]
Here, the position data is position data of a code character string in which an alphanumeric code is printed as a character string on the standard gift certificate. For example, from “character direction”, “coordinates”, “width”, and “height” Become. “Character direction” indicates the print direction of the code character string. For example, the character direction of the code character string of the cc department store shown in FIG. 6C is “left”.
[0066]
Specifically, the format determination unit 13 first collates the character string area data of the character string area 1 with each position data, and confirms whether there is position data that matches the character string area data. To do.
[0067]
As a result, since there is no corresponding position data for the character string area 1 and there is no corresponding position data for the character string areas 2 and 3, the character string area data in the character string area 4 is assigned to each position data. Match.
[0068]
Then, since the character string area data of the character string area 4 substantially matches the position data of the ee department store, the ee department store is set as a primary candidate, and then the image of the character string area 4 is cut out to obtain the character string area. Each character included in 4 is sequentially recognized.
[0069]
Each time each character in the character string area 4 is recognized, it is compared with the format data of the ee department store shown in FIG. 10 to check whether the format of the character string area 4 matches the format of the ee department store. Note that the letters A to N written in the format of FIG. 10 represent alphanumeric characters.
[0070]
Here, as shown in FIG. 7A, the first character of the character string area 4 is “is”, and the format is different from the first character (alphanumeric characters) of the format data of the ee department store shown in FIG. This primary candidate is rejected.
[0071]
Therefore, the format determination unit 13 sequentially collates the character string area data of the next character string areas 5 to 20 with the position data, and as a result, the character string area data of the character string area 20 is stored in the cc department store and the dd department store. Check that it matches the position data.
[0072]
Therefore, characters are sequentially cut out from the character string area 20 and collated with the formats of the cc department store and the dd department store shown in FIG.
[0073]
As a result, when the fifth character '-' is recognized, it is confirmed that it does not match the format of the dd department store, the dd department store is rejected from the primary candidate, and is subsequently collated with the cc department store. It is confirmed that the format of each character in the column area 20 matches the format of the cc department store.
[0074]
For this reason, in this format determination part 13, it determines with the gift certificate of identification object being a gift certificate of cc department store.
[0075]
Next, the ticket type determination process of the ticket type determination unit 15 shown in FIG. 1 will be specifically described.
[0076]
The ticket type determination unit 15 holds attribute data and attribute value data registered in advance as a dictionary, and determines the type and face value of the gift certificate using the attribute data and attribute value data.
[0077]
FIG. 11 is a diagram illustrating an example of attribute data and attribute value data of a cc department store.
[0078]
As shown in the figure (a), the attribute data of the cc department store is the code character string consisting of “ABCD-EFGHI-J”, the ticket type is printed at the key position of “B”, and the face value is “CD” "" Indicates that printing is performed at the position "".
[0079]
Therefore, in order to grasp the ticket type and the face value, it is sufficient to grasp the second character, the third character, and the fourth character of the code character string.
[0080]
In addition, as shown in FIG. 5B, the attribute value data of the cc department store ticket type is an association between the attribute value indicating the ticket type and the code. Specifically, the code “0” is Corresponding to gift cards, code '1' corresponds to general gift certificate, code '2' corresponds to gift certificate spelling ticket, code '8' corresponds to meal ticket, code '9' is member product Corresponds to the ticket.
[0081]
In addition, as shown in FIG. 5C, the face value attribute value data of the cc department store is obtained by associating an attribute value indicating a face value with a code, and specifically, codes “00” and “01”. And “02” corresponds to 500 yen, codes “10”, “11” and “12” correspond to 1000 yen, code “20” corresponds to 5000 yen, and code “30” corresponds to 10,000 yen. To do.
[0082]
For this reason, if such attribute data and attribute value data are used, it can be determined that the ticket type of the cc department store shown in FIG. 7B is a 500 yen gift certificate.
[0083]
Next, the external appearance of the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 shown in FIG. 1 will be described.
[0084]
FIG. 12 is a diagram showing an appearance of the gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 shown in FIG.
[0085]
The gift certificate identifying apparatus 10 shown in FIG. 1 can be incorporated into the reader / sorter 120 shown in FIG. 12A, and when incorporated in the reader / sorter 120, a plurality of gift certificates of different styles are collected together. Even when it is inserted into the gift certificate insertion slot 121, it can be classified into the sorter 122 by type.
[0086]
Moreover, the gift certificate identification apparatus 10 can also be incorporated in the settlement machine 125 shown in FIG. 12B, and when incorporated in the settlement machine 125, the amount of the gift certificate can be aggregated and settled. . In addition, when the apparatus is connected or built in the cash register, transactions with customers at the cash register can be performed extremely efficiently.
[0087]
【The invention's effect】
As described above in detail, the present invention extracts the character string area printed on the gift certificate from the image data, and when the character string of the reference gift certificate is located at the coordinate position of the extracted character string area. , When characters included in the character string area are sequentially cut out, and it is sequentially checked whether the cut out character string conforms to the character string format of the standard gift certificate, and conforms to the character string format of the standard gift certificate Since the gift certificate is configured to be identified as the type of the reference gift certificate, the following effects can be obtained.
[0088]
1) It is possible to input gift certificates having various formats in a bundle and efficiently identify each gift certificate.
[0089]
2) It becomes possible to classify and totalize gift certificates at high speed.
[0090]
3) Even a gift certificate including a ruled line can be identified.
[0091]
Further, according to the present invention, when white pixels that do not satisfy a predetermined run length are replaced with black pixels, the black pixels are connected, and a plurality of black pixel columns located on the same connected line are in contact with the same pixel column In the case where the plurality of pixel columns are connected with black pixels, and there is a pixel shift in a plurality of parallel black pixel columns in contact with each other, a minimum rectangular region including the plurality of black pixel columns is defined as a character string. Since it is configured to be an area, it is possible to quickly and accurately extract a character string area included in image data.
[0092]
Further, the present invention stores the position data of predetermined character strings having different formats possessed by a plurality of reference gift certificates and the format data of the predetermined character strings in association with the types of reference gift certificates, respectively. The character string area data including the coordinate position of the extracted character string area is collated with the position data, the type of the reference gift certificate having the character string that matches the character string area data is searched, and the retrieved reference gift certificate Among them, the reference gift certificate conforming to the format of the character string included in the character string area is specified based on the format data, so that the identification accuracy can be improved.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram showing a configuration of a gift certificate identifying apparatus used in the present embodiment.
FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a coordinate system of character string area data extracted by a character string area extracting unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure of a character string region extraction unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a processing concept of a character string region extraction unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure of a format determination unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a gift certificate used in the present embodiment.
7 is a view showing a character string area of a gift card of the cc department store shown in FIG. 6;
FIG. 8 is a view showing character string area data of a gift card of the cc department store shown in FIG. 7;
FIG. 9 is a view showing position data held by the format determination unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 10 is a diagram showing format data held by the format determination unit shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of attribute data and attribute value data held by the ticket type determination unit shown in FIG. 1;
12 is a diagram showing the external appearance of a machine incorporating the gift certificate identifying apparatus shown in FIG.
[Explanation of symbols]
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 ... Gift certificate identification apparatus 11 ... Image input part 12 ... Character string area | region extraction part 13 ... Format determination part 14 ... Character recognition part 15 ... Ticket type determination part 16 ... Output part 120 ... Reader / sorter 121 ... Gift certificate insertion slot 122 ... Sorter 125 ... Checkout machine

Claims (4)

In the gift certificate identifying method for reading the gift certificate to be identified and identifying the type of the gift certificate based on the read image data,
Extract the character string area printed on the gift certificate from the image data,
When the coordinate position of the extracted character string area corresponds to the coordinate position of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, the characters included in the character string area are sequentially extracted, and the extracted character string is the code of the reference gift certificate Check sequentially whether it matches the format of the string,
A gift certificate identifying method, wherein the gift certificate is identified as a type of the reference gift certificate when it conforms to the format of the code character string of the reference gift certificate. In the gift certificate identification device that reads the gift certificate to be identified and identifies the type of the gift certificate based on the read image data,
Extraction means for extracting a character string area printed on the gift certificate from the image data;
It is searched whether or not the coordinate position of the character string area extracted by the extraction means corresponds to the coordinate position of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, and if there is a corresponding reference gift certificate, the character string area Characters are sequentially cut out, and if all of the cut out character strings match the format of the code character string of the reference gift certificate, determination means for determining that the gift certificate is a type of the reference gift certificate is provided. A gift certificate identification device characterized by the above. The extraction means includes
A first connecting means for connecting a black pixel by replacing a white pixel not satisfying a predetermined run length with a black pixel;
A plurality of black pixel columns located on the same line connected by the first connecting means, in contact with the same pixel column, a second connecting means for connecting the plurality of pixel columns with black pixels;
A character string region creating means having, as a character string region, a minimum rectangular region including the plurality of black pixel columns when there is a pixel shift in a plurality of parallel black pixel columns in contact with each other; The gift certificate identifying apparatus according to claim 2. The determination means includes
Storage means for storing position data of predetermined character strings having different forms possessed by a plurality of reference gift certificates and form data of the predetermined character strings in association with the types of reference gift certificates, respectively;
The type of reference gift certificate having a character string that matches the character string area data by comparing the character string area data including the coordinate position of the character string area extracted by the extracting means with the position data stored in the storage means A search means for searching for,
A specifying means for specifying a reference gift certificate that matches a character string format included in the character string area based on the form data stored in the storage means among the reference gift certificates searched by the search means; The gift certificate identifying apparatus according to claim 2, wherein:

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