Form recognition using reference areas

摘要

A method for processing an input image includes automatically selecting reference areas on each of a plurality of different templates. Reference areas on the input image are compared to the selected reference areas on at least some of the templates, so as to identify the template that most closely matches the input image, and information is extracted from the input image based on the identified template. Typically, the input image is an image of a form document, having fields defined by one of the templates, which fields are filled in with the information. The input image is registered with the identified template in order to extract the information from the fields.