DEVICE FOR AUTOMATICALLY ALIGNING A PRODUCTION COPY IMAGE WITH A REFERENCE COPY IMAGE IN A PRINTING PRESS CONTROL SYSTEM

A device to align images for a printing press control system comprising, a device for capturing a reference image containing one or more image planes from a reference copy, a device for converting the reference image into a monochrome reference image, a device for capturing a production image containing one or more image planes from a production copy, a device for converting the production image into a monochrome production image, a device for defining at least one object model in the monochrome reference image, a device for identifying the position of at least one of the object models in the production image, a device for defining a transfer function which maps the position of the models in said monochrome production image to the position of the models in said monochrome reference image, and a device for applying the transfer function to each of the image planes of the production image, resulting in its alignment to the reference image.