METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DETECTING POSITIONS OF CENTER POINTS OF CIRCULAR PATTERNS

Voting of coordinates of each pixel in a photographic image onto a Hough space corresponding to annuluses is performed, the Hough space being defined by a coordinate system having an X coordinate axis for a circle center point, a Y coordinate axis for a circle center point, and an r coordinate axis for a radial direction. A vote value of each voting position having coordinates (X, Y, r) on the Hough space is acquired as a first integrated vote value from a calculation of a number of votes given to each voting position. A position represented by (X, Y) coordinate values of a voting position associated with the largest first integrated vote value is detected as the position of the center point of the circular pattern.