IMAGE PROCESSING APPARATUS AND IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To properly add secondly available information to electronized information. SOLUTION: In an image processing apparatus, a scanning unit 12 reads out image information regarding an original document; a layout analyzing unit 53 extracts layout information regarding character regions and character addition information added to characters within the character regions from the image information; an OCR processing unit 54 converts the character regions included in the extracted layout information into character information; a keyword extracting unit 55 extracts one or more keywords consisting of a plurality of characters from the character information; a keyword searching unit 56 obtains meta-information by use of the extracted keywords; and an electronic document generating unit 58 generates an electronic document according to description of a predetermined format by adding the meta-information to the character information. COPYRIGHT: (C)2009,JPO&INPIT