Object observation method and device

PURPOSE: To recognize an object existing in an environment from an image of the object to be observed by emphasizing the change in brightness in the image in relation to the observed image having light and shade, and determining an amount of features of the object in relation to the emphasized image. CONSTITUTION: A reservoired water 1 is photographed by an image pick-up device 10, the obtained image is image-processed by an image processing device 20 to extract an amount of features of the object, and the processed results are inputted to a judging device 30. Then, data on the inputted, image-processed results are compared to an object kind judging rule preliminarily inputted to a rule base 35 to judge and classify the kinds of the object. From the classification results, the number of solids by type is measured by means of a measuring device 40 to be inputted to and stored in a data base 45. The object existing in the environment is thus recognized from the image to be observed, as a result the amount of features is extracted, and thus the dirt, etc., of the reservoir water 1 can be diagnosed based on the preliminarily determined rule. COPYRIGHT: (C)1993,JPO&Japio