In an image recording or displaying system using a light beam scanning means, format lines are generated in combination with character data to be recorded or displayed together therewith. A format line data memory memorizes the format line data and the output format line data read out therefrom are combined with the character data. The format line data memory is provided with a horizontal pattern memory and a vertical pattern memory. The horizontal pattern memory memorizes various horizontal patterns in the direction parallel to the scanning line of the light beam scanning means. The vertical pattern memory memorizes the kind of the horizontal pattern according to the position of the scanning line. The vertical pattern memory generates the horizontal pattern code according to the scanning line signal and the horizontal pattern memory generates the selected horizontal pattern for every scanning line.

A character compaction and generation method and apparatus which is particularly adapted to the generation of complex characters such as Kanji characters. A dot matrix defining a given character is compacted into a sparse matrix, with the original character being reconstructed for printing or display from the compacted character defined in the sparse matrix. Each character in the complex character set is compacted and stored in memory one time only, with decompaction being performed each time a given character is to be generated. A set of symbols are defined to represent different patterns which occur frequently in the entire complex character set. Different combinations of the symbols define a given character. The information stored for each sparse matrix representing a given character is comprised of each symbol in the sparse matrix, its position, and its size parameter if the symbol represents a family of patterns which differ only in size.

High resolution character generator for producing rows of characters to be scanned on a display medium. Input data defining characters to be printed in ordered rows of text is sorted to provide specifications for the characters which being on each successive scan line. These specifications are stored initially in an input buffer, and specifications for characters which have been partially printed in a previous scan line are stored in an active character buffer. For each scan line, the character specifications are read first from the active character buffer and then from the input buffer until an end of line specifier is reached. For each character specification received, a font memory containing data defining the characters is cycled. The data from the font memory is decoded and presented to the display medium on a line by line basis.

Method and arrangement for capturing and automatically formatting video signals in both synchronized and deflection driven forms in which a single real-time capture module is provided including three input channels for receiving the video signals, three analog to digital converters for processing the video signals and three dynamic memories. Data from the converters is stored in the three dynamic memories. A line location look-up table is generated during the storage of data which holds the starting address of the stored lines of synchronized video. A video signal is then generated by addressing the line location look-up table.

Video processing arrangement including a host computer having a monitor, a video asset coupled to the computer for generating video signals and an interface for connecting the video asset to the computer to enable the display of video signals on the monitor. The video asset includes various primary elements including a primary composite video module for producing different types of a primary video signal and outputting the primary video signal via output channels, a stroke generator module for generating a stroke XYZ video signal and outputting the stroke video signal via output channels and a real time capture module for capturing video signals in a plurality of different modes. The video asset also includes a common distributed time base module for generating and distributing clock signals to all of the primary elements.