PURPOSE: To contrive to shorten a recognizing time and to improve operability by designating a part to be recognized with a fluorescent pen, etc., deciding the presence and absence of a paint from the output of a scanner and segmenting a designating character.

CONSTITUTION: A part to have the character recognized of an original 14 is instructed by a fluorescent pen, etc., and the part is read by a scanner 3. By the output of a detecting device 2 of the scanner 3, a first comparing circuit 4b converts the surface, on which a character is printed, to '0' and converts the surface, on which the character is not printed, to '1'. A second comparing circuit 4a converts the surface, on which the character is printed and a paint is applied, to '0' and converts the surface, on which anything is not applied, to '1'. These are respectively stored into first and second frame memories 5a and 5b as image information. Next, the character of the part, on which the paint is applied through first and second segmenting parts 6a and 6b, is segmented and outputted. Consequently, the designation of the character to be recognized is easy, the recognizing time is shortened and the operability is improved.