18. The device according to claim 1 , wherein the character description generator is arranged to generate a description of the character by joining together selected adjacent identified character elements, wherein the character description generator is arranged to select the selected adjacent identified character elements employed for the description of the character from a totality of identified character elements such that the selected adjacent identified character elements describe a continuous course of line from a predefined starting point to a predefined end point.
1. A device for detecting characters in an image, comprising: a Hough transformer arranged to identify, as identified elements of writing, circular arcs or elliptical arcs in the image or in a preprocessed version of the image; a character description generator arranged to acquire, on the basis of the identified circular arcs or elliptical arcs, a character description which describes locations of the identified circular arcs or elliptical arcs; and a database comparator arranged to compare the character description with a plurality of comparative character descriptions which have character codes associated with them, so as to provide, as a result of the comparison, a character code of a detected character; wherein the Hough transformer is arranged to identify, as identified elements of writing, individual circular arcs or elliptical arcs, which approximate a course of line of a character within a surrounding of local extremes, in the image or in a preprocessed version of the image, and to provide information about an orientation of an identified circular arc or elliptical arc; and the character description generator is arranged to acquire, based on the identified circular arcs or elliptical arcs and the information about the orientation, a character description which describes locations of the individual identified circular arcs or elliptical arcs.