Visual classification and posture estimation of multiple vehicle occupants
First Claim
1. A method for classifying an occupant including the steps of:
- a. capturing an image of a plurality of occupant areas;
b. dividing the image into a plurality of subimages of predetermined spatial regions;
c. generating a spatial feature matrix of the image based upon the plurality of subimages;
d. analyzing the spatial feature matrix; and
e. classifying a plurality of occupants in the occupant areas based upon said step d).
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
A vehicle occupant detection/classification and posture estimation system includes a camera equipped with a wide-angle (“fish eye”) lens and mounted in the vehicle headliner captures images of all vehicle seating areas. Image processing algorithms can be applied to the image to account for lighting, motion, and other phenomena. A spatial-feature vector is then generated which numerically describes the visual content of each seating area. This descriptor is the result of a number of digital filters being run against a set of sub-images, derived from pre-defined window regions in the original image. This spatial-feature vector is used as an input to an expert classifier function, which classifies each seating area as best representing a scenario in which the seat is (i) empty, (ii) occupied by an adult, (iii) occupied by a child, (iv) occupied by a rear-facing infant seat (RFIS), (v) occupied by a front-facing infant seat (FFIS), or (vi) occupied by an undetermined object. Seating areas which are determined to be occupied by an adult are further sub-classified as (i) occupant in position, or (ii) occupant out-of-position. Out-of-position occupants are occupants who are determined to be within the “keep out zone” of the airbag.
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Citations
24 Claims
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1. A method for classifying an occupant including the steps of:
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a. capturing an image of a plurality of occupant areas;
b. dividing the image into a plurality of subimages of predetermined spatial regions;
c. generating a spatial feature matrix of the image based upon the plurality of subimages;
d. analyzing the spatial feature matrix; and
e. classifying a plurality of occupants in the occupant areas based upon said step d). - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. A vehicle occupant classification system comprising:
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an image sensor for capturing an image of a plurality of occupant areas; and
a processor dividing the image into a plurality of subimages, the processor analyzing the subimages to determine a classification of the occupants in each of the plurality of occupant areas. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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20. A method for classifying an occupant including the steps of:
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a. capturing an image of a plurality of occupant areas;
b. dividing the image into a plurality of subimages of predetermined spatial regions;
c. generating a plurality of low-level descriptors from each of the plurality of subimages;
d. analyzing the low-level descriptors; and
e. classifying an occupant in each of the plurality of occupant areas based upon step d). - View Dependent Claims (21, 22, 23, 24)
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Specification