Video surveillance system

• US 20050162515A1
• Filed: 02/15/2005
• Published: 07/28/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/24/2000
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Avigilon Fortress Corporation
• Original Assignee: ObjectVideo Incorporated (Alarm.com Holdings, Inc.)
• Inventors: Chosak, Andrew J., Myers, Gary W., Frazier, Matthew F., Haering, Niels, Zhang, Zhong, Venetianer, Peter L., Lipton, Alan J., Yin, Weihong
• Application Number:
  US11/057,154
• Publication Number:
  US 20050162515A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 348/143
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/73 Querying
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7837 using objects detected or recognised in the video content
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/785 using colour or luminescence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/7854 using shape G06F16/7837 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/786 using motion, e.g. object motion or camera motion
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/20 Analysis of motion motion estimation for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals H04N19/43, H04N19/51
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/52 Surveillance or monitoring of activities, e.g. for recognising suspicious objects recognising microscopic objects G06V20/69
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19606 Discriminating between target movement or movement in an area of interest and other non-signicative movements, e.g. target movements induced by camera shake or movements of pets, falling leaves, rotating fan
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19608 Tracking movement of a target, e.g. by detecting an object predefined as a target, using target direction and or velocity to predict its new position
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/1961 Movement detection not involving frame subtraction, e.g. motion detection on the basis of luminance changes in the image
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19615 wherein said pattern is defined by the user
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19663 Surveillance related processing done local to the camera
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19667 Details realated to data compression, encryption or encoding, e.g. resolution modes for reducing data volume to lower transmission bandwidth or memory requirements
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19673 Addition of time stamp, i.e. time metadata, to video stream
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19684 Portable terminal, e.g. mobile phone, used for viewing video remotely
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19695 Arrangements wherein non-video detectors start video recording or forwarding but do not generate an alarm themselves
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23412 for generating or manipulating the scene composition of objects, e.g. MPEG-4 objects
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/234318 by decomposing into objects, e.g. MPEG-4 objects
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44012 involving rendering scenes according to scene graphs, e.g. MPEG-4 scene graphs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/272 Means for inserting a foreground image in a background image, i.e. inlay, outlay
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/18 : Closed-circuit television [CCTV] systems, i.e. systems in which the video signal is not broadcast

Abstract

A video surveillance system is set up, calibrated, tasked, and operated. The system extracts video primitives and extracts event occurrences from the video primitives using event discriminators. The system can undertake a response, such as an alarm, based on extracted event occurrences.

Claims

1. A method of video surveillance comprising:

extracting one or more event occurrences based on at least one video or non-video primitive.

2. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

deriving at least one video primitive from an input video sequence.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein said extracting comprises:

applying at least one query to said at least one video or non-video primitive.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein said applying at least one query comprises:

applying at least two sub-queries to said at least one video or non-video primitive; and

applying at least one combinator to results of said at least two sub-queries.

5. The method according to claim 4, wherein said combinator comprises a Boolean operator.

6. The method according to claim 5, wherein said combinator further comprises a modifier.

7. The method according to claim 6, wherein said modifier is selected from the group consisting of:

a temporal modifier, a spatial modifier, an object modifier, and a counter modifier.

8. The method according to claim 3, wherein said at least one query comprises:

at least one activity descriptor query.

9. The method according to claim 3, wherein said at least one query comprises:

at least one property query.

10. The method according to claim 3, wherein said at least one query comprises at least one multi-layer query comprising:

at least three sub-queries; and

at least two combinators.

11. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

retrieving at least one video or non-video primitive from an archive.

12. The method according to claim 1, wherein said video primitive comprises at least one of the types of video primitives selected from the group consisting of:

scene/video descriptors, object descriptors, and flow descriptors.

13. A computer-readable medium containing instructions that, when executed on a computer system, cause the computer system to implement the method according to claim 1.

14. The computer-readable medium according to claim 13, wherein said extracting comprises:

applying at least one query to said at least one video or non-video primitive.

15. The computer-readable medium according to claim 14, wherein said query comprises at least one of the group consisting of:

a property query, an activity descriptor query, and a query formed by combining multiple sub-queries.

16. A video-based security method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 1.

17. A video-based safety method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 1.

18. A video-based traffic-monitoring method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 1.

19. A video-based marketing research and analysis method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 1.

20. A method of video surveillance comprising:

saving at least one video primitive extracted from a video sequence; and

saving at least a portion of said video sequence, wherein a manner in which said at least a portion of said video sequence is saved is dependent upon an analysis of said video sequence.

21. The method according to claim 20, wherein said at least a portion of said video sequence is saved at a lower quality than a quality of said video sequence.

22. The method according to claim 20, wherein said saving at least a portion of said video sequence comprises:

saving only portions of said video sequence in which at least one activity is detected.

23. The method according to claim 20, wherein said saving at least a portion of said video sequence comprises:

saving portions of said video sequence containing a detected activity at a higher quality than portions of said video sequence not containing a detected activity.

24. A computer-readable medium containing instructions that when executed by a computer system cause said computer system to implement the method according to claim 20.

25. A video-based security method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 20.

26. A video-based safety method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 20.

27. A video-based traffic-monitoring method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 20.

28. A video-based marketing research and analysis method comprising the method of video surveillance according to claim 20.

29. A video surveillance system comprising:

at least one sensor, including at least one video source providing a video sequence;

a video analysis subsystem to analyze said video sequence, said video analysis subsystem to derive at least one video primitive; and

at least one storage facility to store said at least one video primitive.

30. The video surveillance system according to claim 29, wherein said at least one storage facility stores at least one non-video primitive.

31. The video surveillance system according to claim 29, wherein said video analysis subsystem is adapted to control storage of at least a portion of said video sequence in said at least one storage facility.

32. The video surveillance system according to claim 31, wherein said video analysis subsystem is adapted to control a video quality of at least a portion of said video sequence to be stored in said at least one storage facility.

33. The video surveillance system according to claim 29, further comprising:

an event occurrence detection and response subsystem coupled to said at least one storage facility; and

a rule and response definition interface coupled to said activity and event analysis subsystem, to provide to said video analysis subsystem at least one input selected from the group consisting of event analysis rules and responses to detected events.

34. The video surveillance system according to claim 33, wherein said event occurrence detection and response subsystem is adapted to apply said event analysis rules using at least one video or non-video primitive stored in said at least one storage facility.

35. A video-based security system comprising the video surveillance system according to claim 29.

36. The video-based security system according to claim 35, wherein the video-based security system is adapted to perform at least one function selected from the group consisting of:

access control;

asset monitoring; and

terrorism prevention.

37. A video-based safety system comprising the video surveillance system according to claim 29.

38. The video-based safety system according to claim 37, wherein the video-based safety system is adapted to perform at least one function selected from the group consisting of:

detecting potentially dangerous situations;

monitoring a sick person; and

monitoring an elderly person.

39. A video-based traffic-monitoring system comprising the video surveillance system according to claim 29.

40. A video-based marketing research and analysis system comprising the video surveillance system according to claim 29.