HUMAN PURSUIT SYSTEM, HUMAN PURSUIT APPARATUS AND HUMAN PURSUIT PROGRAM

• US 20090052739A1
• Filed: 08/18/2008
• Published: 02/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hitachi Kokusai Electric Incorporated (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Hitachi Kokusai Electric Incorporated (Hitachi, Ltd.)
• Inventors: Takahashi, Kazuya, Ito, Wataru, Ito, Mitsue
• Granted Patent: US 8,144,929 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/103
• 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: G06V 40/103 Static body considered as a whole, e.g. static pedestrian or occupant recognition

Abstract

A human pursuit system includes a plurality of cameras, shooting directions of which are directed toward a floor, are installed on a ceiling, a parallax of an object reflected in an overlapping image domain is calculated on the basis of at least a portion of the overlapping image domain where images are overlapped among shot images shot by the plurality of cameras, the object equal to or greater than a threshold value predetermined by the calculated parallax is detected as a human, a pattern image including the detected human object is extracted, and a pattern matching is applied to the extracted pattern image and the image shot by the camera to thereby pursue a human movement trajectory.

Claims

1. A human pursuit system, comprising:

a plurality of cameras installed on a ceiling and shooting directions of these directed toward a floor;

means that calculates a parallax of an object reflected in an overlapping image domain in accordance with at least a portion of the overlapping image domain where images are overlapped, among shot images shot respectively by the plurality of cameras;

means that detects the object, as a human, when the calculated parallax is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold value;

means that extracts a pattern image containing the detected human object; and

means that pursues a trajectory on which the human object moves, by a pattern matching of the extracted pattern image with the shot image by the camera.

2. The human pursuit system according to claim 1, further comprising calculation means that calculates a position coordinate of the human object residing on the floor in accordance with a position of the pattern image containing the detected human object and the parallax calculated for the human object.

3. The human pursuit system according to claim 1, further comprising:

storage means that stores the extracted pattern image for every detected human object; and

update means that updates the pattern image stored in the storage means in accordance with a result of the pattern matching.

4. The human pursuit system according to claim 3, wherein the storage means further stores the position coordinate of the pattern image on the floor in association with the pattern image, and

the update means updates the pattern image in accordance with an image domain of the human object detected from the overlapping image domain in a case where the stored pattern image is contained in the overlapping image domain.

5. The human pursuit system according to claim 4, wherein the update means removes the pattern image in a case where the stored pattern image is contained in the overlapping image domain and the human object is undetected from the overlapping image domain.

6. The human pursuit system according to claim 1, further comprising means that extracts feature amount data from the pattern image, wherein the extracted feature amount data is used for the pattern matching.

7. The human pursuit system according to claim 6, wherein the feature amount data includes at least one of a brightness pattern, a color histogram, a ratio of color components, an edge histogram, a Fourier spectrum, and a Fourier-Mellin spectrum.

8. The human pursuit system according to claim 7, further comprising means that generates a trajectory on which the detected human object moves every shot domain pursued by the plurality of cameras.

9. The human pursuit system according to claim 8, further comprising means that merges the generated trajectories for every detected human object.

10. The human pursuit system according to claim 1, wherein the plurality of cameras are adjusted respectively such that a shooting angle is directed toward a vertically downward direction.

11. The human pursuit system according to claim 1, further comprising means that stores attribute information obtained for the detected human object in association with the trajectory obtained for the detected human object.

12. The human pursuit system according to claim 11, wherein the attribute information is obtained from reading non-contact radio tag information provided for the human object.

13. A human pursuit system, comprising:

means that obtains images shot by a plurality of cameras installed on a ceiling, and shooting directions of these directed toward a floor;

means that calculates a parallax of an object reflected in an overlapping image domain in accordance with at least a portion of the overlapping image domain where the images are overlapped, among shot images shot respectively by the plurality of cameras;

means that detects the object, as a human, when the calculated parallax is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold value;

means that extracts a pattern image containing the detected human object; and

means that pursues a trajectory on which the human object moves, by a pattern matching of the extracted pattern image with the shot image by the camera.

14. A human pursuit program readable, as program codes, by a computer, comprising:

program code means that obtains images shot by a plurality of cameras installed on a ceiling, and shooting directions of these directed toward a floor;

program code means that calculates a parallax of an object reflected in an overlapping image domain in accordance with at least a portion of the overlapping image domain where the images are overlapped, among shot images shot respectively by the plurality of cameras;

program code means that detects the object, as a human, when the calculated parallax is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold value;

program code means that extracts a pattern image containing the detected human object; and

program code means that pursues a trajectory on which the human object moves, by a pattern matching of the extracted pattern image with the shot image by the camera.