METHOD FOR DETECTING AND/OR TRACKING OBJECTS IN MOTION IN A SCENE UNDER SURVEILLANCE THAT HAS INTERFERING FACTORS; APPARATUS; AND COMPUTER PROGRAM

• US 20090060276A1
• Filed: 09/02/2008
• Published: 03/05/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 09/04/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
• Original Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
• Inventors: Loos, Hartmut, Yu, Jie, Ebling, Julia
• Granted Patent: US 8,879,786 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: 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

Abstract

A method for detection and/or tracking of objects in motion 16 in a scene under surveillance 15, in which besides the objects in motion 16, interfering objects and/or interfering regions—both hereinafter called interfering factors 17, 23—can occur, is proposed, in which the scene under surveillance 15, a plurality of regions are defined that are divided up into various region classes; and a first region class D1, 5 includes sensitive regions, in which no and/or only insignificant interfering factors 17, 23 are located and/or are to be expected; and for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion 16 in the sensitive regions, a sensitive content analysis is performed, and a second region class D2, 6 includes semi-sensitive regions 19, in which interfering factors 17, 23 are located and/or are to be expected, and for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion 16 in the semi-sensitive regions 19, a semi-sensitive content analysis is performed, which is limited and/or modified compared to the sensitive content analysis.

Claims

1. A method for detection and/or tracking of objects in motion (16) in a scene under surveillance (15), in which besides the objects in motion (16), interfering objects and/or interfering regions—

both hereinafter called interfering factors (17, 23)—

can occur, in which the scene under surveillance (15), a plurality of regions are defined that are divided up into various region classes; and

a first region class (D1, 5) includes sensitive regions, in which no and/or only insignificant interfering factors (17, 23) are located and/or are to be expected, and for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion (16) in the sensitive regions, a sensitive content analysis is performed, wherein a second region class (D2, 6) includes semi-sensitive regions (19), in which interfering factors (17, 23) are located and/or are to be expected, and for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion (16) in the semi-sensitive regions (19), a semi-sensitive content analysis is performed, which is limited and/or modified compared to the sensitive content analysis.

2. The method as defined by claim 1, wherein a third region class (D3) includes insensitive regions, in which interfering factors (17, 23) are located, and in the insensitive regions, no content analysis for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion (16) is performed.

3. The method as defined by claim 1, wherein in one of the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked that exhibit an unconventional pattern of motion compared to the semi-sensitive regions (19).

4. The method as defined by claim 3, wherein in one of the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked that move in the semi-sensitive regions (19) counter to a general direction of motion.

5. The method as defined by claim 3, wherein in one of the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked that in the semi-sensitive regions (19) move with a directional motion in front of a scene area (15) that has non-directional motions.

6. The method as defined by claim 3, wherein in the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked by way of analysis of the optical flow.

7. The method as defined by claim 1, wherein in the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked via a comparison of characteristics, and preferably it is provided that characteristics of the objects in motion (16) are compared with characteristics of reference objects.

8. The method as defined by claim 7, wherein the reference objects or their characteristics are stored in memory in a reference database (10).

9. The method as defined by claim 1, wherein in the semi-sensitive regions (19), objects in motion (16) are detected and/or tracked and/or further tracked on the basis of motion and/or object and/or characteristic information detected in the sensitive regions (20).

10. An apparatus (1), in particular for performing the method, having an interface (3), which is embodied for receiving image sequences from a scene under surveillance, and in the scene under surveillance, besides one or more objects in motion (16), interfering objects and/or interfering regions—

both hereinafter called interfering factors (17, 23)—

can occur, having a classification module (4), which is embodied for defining regions in the scene under surveillance and dividing up the regions into various region classes, in which a first region class includes sensitive regions (20), in which no and/or only insignificant interfering factors (17, 23) are located and/or are to be expected, having a first analysis module (5), which is embodied for performing a sensitive content analysis for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion (16) in the sensitive regions (20), wherein the classification module (4) is embodied for dividing up the regions into a second region class, which includes semi-sensitive regions (19) in which interfering factors (17, 23) are located and/or are to be expected; and

that the apparatus (1) has a second analysis module (6), which is embodied for performing a semi-sensitive content analysis, for detection and/or tracking of the objects in motion (16) in the semi-sensitive regions (19), which analysis is limited and/or modified compared to the sensitive content analysis.

11. A computer program having program code means, for performing all the steps of the method, when the program is executed on a computer and/or an apparatus.