TECHNIQUES FOR FACE DETECTION AND TRACKING

• US 20120114172A1
• Filed: 07/02/2010
• Published: 05/10/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 07/02/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Tahoe Research Limited (f/k/a Learndale Limited) (Vector Capital Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Intel Corporation
• Inventors: Du, Yangzhou, Li, Qiang Eric
• Granted Patent: US 9,042,599 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/103
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/96 Management of image or video recognition tasks
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/165 using facial parts and geometric relationships

Abstract

Techniques are disclosed that involve face detection. For instance, face detection tasks may be decomposed into sets of one or more sub-tasks. In turn the sub-tasks of the sets may be allocated across multiple image frames. This allocation may be based on a resource budget. In addition, face tracking tasks may be performed.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

receiving a plurality of image frames; and

performing a face detection task on the plurality of image frames, the face detection task comprising multiple sets of one or more sub-tasks;

wherein each of the sets employs a corresponding detection region size.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising allocating a resource budget for face detection sub-task performance in each of the plurality of image frames.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said performing comprises, for each sub-task, scanning a window within a detection region, the detection region having the detection region size of the corresponding set.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said performing comprises, for each sub-task, employing a plurality of classification stages, each classification stage operating on multiple windows concurrently.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein each of the multiple sets employs one or more detection regions having the corresponding detection region size.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein at least one of the multiple sets employs two or more partially overlapping detection regions having the corresponding detection region size.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein said performing comprises performing at least one of the sub-tasks in a corresponding one of the plurality of frames.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

performing a face tracking task on the plurality of image frames.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising maintaining information regarding one or more previously detected faces.

10. An apparatus, comprising:

a face tracking module to track one or more previously detected faces within an image frame; and

a face detection module to perform one or more face detection sub-tasks within the image frame;

wherein each face detection sub-task scans a window within a detection region; and

wherein the one or more face detection sub-tasks are within a resource budget for the image frame.

11. The apparatus of claim 10, further comprising a storage medium to store information regarding the one or more previously detected faces.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the storage medium further stores information regarding any faces detected by one or more face detection sub-tasks.

13. The apparatus of claim 10, further comprising an image sensor to generate the image frame.

14. The apparatus of claim 10, further comprising a display to output the image frame.

15. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein the detection module includes a plurality of classification stages, each classification stage including multiple classification module to operate on multiple windows concurrently.

16. The apparatus of claim 10, wherein each of the face detection sub-tasks are included in one of a plurality of sub-task sets;

and

wherein each of the sub-task sets employs a corresponding window size.

17. An article comprising a machine-accessible medium having stored thereon instructions that, when executed by a machine, cause the machine to:

receive a plurality of image frames; and

perform a face detection task on the plurality of image frames, the face detection task comprising multiple sets of one or more sub-tasks;

wherein each of the sets employs a corresponding detection region size.

18. The article of claim 17, wherein the instructions, when executed by a machine, cause the machine to:

allocate a resource budget for face detection sub-task performance in each of the plurality of image frames.

19. The article of claim 17, wherein said performing comprises, for each sub-task, scanning a window within a detection region, the detection region having the detection region size of the corresponding set.

20. The article of claim 17, wherein each of the multiple sets employs one or more detection regions having the corresponding detection region size.