System And Process For Detecting, Tracking And Counting Human Objects Of Interest

• US 20130236058A1
• Filed: 04/25/2013
• Published: 09/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 07/03/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Shoppertrak RCT LLC
• Original Assignee: Shoppertrak RCT Corporation (Johnson Controls International plc)
• Inventors: Wang, Zhiqian, Kastilahn, William C.
• Granted Patent: US 9,384,407 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/103
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/22 Matching criteria, e.g. proximity measures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/28 Determining representative reference patterns, e.g. by averaging or distorting; Generating dictionaries
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/10016 Video; Image sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/10021 Stereoscopic video; Stereoscopic image sequence
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30242 Counting objects in image
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/285 using a sequence of stereo image pairs
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/292 Multi-camera tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/62 relating to a temporal dimension, e.g. time-based feature extraction; Pattern tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/52 Surveillance or monitoring of activities, e.g. for recognising suspicious objects recognising microscopic objects G06V20/69

Abstract

A method of identifying, tracking, and counting human objects of interest based upon at least one pair of stereo image frames taken by at least one image capturing device, comprising the steps of: obtaining said stereo image frames and converting each said stereo image frame to a rectified image frame using calibration data obtained for said at least one image capturing device; generating a disparity map based upon a pair of said rectified image frames; generating a depth map based upon said disparity map and said calibration data; identifying the presence or absence of said objects of interest from said depth map and comparing each of said objects of interest to existing tracks comprising previously identified objects of interest; for each said presence of an object of interest, adding said object of interest to one of said existing tracks if said object of interest matches said one existing track, or creating a new track comprising said object of interest if said object of interest does not match any of said existing tracks; updating each said existing track; and maintaining a count of said objects of interest in a given time period based upon said existing tracks created or modified during said given time period.

Claims

1. A method of identifying, tracking, and counting objects of interest based upon at least one pair of stereo image frames taken by at least one image capturing device, comprising the steps of:

obtaining said at least one pair of stereo image frames and converting each said stereo image frame to a rectified image frame using calibration data obtained from said at least one image capturing device;

identifying the presence or absence of said objects of interest and comparing each of said objects of interest to existing tracks comprising previously identified objects of interest;

for each said presence of an object of interest, adding said object of interest to one of said existing tracks if said object of interest matches said one existing track, or creating a new track comprising said object of interest if said object of interest does not match any of said existing tracks; and

wherein each track further comprises a set of additional track attributes including, a status attribute for each said track taking one value from three possible values;

active, inactive, or deleted, wherein said status attribute is set to be active if said track comprises the object of interest in the most recent frame, inactive if said track does not comprise any object of interest in the most recent frame, and deleted if said track is marked for deletion.

2. A method of identifying, tracking, and counting objects of interest based upon at least one pair of stereo image frames taken by at least one image capturing device, comprising the steps of:

obtaining said at least one pair of stereo image frames and converting each said stereo image frame to a rectified image frame using calibration data obtained from said at least one image capturing device;

identifying the presence or absence of said objects of interest and comparing each of said objects of interest to existing tracks comprising previously identified objects of interest; and

for each said presence of an object of interest, adding said object of interest to one of said existing tracks if said object of interest matches said one existing track, or creating a new track comprising said object of interest if said object of interest does not match any of said existing tracks.