COLLATION/RETRIEVAL SYSTEM, COLLATION/RETRIEVAL SERVER, IMAGE FEATURE EXTRACTION APPARATUS, COLLATION/RETRIEVAL METHOD, AND PROGRAM

• US 20140153831A1
• Filed: 07/25/2012
• Published: 06/05/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Original Assignee: NEC Corporation
• Inventors: Ishiyama, Rui
• Granted Patent: US 9,842,285 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/190
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0185 Product, service or business identity fraud
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0278 Product appraisal
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/225 based on a marking or identifier characterising the area
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/80 Recognising image objects characterised by unique random patterns

Abstract

The present invention is a collation/retrieval system collating a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor with a product to be collated comprising: a storage unit that stores an image feature of a predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to a reference section common in every product; a to-be-collated product feature extraction unit that receives an image of the product to be collated and detecting the reference section of the product from the received image to extract an image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and a collation unit that collates the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

Claims

1. (canceled)

2. (canceled)

3. (canceled)

4. (canceled)

5. (canceled)

6. A collation/retrieval system collating a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor with a product to be collated comprising:

a storage unit that stores an image feature of a predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to a reference section common in every product;

a to-be-collated product feature extraction unit that receives an image of the product to be collated, detects the reference section of the product from the received image and extracts an image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and

a collation unit that collates the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

7. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6, further comprising:

a product feature extraction unit that receives an image of a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor, detects the reference section of the product from the received image, and extracts the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section to register the extracted image feature of the collation area in the storage unit.

8. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6, wherein the product feature extraction unit and the to-be-collated product feature extraction unit each store in advance the feature of the reference section and the position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section, detect the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and normalize the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.

9. The collation/retrieval system according to claim 6,

wherein the storage unit stores a plurality of image features of collation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrieved and management information corresponding to the plurality of products to be retrieved in a mutually associated manner;

and

wherein the collation/retrieval unit retrieves an image feature having the highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas of the plurality of products to be collated from the stored plurality of image features to output management information of a product corresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.

10. An image feature extraction apparatus comprising a feature extraction unit that detects a reference section common in every product from an image of a product manufactured by or delivered from a producer or a distributor and an image of a product to be collated to extract an image feature of a collation area determined in advance at a position relative to the detected reference section.

11. The image feature extraction apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the feature extraction unit stores in advance a feature of the reference section and a position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section, detects the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and normalizes the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.

12. The image feature extraction apparatus according to claim 10, further comprising:

a transmission unit that transmits the image feature of the collation area to a collation server.

13. A collation/retrieval method comprising:

setting a predetermined section of a product formed into the same pattern to a reference section;

setting an area existing at a standard position relative to the reference section to a collation area; and

using an image feature in the collation area of the product for collation and retrieval of the product.

14. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13 comprising:

capturing an image comprising at least the reference section common in every product and the predetermined collation area of the product determined in advance at a position relative to the reference section;

detecting the reference section from the captured image to extract the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the detected reference section;

storing the extracted image feature of the collation area of the product;

capturing an image comprising at least the reference section of the product to be collated and the predetermined collation area of the product determined by reference to the reference section;

detecting the reference section of the product to be collated from the captured image to extract the image feature of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section; and

collating the stored image feature with the image feature of the collation area of the product to be collated.

15. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the reference section comprises a trademark, a logotype, a name of manufacturer, a manufacturing company, a brand name, a product name, and a product number attached to, printed, stamped, or branded on the product.

16. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the extraction of the image feature comprises;

storing in advance the feature of the reference section and the position of the collation area determined by reference to the reference section,

detecting the predetermined section of the product from the captured image based on the feature of the predetermined section, and

normalizing the position and a size of the collation area by referring to the detected predetermined section to extract the image feature of the collation area.

17. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13 comprising:

storing a plurality of image features of collation areas extracted from a plurality of products to be retrieved and management information corresponding to the plurality of products to be retrieved in a mutually associated manner, and

retrieving an image feature having the highest similarity to the image features of the collation areas of the plurality of products to be retrieved from the stored plurality of image features to output management information of a product corresponding to the image feature having the highest similarity.

18. The collation/retrieval method according to claim 13, wherein the product is an industrial product comprising a leather product, a metal workpiece, a molten resin, and/or a ceramic portion.

19. (canceled)

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22. (canceled)