Monitoring system for monitoring a field

• US 4,236,180 A
• Filed: 02/12/1979
• Issued: 11/25/1980
• Est. Priority Date: 02/27/1978
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: US Philips Corporation (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Original Assignee: US Philips Corporation (Koninklijke Philips N.V.)
• Inventors: Cayzac, Jacques C.
• Primary Examiner(s): Britton, Howard W.
• Application Number:
  US06/011,581
• Time in Patent Office: 652 Days
• Field of Search: 358/105
• US Class Current: 348/154
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19602 Image analysis to detect motion of the intruder, e.g. by frame subtraction
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19634 Electrical details of the system, e.g. component blocks for carrying out specific functions
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/19641 Multiple cameras having overlapping views on a single scene

Abstract

Monitoring system particularly for detecting the presence of moving persons in a monitored area.

This system comprises two detection stages 2 and 22, two processing stages 3 and 23 and a selective switching-on stage 4 which the two groups of stages 2, 22 and 3, 23 have in common. Each one of the detection stages 2 and 22, which comprise cameras 7 and 27, respectively, send field signals to the associated processing stages, these signals corresponding with the observed images. Each processing stage sequentially compares the signal values in the field signals which the stage receives in accordance with a controllable pre-determined rhythm, whereafter it sends comparison signals, whose number is proportional to the magnitude of the observed motion by comparing the field signals, to the switching-on stage 4. When the sum of the two numbers of signals received by the switching-on stage 4 is greater than the threshold value present in the threshold circuit an intervention device 17 is actuated.

Use: Protecting rooms from burglary or hold-ups. Reference: FIG. 1.

Claims

1. A monitoring system for monitoring a field for the detection of motion of objects within a given area, the system comprising a detection stage provided with a camera for signal recording with respect to the area to be monitored, a processing stage provided with a storage device and a comparison circuit for producing comparison signals in dependence on differences and signal agreements, respectively, between signals produced by the camera and delayed and not delayed in the storage device, said comparison circuit comprising a selective switching-on stage having an intervention device actuated in dependence on the number of comparison signals, wherein the system comprises at least two cameras spaced apart and being arranged at a different angle with respect to the area to be monitored by the cameras, each camera being connected through a processing stage to said, single, selective switching-on stage which further comprises means for adding together the comparison signals derived from the different camera signals, and a threshold device coupled between the intervention device and an output of the adding means delivering the sum of the comparison signals.

2. A monitoring system as claimed in claim 1, wherein the two cameras are arranged in a more or less opposite direction with respect to the area to be monitored.

3. A monitoring system as claimed in claims 1 or 2, wherein the system comprises four cameras which are successively arranged at square angles with respect to the area to be monitored.

4. A monitoring system as claimed in claim 3, wherein the system further comprises an arrangement for neutralizing the influence of the mutual distances between a moving object in the monitored area and each individual camera on the result of the count of the total number of comparison signals, this arrangement comprising a counter coupled to said comparison circuit for counting the number of comparison signals, an evaluation circuit for deriving from the counter the number of comparison signals which are supplied sequentially or simultaneously by one common or two separate processing stages, respectively, and for determining, in dependence on the two values thus derived, a coefficient which is inversely proportional to the mathematical expression of the total number of comparison signals present at the output of the counter as a function of the mutual differences, which are at right angles to the axis between the two cameras, between the moving object and each individual camera, and a correction circuit suitable for multiplying this mathematical expression of the total number of comparison signals by this coefficient.

5. A monitoring system as claimed in claim 4, wherein the system further comprises a clock circuit, one synchronizing signal generator for the cameras and one circuit for distributing the field signals which are sequentially supplied by the cameras included in the detection stages.

6. A monitoring system as claimed in claim 5, wherein the threshold value of the threshold circuit present in the selective switching-on stage is controllable in dependence on the period of time during which a first field signal, produced by the camera and supplied by each detection stage to the storage device of the associated processing stage, is retained in the storage device.