Motion-pattern recognition apparatus

• US 5,067,160 A
• Filed: 03/24/1989
• Issued: 11/19/1991
• Est. Priority Date: 04/26/1988
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Dutro Company
• Original Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Inventors: Shimizu, Hiroshi, Yamaguchi, Yoko, Omata, Satoshi
• Primary Examiner(s): Razavi, Michael
• Application Number:
  US07/328,547
• Time in Patent Office: 970 Days
• Field of Search: 382/1, 382/17, 382/8, 382/21, 382/29, 358/105
• US Class Current: 382/107
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/20 Analysis of motion motion estimation for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals H04N19/43, H04N19/51

Abstract

The apparatus recognizes a motion of an object which is moving and is hidden in an image signal, and discriminates the object from the background within the signal. The apparatus has an image forming unit comprising non-linear oscillators, which forms an image of the motion of the object in accordance with an adjacent-mutual-interference-rule, on the basis of the image signal. A memory unit, comprising non-linear oscillators, stores conceptualized meanings of several motions. A retrieval unit retrieves a conceptualized meaning close to the motion image of the object. An altering unit alters the rule, on the basis of the conceptualized meaning. The image forming unit, memory unit, retrieval unit and altering unit form a holonic-loop. Successive alterations of the rules by the altering unit within the holonic loop change an ambiguous image formed in the image forming unit into a distinct image.

Claims

1. A motion-pattern recognition apparatus for recognizing the motion of an object contained in time-varying image data, comprising:

input means arranged for input of time-varying image data;

arithmetic means connected to said input means for computing vectors indicative of local variations in the input time-varying image data;

image forming means connected to said arithmetic means for forming an image corresponding to the motion of the object from said vectors computed by said arithmetic means in accordance with a predetermined rule;

memory means for retrievably storing in advance different kinds of conceptualized meanings of motion;

retrieving means connected to said image forming means and said memory means for retrieving a conceptualized meaning close to the image formed by said image forming means; and

rule altering means connected to said retrieving means and said image forming means for altering said predetermined rule on the basis of said conceptualized meaning retrieved by said retrieving means.

2. An apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said arithmetic means further comprises means for disintegrating the direction of the variation in said time-varying image data into candidates for vectors in units of picture elements, said image forming means further comprising a plurality of holonic processing elements for representing said candidates as holonic information.

3. An apparatus according to claim 2, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a nonlinear oscillator circuit, said holonic information being stored as the amplitude and the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuit.

4. An apparatus according to claim 3, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a Van del Pol oscillator circuit.

5. An apparatus according to claim 2, wherein said holonic processing elements are coupled in the form of a cube, said arithmetic means being arranged to output said vectors to individual ones of said holonic processing elements, which are comprised in said image forming means, in such manner that said candidates for vectors of one picture element may be stored in a column-like form in said cube and so that said vectors of a direction of the entire image of said motion form a plane in said cube.

6. An apparatus according to claim 5, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a nonlinear oscillator circuit and an oscillation controlling circuit for receiving an input from the nonlinear oscillator circuit of another holonic processing element and then for generating from said input a signal for controlling the oscillation of its own nonlinear oscillator circuit,

said holonic processing elements in said column being coupled to each other so that one of said holonic processing elements which stores information representative of motion in one direction and the other which stores information representative of motion in the opposite direction may mutually suppress the oscillations of the respective oscillator circuits.

7. An apparatus according to claim 5, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a nonlinear oscillator circuit and an oscillation controlling circuit for receiving an output from the nonlinear oscillator circuit of another holonic processing element and then for generating from said output a signal for controlling the oscillation of its own nonlinear oscillator circuit, said oscillator circuit of each of said holonic processing elements which belong to one plane in said cube and said oscillation controlling circuit of each of said holonic processing elements belonging to a different plane in said cube being coupled to each other in such manner that a variation in oscillation between adjacent planes may be made smooth, and said rule altering means being arranged to alter said predetermined rule by altering the amount of control of each of said oscillation controlling circuits.

8. An apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said memory means further comprises a plurality of nonlinear oscillator circuits each storing information representative of a conceptualized meaning as the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuit.

9. An apparatus according to claim 5, wherein said memory means further comprises a plurality of nonlinear oscillator circuits, each of which stores information representative of a conceptualized meaning as the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuit, said retrieving means being arranged to retrieve the desired one from among said conceptualized meanings by determining whether or not the phenomenon of entrainment between said nonlinear oscillator circuits in said memory means is caused by the output signals of said nonlinear oscillator circuits in said cube which is comprised in said image forming means.

11. An apparatus according to claim 6, wherein the intensity of the suppression between oscillator circuits changes smoothly.

12. An apparatus according to claim 6, wherein said oscillation controlling means further comprises an amplifying means connected to said non-linear oscillator circuits of said holonic elements.

10. An image processing apparatus for extracting image data related to the motion of an object from physical data nd effecting image processing of the extracted image data, comprising:

input means arranged to photograph an object and input time-varying image data relation to the object;

arithmetic means connected to said input means for computing vectors indicative of local variations in the input time-varying image data;

image forming means connected to said arithmetic means for forming an image corresponding to the motion of the object from said vectors input from said arithmetic means in accordance with a predetermined rule;

memory means for retrievably storing in advance different kinds of conceptualized meanings of motion;

retrieving means connected to said image forming means and said memory means for retrieving a conceptualized meaning close to said image formed by said image forming means;

means for extracting signal information from said image forming means;

means for selectively extracting said conceptualized meanings; and

image processing means for effecting image processing on the basis of said extracted signal information and said extracted conceptualized meanings.

13. A motion-patterned recognition apparatus for recognizing the motion of an object contained in time-varying image data, comprising:

input means arranged to input time-varying image data;

arithmetic means connected to said input means for computing vectors indicative of local variation in the input time-varying image data;

vector altering means connected to said arithmetic means for altering the vectors by interaction therebetween in accordance with a predetermined rule;

memory means for retrievably storing in advance different kinds of conceptualized meanings of motion; and

retrieving means connected to said vector altering means and said memory means for retrieving a conceptualized meaning close to a motion represented by said vectors altered by said vector altering means.

14. An apparatus according to claim 13, wherein said input means comprises a camera.

15. An apparatus according to claim 13, wherein said arithmetic means further comprises sampling means for sampling frames from the time-varying data at two different points of time.

16. An apparatus according to claim 13, wherein said arithmetic means further comprises means for disintegrating the direction of the variation in the time-varying image data into candidates for vectors in units of picture elements.

17. An apparatus according to claim 16, wherein said vector altering means comprises a plurality of holonic processing elements for representing said candidates for vectors as holonic information.

18. An apparatus according to claim 17, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a nonlinear oscillator circuit, the holonic information being stored as the amplitude and the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuits.

19. An apparatus according to claim 17, wherein said holonic processing elements are coupled in the form of a cube.

20. An apparatus according to claim 19, wherein said arithmetic means is arranged to output each of the candidates for vectors to individual ones of said holonic processing elements, which are comprised in said vector altering means, in such manner that said candidates for vectors of one picture element may be stored in a column-like form in said cube and in such manner that said vectors of a direction of the entire image of said motion form a plane in said cube.

21. An apparatus according to claim 20, wherein each of said holonic processing elements further comprises a nonlinear oscillator circuit and an oscillation controlling circuit for receiving an output from the nonlinear oscillator circuit of another holonic processing element and then for generating from said output a signal for controlling the oscillation of its own nonlinear oscillator circuit.

22. An apparatus according to claim 20, wherein said holonic processing elements in said column-like form are coupled to each other in such manner that the oscillation of each of said holonic processing elements in suppressed by the oscillation of another processing element which receives a vector opposite to its own.

23. An apparatus according to claim 20, wherein said oscillator circuit of each of said holonic processing elements which belong to one plane in said cube and said holonic processing elements belonging to a different plane in said cube are coupled to each other in such manner that a variation in oscillation between adjacent planes may be made smooth.

24. An apparatus according to claim 13, wherein said memory means further comprises a plurality of nonlinear oscillator circuits, each of which stores information representative of a conceptualized meaning as the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuit.

25. An apparatus according to claim 20, wherein said memory means further comprises a plurality of nonlinear oscillator circuits, each of which stores information representative of a conceptualized meaning as the phase of oscillation of said nonlinear oscillator circuit, said retrieving means being arranged to retrieve the desired one from among said conceptualized meaning by determining whether or not the phenomenon of entrainment between said nonlinear oscillator circuit in said memory means is caused by the output signal of said nonlinear oscillator circuits in said cube which is comprised in said vector altering means.

26. A motion-pattern recognition apparatus for recognizing the motion of an object contained in image data, comprising:

camera means for inputting image data;

arithmetic means connected to said input means for computing vector indicative of local variation in the input image data;

vector altering means connected to said arithmetic means for altering the vectors by interaction therebetween;

memory means for storing in advance different kinds of conceptualized meanings of motion;

determining means connected to said vector altering means and said memory mans for determining a conceptualized meaning close to a motion represented by the vectors altered by said vector altering means;

means for extracting signal information from said vector altering means;

means for selectively extracting said conceptualized meanings; and

image processing means for effecting image processing on the basis of the extracted signal information and the extracted conceptualized meaning.