Method and apparatus for tracking an object using a continuously adapting mean shift
First Claim
1. A method of tracking a probability distribution of an object, said method comprising:
- calculating a mean location of a probability distribution within a search window, the search window used to define the probability distribution whose mean location is to be calculated;
centering said search window onto said mean location;
resizing said search window; and
repeating said calculating, resizing and centering.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A tracking method is disclosed. The method of the present invention tracks a object using a probability distribution of the desired object. The method operates by first calculating a mean location of a probability distribution within a search window. Next, the search window is centered on the calculated mean location. The steps of calculating a mean location and centering the search window may be performed until convergence. The search window may then be resized. Successive iterations of calculating a mean, centering on the mean, and resizing the search window track an object represented by the probability distribution. In one embodiment, a flesh hue probability distribution is generated from an input video image. The flesh hue probability distribution is used to track a human head within the video image.
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Citations
20 Claims
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1. A method of tracking a probability distribution of an object, said method comprising:
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calculating a mean location of a probability distribution within a search window, the search window used to define the probability distribution whose mean location is to be calculated;
centering said search window onto said mean location;
resizing said search window; and
repeating said calculating, resizing and centering. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. A method of tracking an object within a video image, said method comprising:
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converting said video image into a probability distribution;
calculating a mean location of a probability distribution within a search window, the search window used to define the probability distribution whose mean location is to be calculated;
centering said search window onto said mean location; and
repeating said calculating and centering. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. An apparatus for tracking an object, said apparatus comprising:
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a video camera, said video camera capturing an image of said object;
a video digitizer, said video digitizer digitizing said image; and
a computer system, said computer system converting said image into a probability distribution, said computer system iteratively calculating a mean location of a probability distribution within a search window of said image and centering said search window onto said mean location. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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Specification