Background removal in a live video
First Claim
1. A method of segmenting a foreground from a background image, comprising:
- hardware for determining color and contrast attributes of pixels of the background image to be used in a video sequence, wherein the background image occupies an entire area of each frame of the video sequence except when the foreground hides part of the background image;
hardware for approximating a segmentation boundary demarcating the foreground based on differences between color and contrast attributes of pixels of the foreground versus the color and contrast attributes of pixels of the background image; and
hardware for refining the segmentation boundary between the foreground and the background image by adaptively attenuating a background contrast, wherein the attenuating includes decreasing a value of the contrast attribute of pixel pairs in the background image while maintaining a value of the contrast attribute of pixel pairs associated with the segmentation boundary.
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Abstract
Exemplary systems and methods segment a foreground from a background image in a video sequence. In one implementation, a system refines a segmentation boundary between the foreground and the background image by attenuating background contrast while preserving contrast of the segmentation boundary itself, providing an accurate background cut of live video in real time. A substitute background may then be merged with the segmented foreground within the live video. The system can apply an adaptive background color mixture model to improve segmentation of foreground from background under various background changes, such as camera movement, illumination change, and movement of small objects in the background.
74 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A method of segmenting a foreground from a background image, comprising:
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hardware for determining color and contrast attributes of pixels of the background image to be used in a video sequence, wherein the background image occupies an entire area of each frame of the video sequence except when the foreground hides part of the background image; hardware for approximating a segmentation boundary demarcating the foreground based on differences between color and contrast attributes of pixels of the foreground versus the color and contrast attributes of pixels of the background image; and hardware for refining the segmentation boundary between the foreground and the background image by adaptively attenuating a background contrast, wherein the attenuating includes decreasing a value of the contrast attribute of pixel pairs in the background image while maintaining a value of the contrast attribute of pixel pairs associated with the segmentation boundary. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. A system for segmenting a foreground from a background of a video sequence, comprising:
hardware comprising a foreground extractor to separate the foreground from the background of the video sequence, the foregoing extractor comprising; a segmentation engine to label pixels of the video sequence as either foreground or background; a boundary determination engine to calculate a boundary between the foreground and the background; a color evaluator to calculate the boundary according to foreground colors and background colors; and a contrast evaluator to calculate the boundary according to foreground contrasts and background contrasts, the contrast evaluator comprises a background contrast attenuator to attenuate contrast in the background while adaptively preserving contrast associated with the boundary. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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20. A computer-implemented system for segmenting a foreground from a background image, comprising:
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hardware means for segmenting the foreground from the background image in a video sequence; hardware means for determining a segmentation boundary between the foreground and the background image; hardware means for selecting pixel pairs associated with the segmentation boundary according to a difference in contrast with corresponding pixel pairs in the background image; and hardware means for refining the segmentation boundary by attenuating background contrast while preserving contrast of the pixel pairs associated with the segmentation boundary.
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Specification