VEHICLE PERIPHERY MONITORING DEVICE

• US 20130083968A1
• Filed: 06/30/2011
• Published: 04/04/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (Honda Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (Honda Motor Company)
• Inventors: Sakamoto, Yosuke
• Granted Patent: US 8,867,788 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/103
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/24 Classification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30261 Obstacle
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/13 Edge detection
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/44 Local feature extraction by analysis of parts of the pattern, e.g. by detecting edges, contours, loops, corners, strokes or intersections; Connectivity analysis, e.g. of connected components
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/56 exterior to a vehicle by using sensors mounted on the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/58 Recognition of moving objects or obstacles, e.g. vehicles or pedestrians; Recognition of traffic objects, e.g. traffic signs, traffic lights or roads
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/165 for passive traffic, e.g. including static obstacles, trees

Abstract

A vehicle periphery monitoring device includes: a first edge image generation element 5 which generates a first edge image on the basis of luminance components of a captured image acquired by an in-vehicle camera 2; a second edge image generation element 6 which generates a second edge image on the basis of hue components or saturation components of the captured image; a composite edge image generation element 7 which generates a composite edge image formed by combining the first edge image and the second edge image; and an object classification identification element 8 which identifies whether or not the object is a prescribed kind of structure on the basis of the external shape of the object represented by the composite edge image.

Claims

1. A vehicle periphery monitoring device which detects an object existing outside a vehicle on the basis of a captured image of an area in the periphery of the vehicle acquired by an in-vehicle camera, the device comprising:

a first edge image generation element configured to extract a first edge as a discontinuous varying portion in a value of a luminance component from the captured image on the basis of the luminance components of the captured image and generates a first edge image which is composed of the extracted first edges;

a second edge image generation element configured to extract a second edge as a discontinuous varying portion in a value of a hue component or a saturation component on the basis of the hue components or the saturation components of the captured image and generates a second edge image which is composed of the extracted second edges;

a composite edge image generation element configured to generate a composite edge image formed by combining the generated first edge image and second edge image; and

an object classification identification element configured to determine whether or not an external shape of the object represented by an object outline image which is an image constituting a visible outline of the object contained in the captured image in the generated composite edge image coincides with an external shape of a prescribed kind of structure and identifies whether or not the object is the prescribed kind of structure on the basis of at least the determination result.

2. The vehicle periphery monitoring device according to claim 1, wherein:

the prescribed kind of structure is a structure whose outer surface is sectioned into a plurality of colored areas by a plurality of boundaries extending in a horizontal or diagonal direction and in parallel to each other on the outer surface and in which the colored areas adjacent to each other with each boundary therebetween are colored in colors different from each other; and

the object classification identification element determines that the object is the prescribed kind of structure in the case where the external shape of the object represented by the object outline image coincides with the external shape of the prescribed kind of structure, and there are a plurality of the first edges or the second edges extending in a horizontal or diagonal direction and in parallel to each other are present inside the object outline image.