VIDEO-BASED METHOD FOR PARKING ANGLE VIOLATION DETECTION

• US 20130266187A1
• Filed: 05/01/2012
• Published: 10/10/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 04/06/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Conduent Business Services, LLC (Conduent, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Xerox Corporation (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Inventors: Bulan, Orhan, Loce, Robert P., Bernal, Edgar A., Wang, Yao Rong, Pennington, Graham S.
• Granted Patent: US 8,737,690 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/104
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 20/54 of traffic, e.g. cars on the road, trains or boats

Abstract

A method and a system for determining a parking angle violation includes receiving video data from a sequence of frames taken from an image capture device monitoring a parking area. The method further includes determining a first line in a current frame where the line represents a nominal orientation of the parking area. The method includes detecting a presence of a vehicle in the parking area. The method includes determining a second line in the frame where the line represents the orientation of the detected vehicle. The method further includes computing an angle between the first and second lines. The method includes determining whether the detected vehicle is violating a parking regulation based on the computed angle.

Claims

1. A method for determining a parking angle violation, the method comprising:

receiving video data from a sequence of frames taken from an associated image capture device monitoring a parking area;

determining a first line in a current frame where the line represents a nominal orientation of the parking area;

detecting a presence of a vehicle in the parking area;

determining a second line in the frame where the line represents the orientation of the detected vehicle;

computing an angle between the first and second lines; and

,

determining whether the detected vehicle is violating a parking regulation based on the computed angle.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the nominal orientation of the parking area is performed by a process selected from a group consisting of:

determining an angle of the longest line in the scene detected by a Hough Transform;

determining a dominant orientation of a motion heat map; and

applying manually input data.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the orientation of the vehicle is performed by one of determining an angle of a major axis of a fitted ellipse to a boundary of the detected vehicle and determining an angle of a longest line in a body of the detected vehicle.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the computing the angle includes:

estimating a curb angle θ

_c using the first line;

estimating a vehicle angle θ

_v using the second line;

computing a difference between the curb angle θ

_c and the vehicle angle θ

_v.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the estimating the curb angle θ

_c includes;

determining the first line in the current frame representing the nominal orientation of the parking area;

determining start coordinates and end coordinates of the first line;

applying the start and end coordinates to an algorithm for determining an angle of a curb relative to a coordinate system of pixels in the image plane.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the estimating the vehicle angle θ

_v includes;

determining start coordinates and end coordinates of the second line;

applying the start and end coordinates to an algorithm for determining the angle of the vehicle relative to a coordinate system of pixels in an image plane.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining whether the detected vehicle is violating the parking regulation includes:

comparing the angle to a predetermined threshold;

in response to the angle meeting or exceeding the predetermined threshold, indicating that the detected vehicle is in violation of the parking regulation;

in response to the angle not meeting or exceeding the predetermined threshold, proceeding to process a subsequent frame in the sequence.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the detecting the vehicle includes:

determining whether the current frame is an initial frame of the sequence;

in response to the current frame being the initial frame, initializing a background image; and

in response to the current frame not being the initial frame, updating a background in the current frame by applying a predetermined updating factor p in an algorithm used to determine the background, wherein the updating factor p varies for each pixel in the current frame and depends on a classification of the pixel as belonging to one of a foreground image and a background construct.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

computing an absolute difference in an intensity between pixels located in the current frame and pixels at corresponding locations in one of a background image initialized in an initial frame and a background of a preceding frame;

determining if the difference meets or exceeds a threshold; and

,

classifying the pixels in the select frame based on the difference and the threshold.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the classifying the pixels includes:

in response to the threshold not being met or exceeded, classifying a pixel as belonging to the background construct;

in response to a threshold being met or exceeded, classifying the pixel as belonging to the foreground image.

11. The method of claim 9 further comprising:

providing a binary image using the classified pixels, the providing including;

assigning a “

0”

value to the pixels corresponding to locations classified as belonging to a background image, and

assigning a “

1”

value to pixels corresponding to locations classified as belonging to a foreground image; and

,

processing the binary image for determining whether the detected vehicle is violating the parking regulation.

12. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

in response to determining that the detected vehicle is violating the parking regulation, providing notice of the violation to a user device.

13. A computer program product comprising tangible media which encodes instructions for performing the method of claim 1.

14. A system for determining parking availability comprising:

a parking angle determination device comprising memory which stores instructions for performing the method of claim 1 and a processor, in communication with the memory for executing the instructions.

16. The system according to claim 14 wherein the curb angle determination module is adapted to:

determine the first line in the current frame representing the nominal orientation of the parking area;

determine start coordinates and end coordinates of the first line;

apply the start and end coordinates to an algorithm for determining an angle θ

_c of a curb relative to a coordinate system of pixels in an image plane.

18. The system according to claim 16, wherein the parking angle detection module is adapted to compute a difference between the curb angle θ

_c and the vehicle angle θ

_v.

19. The system according to claim 14, wherein the boundary violation detection module is adapted to:

compare the angle to a predetermined threshold;

in response to the angle meeting or exceeding the predetermined threshold, indicate that the detected vehicle is in violation of the parking regulation;

in response to the angle not meeting or exceeding the predetermined threshold, proceed to process a subsequent frame in the sequence.

20. The system according to claim 14, wherein the stationary vehicle detection module is adapted to:

determine whether a current frame is an initial frame of the sequence;

in response to the current frame being the initial frame, initialize a background image; and

in response to the current frame not being the initial frame, update a background in the current frame by applying a predetermined updating factor p in an algorithm used to determine the background, wherein the updating factor p varies for each pixel in the current frame and depends on a classification of the pixel as belonging to one of a foreground image and a background construct.

15. A system for determining a parking angle violation, the system comprising:

a parking angle violation determination device, the determination device including;

a video buffer module adapted for receiving video data from a sequence of frames taken from an associated image capture device monitoring a parking area;

a curb angle determination module adapted for determining a first line in a current frame where the line represents a nominal orientation of the parking area;

a stationary vehicle detection module adapted for detecting a presence of a vehicle in the parking area;

a vehicle angle determination module adapted for determining a second line in the frame where the line represents the orientation of the detected vehicle;

a parking angle violation detection module adapted for computing an angle between the first and second lines and determining whether the detected vehicle is violating a parking regulation based on the computed angle; and

,

a processor adapted to implement the modules.

17. The system according to claim 15, wherein the vehicle classification module is adapted to:

determine start coordinates and end coordinates of the second line;

apply the start and end coordinates to an algorithm for determining an angle θ

_v of the detected vehicle relative to a coordinate system of pixels in an image plane.