Smart camera

About: Smart camera is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5571 publications have been published within this topic receiving 93054 citations. The topic is also known as: intelligent camera.

Providing camera-based services using a portable communication device

Abstract: Camera-based services are provided to a user of a portable communication device by recognizing text contained in an image. An image of an environment is captured using a camera within the portable communication device so as to obtain image data. The image data is processed such that text data is recognized and extracted from the image data. Data related to the text data is then output in a form recognizable by a user of the portable communication device. The text data can be processed on the portable communication device to obtain the data related to the text data. Alternatively, the processing is performed by a processing unit external to the portable communication device. Translated and audio versions of the text data are output to the user. One camera-based service provides price and product information related to a product described in an image captured by the camera.

Video surveillance system

Abstract: A video surveillance system that automatically keeps track of a moving object in an accurate and efficient manner. The system has two cameras for surveillance. One is a visible-light integrating camera that has a frame integration function to capture visible-light images of objects, and the other is an infrared camera for taking infrared images. A rotation unit tilts and pans the visible-light integrating camera and/or infrared camera, under the control of a tracking controller. Video output signals of those cameras are processed by image processors. The tracking controller operates with commands from a system controller, so that it will keep track of a moving object with the visible-light integrating camera in a first period and with the infrared camera in a second period.

Video/audio communication system with confirmation capability

Abstract: There is disclosed a system in which, in order to vary the audio input/output characteristics in linkage with the camera operation and to thereby improve the realistic feeling, the camera control server of the CPU transfers the camera control command, received through the network, to the camera control device to control the camera. In more details, the camera control server also sends control commands to the audio input control device, the audio output device and the video display control device according to the camera control thereby controlling the input characteristics (spreading, direction and sensitivity) of the microphone and the output characteristics (spreading, direction and depth) of the speaker and varying the image displayed on the monitor. There is also disclosed technology for displaying, on the monitor, the information on the operator of the camera and on the receiver of the image, and for varying the direction of the monitor according to the panning or tilting operation of the camera.

Surveillance camera scheduling: a virtual vision approach

Abstract: We present a surveillance system, comprising wide field-of-view (FOV) passive cameras and pan/tilt/zoom (PTZ) active cameras, which automatically captures and labels high-resolution videos of pedestrians as they move through a designated area. A wide-FOV stationary camera can track multiple pedestrians, while any PTZ active camera can capture high-quality videos of a single pedestrian at a time. We propose a multi-camera control strategy that combines information gathered by the wide-FOV cameras with weighted round-robin scheduling to guide the available PTZ cameras, such that each pedestrian is viewed by at least one active camera during their stay in the designated area.A distinctive centerpiece of our work is the exploitation of a visually and behaviorally realistic virtual environment simulator for the development and testing of surveillance systems. Our research would be more or less infeasible in the real world given the impediments to deploying and experimenting with an appropriately complex camera sensor network in a large public space the size of, say, a train station. In particular, we demonstrate our surveillance system in a virtual train station environment populated by autonomous, lifelike virtual pedestrians, wherein easily reconfigurable virtual cameras generate synthetic video feeds that emulate those generated by real surveillance cameras monitoring richly populated public spaces.

Camera Networks: The Acquisition and Analysis of Videos over Wide Areas

Abstract: As networks of video cameras are installed in many applications like security and surveillance, environmental monitoring, disaster response, and assisted living facilities, among others, image understanding in camera networks is becoming an important area of research and technology development. There are many challenges that need to be addressed in the process. Some of them are listed below: - Traditional computer vision challenges in tracking and recognition, robustness to pose, illumination, occlusion, clutter, recognition of objects, and activities; - Aggregating local information for wide area scene understanding, like obtaining stable, long-term tracks of objects; - Positioning of the cameras and dynamic control of pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) cameras for optimal sensing; - Distributed processing and scene analysis algorithms; - Resource constraints imposed by different applications like security and surveillance, environmental monitoring, disaster response, assisted living facilities, etc. In this book, we focus on the basic research problems in camera networks, review the current state-of-the-art and present a detailed description of some of the recently developed methodologies. The major underlying theme in all the work presented is to take a network-centric view whereby the overall decisions are made at the network level. This is sometimes achieved by accumulating all the data at a central server, while at other times by exchanging decisions made by individual cameras based on their locally sensed data. Chapter One starts with an overview of the problems in camera networks and the major research directions. Some of the currently available experimental testbeds are also discussed here. One of the fundamental tasks in the analysis of dynamic scenes is to track objects. Since camera networks cover a large area, the systems need to be able to track over such wide areas where there could be both overlapping and non-overlapping fields of view of the cameras, as addressed in Chapter Two: Distributed processing is another challenge in camera networks and recent methods have shown how to do tracking, pose estimation and calibration in a distributed environment. Consensus algorithms that enable these tasks are described in Chapter Three. Chapter Four summarizes a few approaches on object and activity recognition in both distributed and centralized camera network environments. All these methods have focused primarily on the analysis side given that images are being obtained by the cameras. Efficient utilization of such networks often calls for active sensing, whereby the acquisition and analysis phases are closely linked. We discuss this issue in detail in Chapter Five and show how collaborative and opportunistic sensing in a camera network can be achieved. Finally, Chapter Six concludes the book by highlighting the major directions for future research. Table of Contents: An Introduction to Camera Networks / Wide-Area Tracking / Distributed Processing in Camera Networks / Object and Activity Recognition / Active Sensing / Future Research Directions