Real-Time Road Surveillance By An Optical Sensor

Matthias Burkhard; Nils Rehfeld

doi:10.1117/12.943398

11 April 1988 Real-Time Road Surveillance By An Optical Sensor

Matthias Burkhard, Nils Rehfeld

Proceedings Volume 0860, Real-Time Image Processing: Concepts and Technologies; (1988) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.943398
Event: 1987 Symposium on the Technologies for Optoelectronics, 1987, Cannes, France

Abstract

We describe a real-time optical device for vehicle detection and recognition on roads. With vehicle traffic on public roads steadily increasing, there is a growing need for efficient monitoring and control of traffic flow. There is need for traffic counting (vehicle detection), estimation of vehicle speed and for vehicle classification (i.e. passenger car, truck). An optical sensor is very well suited to this problem giving detailed information from vehicles seen from a position beside or above the road. We implemented a device for this task operating in real-time with image scanning rates of about 100 Hz. Such rates are necessary for vehicle speeds up to 100 km/h. We solved the problem of high data rates by reducing the sensor's field of view down to two parallel receptor columns with a well known spacing and by sampling the grayvalues from the columns with a rate well fitted to the minimum of the required information. The principal idea of the applied image processing is to use change detection by means of difference pictures, embedded in a dynamic scene driven control. For the reliable detection and segmentation of moving vehicles a simple vehicle model and some rough estimates of the traffic flow are used. The segmented image data of the vehicles together with the derived information are collected for further inspection and processing. The system is realized on the Visual Interpretation System for Technical Applications (VISTA) developed by the Fraunhofer Institute IITB /1/. Most data processing is performed by software. The system achieves well the picture scanning rate of 100 Hz. For experimental purposes all image processing data are continuously displayed on a video monitor.

Citation Download Citation

Matthias Burkhard and Nils Rehfeld "Real-Time Road Surveillance By An Optical Sensor", Proc. SPIE 0860, Real-Time Image Processing: Concepts and Technologies, (11 April 1988); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.943398

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