| Entries |
| Document | Title | Date |
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| 20080212837 | LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION APPARATUS, LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION METHOD, AND COMPUTER-READABLE STORAGE MEDIUM - A license plate recognition apparatus includes a detection unit configured to detect a plurality of quadrangles of license plate region candidates from input images, a character recognition unit configured to execute character recognition of a character region included in the license plate region candidate detected, and an output unit configured to select a license plate region candidate to be output from among the plurality of license plate candidates detected by the detection unit based on the character recognition result and information of the quadrangle of the respective license plate region candidates and output information relating to the license plate region candidates selected. | 09-04-2008 |
| 20080253616 | Imaging System and Imaging Method - The present invention relates to, for example, an image pickup system having a structure capable of imaging a subject at a low power consumption and a low cost even when the subject may be dark. The image pickup system comprises an image pickup device, a peak position detecting section, a partial image acquiring section, and a partial image operating section. The image pickup device outputs image data that represents the two-dimensional intensity distribution of light incident on a photodetecting section, and outputs light intensity profile data that represents the one-dimensional intensity distribution of the incident light in each of first and second directions in the photodetecting section. The peak position detecting section detects a light intensity peak position in the two-dimensional intensity distribution of the light incident on the photodetecting section in the image pickup device, based on the light intensity profile data outputted from the image pickup device. The partial image acquiring section acquires a partial image from an entire image that can be imaged by the image pickup device so that the light intensity peak position detected by the peak position detecting section is made a specific position for the partial image in the entire image. The partial image operating section integrates the acquired partial image. | 10-16-2008 |
| 20080285803 | Modulated light trigger for license plate recognition cameras - A camera system comprises a CCD imaging device, an infrared illumination source, and a power modulator for amplitude modulating the infrared illumination, e.g., with a 7-kHz tone. A beam splitter is set in front of the CCD imaging device, and a photo-diode array is attached to the beam splitter to detect modulated infrared light returning from the same field of vision as the CCD imaging device Various tone filters, and triggers connected to the tone filters, will cause the CCD imaging device to take a digital picture when the returning modulated infrared light exceeds some threshold and comes from right areas of a picture frame. Such digital pictures will most probably include an image of a vehicle license plate that can be processed, and the results used to extract the registration data from a database. | 11-20-2008 |
| 20080285804 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR RECOGNIZING THE STATE OF ORIGIN OF A VEHICLE LICENSE PLATE - A system analyzes various design characteristics of a vehicle license plate, including character size, placement and color, to identify the state of issuance of the plate. In some embodiments, the system uses spectral properties of light reflected from a vehicle license plate to determine spectral frequency bands having the best contrast between characters on the plate and the background of the plate. For example, red characters against a white background exhibit high contrast levels at wavelengths of about 420 nm to about 595 nm. Green characters against a white background exhibit high contrast levels at wavelengths of about 600 nm to about 750 nm. Blue characters against a white background exhibit high contrast levels at wavelengths of about 550 nm to about 750 nm. Thus, spectral characteristics in combination with other design-related characteristics of a license plate may be used to identify the state of origin of the plate. Once the state of origin is identified, origin-specific syntax matching may be used to enhance optical character recognition routines. | 11-20-2008 |
| 20090161913 | CAMERA CONTROL METHOD FOR VEHICLE NUMBER PLATE RECOGNITION - This development is about the camera control method for a vehicle license plate recognition system. In detail, it is about the applying variable shutter speed and gain level per image frames that are captured through a CCTV camera of vehicle license plate recognition system. The entire control is done through 3 steps. The first step is to build up a lookup table of electronic shutter speed and gain level to generate images of various brightness levels and archive the created lookup table on to a memory of a camera. The second step is to calculate the average value of image brightness and write the multiple parameters of electronic shutter speed and gain level that match with the calculated average brightness value in the lookup table to a camera control register. The third step is to output series of images of various brightness that are captured under various shutter speeds and gain levels by the control from the camera register. This development is to get series of images with various brightness instantly by adjusting shutter speed and gain level of each frame to avoid recognition failure due to inadequate (too bright or too dark in recognizing numbers in a plate) image frame in harsh conditions such as strong sun lights or fluctuating brightness, which may confuse camera in controlling shutter speed and gain level for getting proper images to recognize. | 06-25-2009 |
| 20090208059 | Fast License Plate Verifier - A method for identifying vehicles, including capturing a first image of a first vehicle using a first camera at a first position and a second image of the first vehicle using a second camera at a second position different from the first position. The method further includes determining a transformation between the first image and the second image. A third image of a second vehicle using the first camera is captured, and the transformation is applied to the third image to generate a fourth image of the second vehicle. The fourth image is analyzed, using a database of identified vehicles, to determine an identity of the second vehicle. | 08-20-2009 |
| 20090208060 | LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION SYSTEM USING SPATIAL-TEMPORAL SEARCH-SPACE REDUCTION AND METHOD THEREOF - The present invention discloses a license plate recognition system by utilizing spatial-temporal search-space reduction and method thereof. The license plate recognition system can selects a pixel with character edge feature from the inputted image and a plurality of candidate regions from the image; and detect if the candidate region of the inputted image has been appeared in a preceding image. Then the recognition system in the present invention separates the candidate region into a plurality of blocks, calculates the repeated block based on a current image and a preceding image, and determines whether the candidate region is repeated according to the repeated block. Thus, by discarding the repeated regions, the license plate recognition system in the present invention can avoid redundant calculation and improve the efficiency and performance for recognition of real plate character in the image. | 08-20-2009 |
| 20100054539 | Method and system of identifying one or more features represented in a plurality of sensor acquired data sets - A method and system for identifying one or more features represented in a plurality of sensor acquired data sets is described. The method and apparatus is particularly useful in automatic license plate recognition applications, where the sensor acquired data sets are data obtained from one or more digital cameras. This is achieved by determining a first probability of the identity of the one or more features (eg alphanumeric characters) from a first one of the data sets; determining a second probability of the identity of the one or more features from a second one of the data sets; and, using data fusion techniques, fusing the determined first and second probabilities to provide a fused probability. This fused probability is used to identify the one or more features from data sets. | 03-04-2010 |
| 20100128931 | AUTOMATED SECURITY GATE ATTENDANT - An automated security attendant for a mechanical gate includes an interface that queries a visitor as to the name and destination of the visitor, and then automatically proceeds with authentication of the visitor. The system includes cameras and recording equipment for capturing the visitor's face and license plates, and records this information along with a time and date stamp of the event. The visitor can be authenticated in accordance with a pre-stored list of names or license plates, or can be authenticated in real time through contact with authorized personnel. The system can further initiate two way conversation with between the visitor and the authorized personnel, and provide the authorized personnel with the image of the visitor's face and/or license plate. The system can also monitor the gate for damage and alert authorities where the security of the gate has been compromised. | 05-27-2010 |
| 20100195871 | Autonomous Wide-Angle License Plate Recognition - A system in a moving surveillance vehicle operates in background mode to capture images of license plates of neighboring moving vehicles, which may occupy lanes other than the lane in which the surveillance vehicle is moving. The images are used to determine the license plate numbers of the moving vehicles, which are then checked against a database to determine whether there are any potential law enforcement-related problems that require the attention of the operator. If so, the system alerts the operator using an audible tone, visual prompt, vibration, or in some other suitable manner. The entire process, including generation of the alert can occur autonomously of the operator. | 08-05-2010 |
| 20100246890 | DETECTION OF OBJECTS IN IMAGES - A system described herein includes a detector component that automatically determines location of a license plate in a digital image. The system further includes a blurrer component that automatically blurs the digital image at the determined location of the license plate, wherein blurring undertaken by the blurrer component is based at least in part upon confidence scores assigned to pixels in the digital image that correspond to the determined location of the license plate. | 09-30-2010 |
| 20100272317 | PARKED VEHICLE LOCATION SYSTEM - The parked vehicle location system, comprising guiding means ( | 10-28-2010 |
| 20100278389 | METHOD FOR IMAGE RECOMBINATION OF A PLURALITY OF IMAGES AND IMAGE IDENTIFICATION AND SYSTEM FOR IMAGE ACQUIRING AND IDENTIFICATION - The present invention provides a method for image recombination of a plurality of images and image identification and a system for image acquiring and identification. Features with respect to the plurality of images are recombined and enhanced so as to form a recombined image. After that, the recombined image is processed to emphasize the features of the recombined image so that the recombined image is capable of being identified easily. Furthermore, the present provides a system to perform the foregoing method, whereby reducing unidentified problems caused due to low quality image of the monitoring system. | 11-04-2010 |
| 20110116686 | VIDEO TOLLING SYSTEM WITH ERROR CHECKING - An automated toll collection system based on visual recognition of a license plate with a supplemental enhancement to confirm the character recognition of the license plate is disclosed. In an embodiment, a supplemental graphic insignia encodes a check-sum for the license plate characters. The insignia is recorded at the same time as the license plate and the check sum is decoded to confirm the interpretation of the characters on the license plate. Other forms of confirmation devices are also disclosed, including RFID devices. | 05-19-2011 |
| 20110116687 | METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR OBJECT CLASSIFICATION - A method of classifying an object, in particular of classifying a vehicle by evaluating the degree of correlation between an image data set corresponding to an image of at least part of the vehicle and each of a plurality of reference data sets each of which corresponds to a reference image of a vehicle comprises the steps of establishing the vehicle's aspect and selecting the plurality of reference data sets from a larger group of such data sets on the basis of the vehicle's aspect. By selecting from the larger group only those reference data sets which correspond to the vehicle's aspect, faster classification is achieved for a given level of processing resources. Alternatively, for a given processing or classification rate, the level of processing resources may be reduced compared to the prior art. | 05-19-2011 |
| 20110123068 | METHOD OF AND ARRANGEMENT FOR BLURRING AN IMAGE - A method of reducing the spatial resolution of images is disclosed. At least one embodiment of the method includes: —acquiring an input image including image parts having a spatial resolution larger than SR pixels/meter; —acquiring a depth map associated with the input image; —determining for each pixel p(x,y) a spatial resolution value by means of the depth map; —processing a region of pixels of the input image for which holds that the spatial resolution value is larger than a predefined threshold corresponding to SR pixels/meter to obtain a corresponding region of pixels having a spatial resolution smaller then or equal to SR pixels/meter in an output image. The method enables to removes privacy information from images by reducing the spatial resolution to a level that the privacy information cannot be recognized in the image anymore. | 05-26-2011 |
| 20110135156 | Method of Locating License Plate of Moving Vehicle - While locating a license plate of a moving vehicle on consecutive images, motion detection is first performed on the consecutive images to detect a moving vehicle image, which is segmented using edge detection, and the segmented moving vehicle image is analyzed to retrieve characteristics for locating a license plate image and determining characters on the located license plate image. As a result, a precise location of the license plate is thus precisely located for further recognition no matter what weathers in which the consecutive images are recorded. The above-mentioned technique requires merely few calculations, is easily implemented, and may be applied on an intelligent digital video recording (DVR) system including many computer-vision functions. | 06-09-2011 |
| 20110194733 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR OPTICAL LICENSE PLATE MATCHING - An automated system and method are disclosed for reading license plate characters and associating the image with a vehicle by comparing to existing images and supplementing the automated system with manual review, comprising: capturing a first license plate image; processing the first image with optical character recognition equipment to produce an OCR result; associating the OCR result with a confidence level. If the confidence level is above a predetermined threshold, determining whether the OCR result matches a previously-obtained OCR result and if the confidence level is not above the predetermined threshold, presenting the first image for a manual review to produce a manual result. | 08-11-2011 |
| 20120106801 | VEHICLE TRACKING AND LOCATING SYSTEM - A vehicle tracking and locating system provides information to a user about a vehicle of interest, and includes a database controller in operative communication with a database, and configured to receive data corresponding to vehicles from a plurality of client sources, and configured to save the data as information records corresponding to each client source. A plurality of external communication devices transmit a data request by the user corresponding to the vehicle of interest. A request server receives the data request in one a variety of communication formats. An input request processor operatively coupled to the request server is configured to obtain information records from the database corresponding to the data request. An output processor operatively coupled to the request server provides data of interest from the obtained information records for transmission to the respective communication device to satisfy the user request. | 05-03-2012 |
| 20120106802 | VEHICLE LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION METHOD AND SYSTEM THEREOF - A vehicle license plate recognition method and a system thereof are disclosed. A region where a vehicle license plate image exists is detected according to the edge densities of an input image and a vehicle license plate specification. A text area of the vehicle license plate image is divided into a plurality of character images. The character images are binarized to obtain a plurality of binarized character images. A plurality of characters is recognized from the binarized character images. The characters are recombined to form a character string. The abovementioned steps are repeated to obtain a new character string from another image of the same vehicle, which is captured at a next time point. The character string is compared with the new character string character by character to obtain a comparison result for verifying reliability of recognition through a voting technique. | 05-03-2012 |
| 20120148105 | AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION SYSTEM AND METHOD USING HUMAN-IN-THE-LOOP BASED ADAPTIVE LEARNING - An automated license plate recognition (ALPR) system and method using a human-in-the-loop based adaptive learning approach. One or more images with respect to an automotive vehicle can be segmented in order to determine a license plate of the automotive vehicle within a scene. An optical character recognition (OCR) engine loaded with an OCR algorithm can be further adapted to determine a character sequence of the license plate based on a training data set. A confidence level with respect to the images can be generated in order to route a low confidence image to an operator for obtaining a human interpreted image. The parameters with respect to the OCR algorithm can be adjusted based on the human interpreted image and the actual image of the license plate. A license plate design can be then incorporated into the OCR engine in order to automate the process of recognizing the license plate with respect to the automotive vehicle in a wide range of transportation related applications. | 06-14-2012 |
| 20120155712 | METHOD FOR AUTOMATIC LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION USING ADAPTIVE FEATURE SET - A method for determining a confidence level to be used in identifying a vehicle. The method includes receiving a vehicle image, extracting a license plate image from the at least one vehicle image, determining a license plate number and associated confidence level based upon the license plate image, and comparing the associated confidence level against a confidence threshold. If the associated confidence level is below the confidence threshold, the method further includes extracting auxiliary data from the at least one vehicle image, corresponding the extracted auxiliary data and a set of stored auxiliary data, and updating the associated confidence level to produce an updated confidence level based upon the correspondence of the extracted auxiliary data and the set of stored auxiliary data. | 06-21-2012 |
| 20120170814 | IMAGES OF CARS INTEGRATION SYSTEM AND METHOD - A cloud server of a data center and method integrate images of cars. The cloud server analyzes an image to obtain a license plate number of the car and generates a keyword corresponding to the image. The cloud server of the data center receives a number input by a user from a client. The cloud server of the data center matches the input number with the keyword to search an image corresponding to the input number. | 07-05-2012 |
| 20120263352 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR VERIFYING AUTOMATIC LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION RESULTS - Methods and systems for verifying automatic license plate recognition results providing an input image of a license plate to a processing system that extracts bitmap data from the provided input image and determines a particular license template image associated with the license plate input image. The processing system segments the input image bitmap data into text region bitmap data and outer region bitmap data and then matches the input image text region bitmap data and input image outer region bitmap data against text region bitmap data and outer region bitmap data, respectively, of the license plate image template to determine if there is a match between the license plate of the input image and the template license plate. | 10-18-2012 |
| 20120269398 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR IDENTIFYING A LICENSE PLATE - A license plate localization method and system based on a combination of a top-down texture analysis and a bottom-up connected component. An image with respect to a vehicle captured by an image capturing unit can be processed in order to locate and binarize a busy area. A black run with respect to the binarized image can be analyzed and classified and one or more objects (connected components) can be generated based on the black run classification. The objects can be further classified in accordance with their size utilizing a run-length based filter to filter out a non-text object. The leftover objects can then be spatially clustered and the uniformity and linearity of the clustered objects can be examined based on a linearity test. The clustered objects can be rejected if they fail the linearity test and the detected objects can further be matched with a plate edge characteristic in order to locate a license plate. | 10-25-2012 |
| 20120275653 | METHOD FOR RECOGNIZING LICENSE PLATE IMAGE, AND RELATED COMPUTER PROGRAM PRODUCT, COMPUTER-READABLE RECORDING MEDIUM, AND IMAGE RECOGNIZING APPARATUS USING THE SAME - A computer implemented method for recognizing license plate image, and related computer product, computer-readable recording medium, and image recognizing apparatus using the same is provided. The method includes collecting a plurality of character template images and respectively homogenizing the character template images to generate a plurality of simulated character template images based on the license plate image. The method also includes respectively generating a plurality of similarity degrees corresponding to the simulated character template images by comparing the simulated character template images with the license plate image. The method further includes estimating at least one candidate character corresponding to the license plate image and at least one candidate character position corresponding to the at least one candidate character according to the similarity degrees corresponding to the simulated character template images. Accordingly, the method can effectively recognize license plate numbers in a license plate image. | 11-01-2012 |
| 20130004024 | Method and system of identifying one or more features represented in a plurality of sensor acquired data sets - A method and system for identifying one or more features represented in a plurality of sensor acquired data sets is described. The method and apparatus is particularly useful in automatic license plate recognition applications, where the sensor acquired data sets are data obtained from one or more digital cameras. This is achieved by determining a first probability of the identity of the one or more features (e.g., alphanumeric characters) from a first one of the data sets; determining a second probability of the identity of the one or more features from a second one of the data sets; and, using data fusion techniques, fusing the determined first and second probabilities to provide a fused probability. This fused probability is used to identify the one or more features from data sets. | 01-03-2013 |
| 20130028481 | SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR IMPROVING IMAGE RECOGNITION - An embodiment generally relates to systems and methods for processing license plate image data. A processing module can receive an image comprising a license plate and, from the image, localize a region of the license plate itself. The license plate region can be extracted and license plate distortion parameters can be inferred. The image can be geometrically corrected using the inferred license plate distortion parameters, and the license plate image can be iteratively sharpened to optimize the quality of the license plate image. Further, processing parameters can be modified and applied to the image data in a feedback-based loop for further optimization. | 01-31-2013 |
| 20130108114 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR INTERCEPTION OF IP TRAFFIC BASED ON IMAGE PROCESSING | 05-02-2013 |
| 20130129151 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR IMPROVED LICENSE PLATE SIGNATURE MATCHING BY SIMILARITY LEARNING ON SYNTHETIC IMAGES - Methods and systems for improved license plate signature matching by similarity learning on synthetic images comprise generating a plurality of synthetic license plate images; applying one or more transformations to the synthetic license plate images to cause the synthetic license plate images to more closely resemble authentic license plate image captures; and providing the synthetic license plate images as inputs to a machine distance learning algorithm in which weighted similarity scores are calculated between signatures of analogous and non-analogous license plate images and one or more sets of signature weights are iteratively adjusted to increase the likelihood that comparing analogous license plate images results in high weighted signature similarity scores and comparing non-analogous license plate images results in low weighted signature similarity scores. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130129152 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR IMPROVING YIELD IN WANTED VEHICLE SEARCHES - In response to determining that a target vehicle is at large, identification information associated with the target vehicle's license plate may be retrieved and used to generate one or more synthetic license plate images. The synthetic license plate images may be subjected to one or more transformation to cause them to resemble authentic license plate image captures and/or to mimic authentic license plate image captures from existing and operational ALPR system cameras. Target signatures may then be calculated from the synthetic license plate images. Upon capturing an authentic license plate image using an ALPR system camera, a signature of the authentic license plate image may be calculated. If a match is found between the signature of the authentic license plate image and a target signature, law enforcement may be alerted that the target vehicle was detected at the location of the ALPR system camera. | 05-23-2013 |
| 20130136310 | Method and System for Collecting Information Relating to Identity Parameters of A Vehicle - The present invention discloses methods and systems for collecting information relating to identity parameters of a vehicle. According to the invention an image of the vehicle is obtained. A sub-image within the image is identified, interest points within the sub-image are detected and the sub-image is processed so as to obtain descriptors representing the interest points. The descriptors are matched to predetermined descriptors representing interest points in previously obtained images respective of known identity parameters and the information is stored in a record representing an identity of the vehicle. | 05-30-2013 |
| 20130142393 | VEHICULAR THREAT DETECTION BASED ON IMAGE ANALYSIS - Techniques for ability enhancement are described. Some embodiments provide an ability enhancement facilitator system (“AEFS”) configured to enhance a user's ability to operate or function in a transportation-related context as a pedestrian or a vehicle operator. In one embodiment, the AEFS is configured perform vehicular threat detection based at least in part on analyzing image data. An example AEFS receives data that represents an image of a vehicle. The AEFS analyzes the received data to determine vehicular threat information, such as that the vehicle may collide with the user. The AEFS then informs the user of the determined vehicular threat information, such as by transmitting a warning to a wearable device configured to present the warning to the user. | 06-06-2013 |
| 20130148857 | APPARATUS FOR EXTRACTING CHARACTER AREA IN VEHICLE NUMBER PLATE AND METHOD THEREOF - Disclosed are an apparatus for extracting a character area in a vehicle number plate and a method thereof. An apparatus for extracting a character area in a vehicle number plate according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention includes a candidate area extracting unit configured to extract a plurality of character candidate areas from a vehicle number plate image using a plurality of algorithms; a filtering unit configured to determine a final character candidate area from the plurality of extracted character candidate areas; and a character area selecting unit configured to select a final character area from the final character candidate area using geometric information of blobs. | 06-13-2013 |
| 20130148858 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR LINK ANALYSIS BASED ON IMAGE PROCESSING - Methods and systems to identify relationships between individuals by analyzing digital images and automatically detecting individuals who appear together in the images. A link analysis system accepts one or more digital images, and automatically recognizes individuals who appear together in the images. The system may recognize the individuals, for example, by applying a suitable face recognition process to the images. Upon identifying individuals who appear together, the system defines a relationship between them and acts upon the relationship. | 06-13-2013 |
| 20130163822 | Airborne Image Capture and Recognition System - Provided is a system and method of electronically identifying a license plate and comparing the results to a predetermined database. The software aspect of the system runs on standard PC hardware and can be linked to other applications or databases. It first uses a series of image manipulation techniques to detect, normalize and enhance the image of the number plate. Optical character recognition (OCR) is used to extract the alpha-numeric characters of the license plate. The recognized characters are then compared to databases containing information about the vehicle and/or owner. | 06-27-2013 |
| 20130163823 | Image Capture and Recognition System Having Real-Time Secure Communication - Provided is a system and method of electronically identifying a license plate and comparing the results to a predetermined database. The software aspect of the system runs on standard PC hardware and can be linked to other applications or databases. It first uses a series of image manipulation techniques to detect, normalize and enhance the image of the number plate. Optical character recognition (OCR) is used to extract the alpha-numeric characters of the license plate. The recognized characters are then compared to databases containing information about the vehicle and/or owner. | 06-27-2013 |
| 20130170711 | EDGE DETECTION IMAGE CAPTURE AND RECOGNITION SYSTEM - Provided is a system and method of electronically identifying a license plate and comparing the results to a predetermined database. The software aspect of the system runs on standard PC hardware and can be linked to other applications or databases. It first uses a series of image manipulation techniques to detect, normalize and enhance the image of the number plate. Optical character recognition (OCR) is used to extract the alpha-numeric characters of the license plate. The recognized characters are then compared to databases containing information about the vehicle and/or owner. | 07-04-2013 |
| 20130182909 | IMAGE SEGMENTATION BASED ON APPROXIMATION OF SEGMENTATION SIMILARITY - A system and a method for image segmentation use segmentation maps of one or more similar images as a basis for the segmentation. The method includes generating an image signature for an input image to be segmented and identifying at least one similar image from a set of images, based on the image signature of the input image and image signatures of images in the set of images. The similarity may be computed after first projecting the image signatures into a feature space where similarity is more likely to agree with segmentation map similarity. The input image is segmented, based on the segmentation map of one or more of the at least one identified similar images. | 07-18-2013 |
| 20130182910 | LICENSE PLATE OPTICAL CHARACTER RECOGNITION METHOD AND SYSTEM - A method and system for recognizing a license plate character utilizing a machine learning classifier. A license plate image with respect to a vehicle can be captured by an image capturing unit and the license plate image can be segmented into license plate character images. The character image can be preprocessed to remove a local background variation in the image and to define a local feature utilizing a quantization transformation. A classification margin for each character image can be identified utilizing a set of machine learning classifiers each binary in nature, for the character image. Each binary classifier can be trained utilizing a character sample as a positive class and all other characters as well as non-character images as a negative class. The character type associated with the classifier with a largest classification margin can be determined and the OCR result can be declared. | 07-18-2013 |
| 20130216101 | EFFICIENT AND FAULT TOLERANT LICENSE PLATE MATCHING METHOD - A method and system for identifying a matching license plate. A pair of full or partial plate numbers to be matched can be received. The pair includes a target plate made up of a first set of characters and a suspect plate made up of a second set of characters. A set of number-order preserved sub-plates can be generated by adding and subtracting a single character from the second set of characters. Utilizing a site specific license plate matching table (P-table), a matching score between each of the sub-plates and the target plate may be calculated as part of a string correlation calculation. A maximum value for each of the sub-plate matching scores can then be calculated. The maximum value can be normalized to a 0˜100 scale and used as a final matching score. When the final matching score exceeds a predetermined threshold, an alert may be issued. | 08-22-2013 |
| 20130216102 | USER IDENTIFICATION AND PERSONALIZATION BASED ON AUTOMOTIVE IDENTIFIERS - A system and method for user identification and personalization based on automotive identifiers are described. Image data of a vehicle is received from an image capture device. Vehicle identification information is extracted from the image data. A data record associated with a user is retrieved using the vehicle identification information. A personalized communication for the user is generated based on the retrieved data record. The personalized communication may be transmitted to a device. The personalized communication may comprise a recommendation. | 08-22-2013 |
| 20130236063 | MULTIPLE VIEW TRANSPORTATION IMAGING SYSTEMS - A camera may be positioned to have a direct view of on-coming vehicle traffic from a first perspective. Additionally, a reflective surface, such as a mirror, may be positioned within the viewing area of the same camera to provide the camera with a reflected view of vehicle traffic from a second perspective. The images recorded by the camera may then be received by a computing device. The computing device may separate the images into a direct view region and a reflected view region. After separation, the regions may be analyzed independently and/or combined with other regions, and the analyzed data may be stored. The regions may be analyzed to determine various vehicle characteristics, including, but not limited to, vehicle speed, license plate identification, vehicle occupancy, vehicle count, and vehicle type. | 09-12-2013 |
| 20130243260 | METHODS, SYSTEMS AND PROCESSOR-READABLE MEDIA FOR TRACKING HISTORY DATA UTILIZING VEHICLE AND FACIAL INFORMATION - A method and system for tracking a customer history data utilizing a combination of vehicle and facial information. A license plate image with respect to a customer vehicle can be captured and information with respect to the license plate obtained. The license plate information can be employed as an unique customer identifier with respect to customer history data, if the customer places an order (e.g., drive-through service). Facial images of the customer upon entry to a store and/or upon checkout can be captured and processed. The checkout image can be matched against a set of images in order to associate customer order information with customer history data identified from the license plate information for tracking an in-store order transaction. | 09-19-2013 |
| 20130259314 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR ENHANCING THE PERFORMANCE OF AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION APPLICATIONS UTILIZING MULTIPLE RESULTS - Method and system for enhancing performance of an automated license plate recognition system utilizing multiple results is disclosed herein. Multiple images can be captured as a vehicle passes through an observation zone and each image can be processed utilizing an ALPR unit to obtain a plate code result and associated confidence values. An iterative processing of character level information across an OCR code followed by a higher level error checking based on learned context information can be performed. A string correlation approach can be employed to optimally align the OCR code from multiple images despite noise factors. The OCR confidence and state mask information can then be leveraged to select a character for an output plate code taking into account the ALPR error sources. Such an approach leads to a more accurate result and increases the system yield. | 10-03-2013 |
| 20130266190 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR STREET-PARKING-VEHICLE IDENTIFICATION THROUGH LICENSE PLATE CAPTURING - A method and a system for identifying a vehicle in a parking area includes receiving video data from a video camera observing a parking area from a first field of view over duration of time and receiving image data from a still camera observing a second field of view overlapping the first field of view. The method includes tracking a location of a vehicle across a sequence of frames. The tracking includes determining a time instant at which each frame was captured. The method includes comparing a select frame captured by the video camera with an image captured by the still camera. Based on the comparing, the method includes matching the vehicle in the image with the vehicle in the frame. The method includes determining a license plate number of the vehicle by locating a license plate on the vehicle in the image. | 10-10-2013 |
| 20130272579 | ROBUST CROPPING OF LICENSE PLATE IMAGES - A method, system, and computer-usable tangible storage device for robustly cropping and accurately recognizing license plates to account for noise sources and interfering artifacts are disclosed. License plate images and sub-images can be tightly cropped utilizing an image-based classifier and gradient-based cropping. An image-based classifier can identify the location of valid characters within the image. Because of a number of noise sources, such as, for example, residual plate rotation and shear in the characters within the image, the image-based classifier performs a “rough” identification of the image boundaries. An additional processing step utilizing gradient-based cropping is performed to fine-tune the license plate image boundaries. Gradient-based cropping eliminates unwanted border artifacts that could substantially impact the segmentation and license plate character recognition results. | 10-17-2013 |
| 20130272580 | Methods and Systems for Enhancing Read Accuracy in an Automated License Plate Reader System - One embodiment of the apparatuses, methods, and systems of the present disclosure is a license plate, sticker, or ALPR system having enhanced or increased accuracy. At least one of the license plate, sticker, or ALPR system includes useful information that is transmitted over a first channel and checking information that is transmitted over a second channel. The second channel is devoted solely to transmitting the checking information (e.g., the second channel does not transmit useful information). In other words, the license plates, stickers, and ALPR systems of the present disclosure include at least one channel that is devoted solely to transmitting checking information. | 10-17-2013 |
| 20130279757 | LARGE VENUE SECURITY METHOD - A method for reducing violence within crowded venues includes reading license plates of vehicles passing into entry ports of a parking area, and capturing facial images of persons seeking admission to the venue. A computer compares such license plates to a database of vehicle license plates associated with persons with past histories of violence. A computer also compares captured facial images to a database of facial data for persons with past violent histories. Upon detecting a match, the computer creates an alert presented to law enforcement officers at the venue to facilitate detention of such persons for investigation. Information recorded on entry tickets is scanned and saved together with the facial image of the ticket holder. If a violent act occurs, cameras within the venue capture facial images of participants. The computer matches such participants to stored identifying data to assist in the identification and apprehension of such persons. | 10-24-2013 |
| 20130279758 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ROBUST TILT ADJUSTMENT AND CROPPING OF LICENSE PLATE IMAGES - Methods, systems and processor-readable media for robust tilt adjustment and cropping of a license plate image. A vehicle image can be captured by an image-capturing unit and converted to a binary image utilizing a binarization approach. A long run within the binary image can then be removed and a morphological filtering can be applied to break an unwanted connection between characters due to a license plate frame and an image noise. A connected component (CC) within the image can be identified and screened based on a number of key metrics to remove a most likely candidate character connected component. A line-fit based iterative search process can then be performed for robust tilt removal and vertical cropping of the license plate image to obtain a tight bounding box on the license plate characters if sufficient candidate characters remain after the search process. Otherwise, the region of interest can be rejected. | 10-24-2013 |
| 20130279759 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR IMPROVED CHARACTER RECOGNITION IN DISTORTED IMAGES - Systems and methods are provided for recognizing characters within a distorted image. According to a one aspect, a method for recognizing one or more characters within a distorted image includes rendering one or more imitation images, the imitation images including simulations of the distorted image, applying one or more distortion models to the imitation images, thereby generating distorted imitation images, comparing the distorted imitation images with the distorted image in order to compute similarities between the distorted imitation images and the distorted image, and identifying the characters based on the best similarity. According to other aspects, the systems and methods can be configured to provide recognition of other distorted data types and elements. | 10-24-2013 |
| 20130294652 | License plate character segmentation using likelihood maximization - A method determines a license plate layout configuration. The method includes generating at least one model representing a license plate layout configuration. The generating includes segmenting training images each defining a license plate to extract characters and logos from the training images. The segmenting includes calculating values corresponding to parameters of the license plate and features of the characters and logos. The segmenting includes estimating a likelihood function specified by the features using the values. The likelihood function measures deviations between an observed plate and the model. The method includes storing a layout structure and the distributions for each of the at least one model. The method includes receiving as input an observed image including a plate region. The method includes segmenting the plate region and determining a license plate layout configuration of the observed plate by comparing the segmented plate region to the at least one model. | 11-07-2013 |
| 20130294653 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR OPTIMIZED PARAMETER SELECTION IN AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION - A system and method for automatically recognizing license plate information, the method comprising receiving an image of a license plate, and generating a plurality of image processing data sets, wherein each image processing data set of the plurality of image processing data sets is associated with a score of a plurality of scores by a scoring process comprising determining one or more image processing parameters, generating the image processing data set by processing the image using the one or more image processing parameters, generating the score based on the image processing data, and associating the image processing data set with the score. | 11-07-2013 |
| 20130294654 | ROBUST CHARACTER SEGMENTATION FOR LICENSE PLATE IMAGES - A method and system for achieving accurate segmentation of characters with respect to a license plate image within a tight bounding box image. A vehicle image can be captured by an image capturing unit and processed utilizing an ALPR unit. A vertical projection histogram can be calculated to produce an initial character boundary (cuts) and local statistical information can be employed to split a large cut and insert a missing character. The cut can be classified as a valid and/or a suspect character and the suspect character can be analyzed. The suspect character can be normalized and passed to an OCR module for decoding and generating a confidence quote with every conclusion. The non-character images can be rejected at the OCR level by enforcing a confidence threshold. An adjoining suspect narrow character can be combined and the OCR confidence of the combined character can be assessed. | 11-07-2013 |
| 20130329961 | Geometric pre-correction for automatic license plate recognition - A method for adjusting a license plate that is detected in a captured image includes automatically determining at least one set of correction parameters corresponding to a slant-oriented license plate. The method further includes receiving an input image representing a detected license plate. In response to receiving the input image, the method includes automatically adjusting the input image to obtain a corrected image using the at least one set of correction parameters. | 12-12-2013 |
| 20140029804 | IMAGE EDITING APPARATUS - An image editing apparatus includes an input unit configured to input a moving image stream that includes a plurality of frames, an extracting unit configured to extract a specific subject from at least one of frames included in the input moving image stream, and an image processor configured to determine whether or not to perform a mask processing to the specific subject included in the at least one frame of the input moving image stream according to a predetermined output condition which is defined based on at least an output resolution of the moving image stream to be output, and performs the mask processing to the specific subject based on the determination result. | 01-30-2014 |
| 20140044313 | REPORTING SYSTEM AND REPORTING METHOD FOR STOLEN VEHICLES - A reporting method includes: capturing an image of a vehicle through a camera. Detecting the image to obtain a number of a license plate. Encrypting the number of the license plate and a position of the camera. Deciphering the encrypted data to obtain the position and the number of the license plate. Comparing the deciphered number of the license plate with numbers of license plates of stolen vehicles to determine whether the deciphered number of the license plate is the same as one of the numbers of the license plates. Storing the position of the camera and the deciphered number of the license plate in response to the deciphered number of the license plate being the same as one of the numbers of the license plates, and transmitting the position of the camera and the deciphered number of the license plate to offices. | 02-13-2014 |
| 20140064564 | COLLECTING INFORMATION RELATING TO IDENTITY PARAMETERS OF A VEHICLE - The present invention discloses methods and systems for collecting information relating to identity parameters of a vehicle. According to the invention an image of the vehicle is obtained. A sub-image within the image is identified, interest points within the sub-image are detected and the sub-image is processed so as to obtain descriptors representing the interest points. The descriptors are matched to predetermined descriptors representing interest points in previously obtained images respective of known identity parameters and the information is stored in a record representing an identity of the vehicle. | 03-06-2014 |
| 20140072177 | Methods for Identifying Vehicle License Plates - A method for identifying vehicle license plate, comprising: mounting a server apparatus, and establishing a vehicle database and a vehicle license plate identification library in the server apparatus so as to generate a vehicle data and a vehicle license plate identification program; establishing a communication link, and receiving the vehicle data and the vehicle license plate identification program by the mobile device, and installing the vehicle license plate identification program and storing the vehicle data; capturing plate number of a vehicle by a camera module mounted in the mobile device for generating an image and then analyzing the plate number in the image by an analyzing program to generate an analysis result; comparing the analysis result with the vehicle data by a comparison module of the mobile device for generating a comparison result; and displaying the comparison result. | 03-13-2014 |
| 20140072178 | PARKING LOT INFORMATION SYSTEM USING IMAGE TECHNOLOGY FOR IDENTIFYING AVAILABLE PARKING SPACES - A parking lot information system comprising a digital camera for obtaining an image of parking spaces in the parking lot where each parking space is marked with a visual identifier, a computer coupled to the digital camera for identifying available parking spaces by recognizing the identifiers marking the available parking spaces, and a display coupled to the computer for displaying information on the available parking spaces. | 03-13-2014 |
| 20140126779 | System for license plate identification in low-quality video - This invention proposes an identification system for license plates captured in low-quality motion video, such as accidental footage from security cameras, amateur video, cell phones, etc, including situations when the license plate number is completely unreadable. This is done by dividing the surface of the license plate into a pattern of segments assigned to a number of groups, each group possessing unique optical properties such as shading, reflectivity, IR absorption, etc. Taking advantage of the the varied light response among the segment groups, the pattern can encode identifying information, e.g. a binary sequence, which helps identify the vehicle. Using image processing software, this information can be decoded from low-quality video footage via an analysis of temporally correlated luminance levels. The system thus allows the identification of vehicles captured accidentally and under poor lighting conditions, as in the case of a security camera in a convenience store capturing the image of a vehicle fleeing a nearby crime scene. | 05-08-2014 |
| 20140140578 | PARKING ENFORCEMENT SYSTEM AND METHOD OF PARKING ENFORCEMENT - A parking enforcement system comprises a camera for capturing a license plate image and software for analyzing the license plate image to generate a read license plate number. The read license plate number is cross-referenced with a list of known license plate numbers to determine if the read license plate number is associated with a payment event. A citation against the read licence plate number if the read license plate is not associated with a payment event. | 05-22-2014 |
| 20140169633 | EMERGENCY RESCUE VEHICLE VIDEO BASED VIOLATION ENFORCEMENT METHOD AND SYSTEM - Disclosed are methods and systems for monitoring and reporting road violations of vehicles sharing roads with responding emergency vehicles. According to an exemplary method video is captured from a forward and/or rear facing camera mounted to an emergency vehicle, and the video is processed to identify any vehicles in violation within a prescribed distance from the emergency vehicle. A license plate id of a vehicle determined to be in violation is identified and communicated to the appropriate authorities. | 06-19-2014 |
| 20140169634 | SYSTEM, DEVICE, AND METHOD FOR DETECTING AND LOCATING WANTED VEHICLES - A method, system, and device for analyzing images captured by a vehicle-based camera includes establishing a communication connection between a mobile communication device and an in-vehicle computing system. Scanning data may be retrieved from a scanning data server by the mobile communication device and, in some embodiments, forwarded to the in-vehicle computing system. A vehicle-base camera may be used to capture one or more images. An image analysis module of the in-vehicle computing system or mobile communication device may be used to analyze the captured image(s) for a match between the image(s) and the scanning data. In response to identifying a match, the mobile communication device may notify the scanning data server of the identified match. | 06-19-2014 |
| 20140177925 | LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION SYSTEM AND METHOD - A license plate recognition system and method recognizes a license plate attached to a vehicle and bears a license plate number. The system includes a database module, a reducing module, an image capturing unit, a sorting unit, and a recognizing module. The database module stores license plate position sample type-related data and license plate number sample type-related data whose quantity is reducible by the reducing module. The image capturing unit captures license plate images at different imaging resolutions to generate license plate position image eigenvalue and license plate number image eigenvalue. The sorting unit computes the license plate position image eigenvalue to generate license plate position type-related data and computes the license plate number image eigenvalue to generate license plate number type-related data. The recognizing module compares the license plate number type-related data with the license plate number sample type-related data, thereby recognizing the license plate number. | 06-26-2014 |
| 20140254877 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR IDENTIFYING A VEHICLE LICENSE PLATE - A method and a system for identifying a license plate of a vehicle are described. The system has a gateway, a web server, and a client device. The gateway is coupled to a security device. The web server has a management application configured to communicate with the gateway. The client device communicates with the gateway identified by the web server. The gateway detects, identifies, and tracks a license plate of a vehicle using a non-infrared camera coupled to the gateway. The gateway generates indicators corresponding to the license plate on a picture generated by the non-infrared camera. | 09-11-2014 |
| 20140254878 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR SCANNING VEHICLE LICENSE PLATES - A method and a system for identifying a license plate of a vehicle are described. The system has a gateway, a web server, and a client device. The gateway is coupled to a security device. The web server has a management application configured to communicate with the gateway. The client device communicates with the gateway identified by the web server. A non-infrared camera connected to the gateway visually scans a location having a plurality of parked vehicles, and identifies characters in the license plates of the plurality of parked vehicles. | 09-11-2014 |
| 20140254879 | Location Classification Based on License Plate Recognition Information - Methods and systems for Methods and systems for classifying the locations of a vehicle of interest based on License Plate Recognition (LPR) instances are described herein. Locations associated with LPR instances matching a particular license plate number are classified based on LPR information gathered within search zones around each location. Clusters of one or more LPR instances associated with a target license plate number are identified. A search zone is defined around a cluster of one or more LPR instances associated with a target license plate number. LPR instances associated with other license plate numbers within the search zone are received from an LPR server, and a location associated with the search zone is classified based on LPR information gathered within the search zone. In some examples, the location classification is based on LPR activity matching a target license plate number, general LPR activity within the search zone, or both. | 09-11-2014 |
| 20140270386 | METHOD FOR READING VEHICLE IDENTIFICATIONS - A method is disclosed for reading license plate numbers in a road network, comprising: recording an image of a license plate number at a first location, OCR-reading a license plate character string in the image, and storing an OCR data set in a database; recording an image of a license plate number at a second location, OCR-reading a license plate number character string in the image, and generating a current OCR data set; and, if a confidence measure of the current OCR data set falls below a first minimum confidence value, selecting a stored OCR data set with a license plate number image having a similarity exceeding a minimum similarity value and/or having the greatest similarity to the license plate number image of the current OCR data set, and using the selected OCR data set for improving the license plate number character string of the current OCR data set. | 09-18-2014 |
| 20140301606 | DATA AUGMENTATION METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR IMPROVED AUTOMATIC LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION - Methods, systems, and processor-readable media for data augmentation utilized in an automatic license plate recognition engine. A machine-readable code can be associated with an automatic license plate recognition engine. The machine-readable code can be configured to define parameters that drive processing within the automatic license plate recognition engine to produce recognition results thereof and enhance a machine readability of a license plate recognized and analyzed via the automatic license plate recognition engine. | 10-09-2014 |
| 20140307923 | DETERMINING IMAGES HAVING UNIDENTIFIABLE LICENSE PLATES - An approach for processing an image is presented. A category specifying characteristics of a shape of a license plate of a vehicle is determined. Based on the category, characteristics of objects in the image are determined to not match the characteristics of the shape of the license plate. Based on the characteristics of the objects in the image not matching the characteristics of the shape of the license plate, the image is determined to not include an identifiable license plate. In response to determining the image does not include the identifiable license plate, the image is determined to be invalid and a manual character recognition process for determining identifiers in license plates is bypassed. | 10-16-2014 |
| 20140307924 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR CHARACTER SEGMENTATION IN AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION APPLICATIONS - Methods and systems for character segmentation in an automatic license plate recognition application. One or more images of a license plate are acquired. Then, a pixel-level importance may be calculated with respect to the image(s) of the license plate based on information within the image, such as gradient information and raw grayscale information. A seam selection can be then applied with respect to the pixel-level importance map and the image(s) by enforcing constraints based on known characteristics of license plates in order to provide for character segmentation with respect to the image(s) of the license plate. | 10-16-2014 |
| 20140328518 | METHODS, SYSTEMS AND PROCESSOR-READABLE MEDIA FOR DESIGNING A LICENSE PLATE OVERLAY DECAL HAVING INFRARED ANNOTATION MARKS - Methods, systems and processor-readable media for providing a license plate overlay decal with an infrared readable annotation mark for an optical character recognition and segmentation. The annotation mark with respect to character image of a license plate can be designed by training an ALPR engine to improve automatic license plate recognition performance. A plate overlay decal can be rendered with the annotation mark and attached to a license plate. The annotation mark can also be directly placed on the license plate when the license plate is rendered. The annotation mark is visible when illuminated by an infrared light and the license plate appears normal in visible light. The annotation mark enables an ALPR imaging system to obtain more information for each character and utilize the information to improve conclusion accuracy. | 11-06-2014 |
| 20140334684 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR NEIGHBORHOOD-SCALE VEHICLE MONITORING - A system and method may include a station to identify a vehicle and to determine a characterizing feature of the vehicle. An imager that is located remotely from the station is configured to acquire an image of the vehicle that includes the characterizing feature. A processor is configured to detect the characterizing feature in the acquired image and to associate the detected characterizing feature with the identified vehicle so as to predict a location of the vehicle. | 11-13-2014 |
| 20140348391 | SNOW CLASSIFIER CONTEXT WINDOW REDUCTION USING CLASS T-SCORES AND MEAN DIFFERENCES - Methods, systems and processor-readable media for determining, post training, which locations of a classifier window are most significant in discriminating between class and non-class objects. The important locations can be determined by calculating the mean and standard deviation of every pixel location in the classifier context for both the positive and negative samples of the classifier. Using a combination of t-scores and mean differences, the importance of all pixel locations in the classifier score can be rank ordered. A sufficient number of pixel locations can then be selected to achieve a detection rate close enough to the full classifier for a particular application. | 11-27-2014 |
| 20140348392 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR AUTOMATICALLY DETERMINING THE ISSUING STATE OF A LICENSE PLATE - Methods and systems for automatically determining the issuing state of a license plate. An image of a license plate acquired by an ALPR engine can be processed via one or more OCR engines such that each OCR engine among the OCR engines is tuned to a particular state. Confidence data output from the OCR engine(s) can be analyzed (among other factors) to estimate the issuing state associated with the license plate. Multiple observations related to the issuing state can be merged to derive an overall conclusion and assign an associated confidence value with respect to the confidence data and determine a likely issuing state associated with the license plate. | 11-27-2014 |
| 20140355835 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR OCR OUTPUT VERIFICATION - A system and method for computing confidence in an output of a text recognition system includes performing character recognition on an input text image with a text recognition system to generate a candidate string of characters. A first representation is generated, based on the candidate string of characters, and a second representation is generated based on the input text image. A confidence in the candidate string of characters is computed based on a computed similarity between the first and second representations in a common embedding space. | 12-04-2014 |
| 20140355836 | Dynamic Adjustment of Automatic License Plate Recognition Processing Based on Vehicle Class Information - Methods and systems for improving automated license plate recognition performance. One or more images of a vehicle can be captured via an automated license plate recognition engine. Vehicle class information associated with the vehicle can be obtained using the automated license place recognition engine. Such vehicle class information can be analyzed with respect to the vehicle. Finally, data can be dynamically adjusted with respect to the vehicle based on a per image basis to enhance recognition of the vehicle via the automated license plate recognition engine. | 12-04-2014 |
| 20140355837 | Electronic Toll Management and Vehicle Identification - Identifying a vehicle in a toll system includes accessing image data for a first vehicle and obtaining license plate data from the accessed image data for the first vehicle. A set of records is accessed. Each record includes license plate data for a vehicle. The license plate data for the first vehicle is compared with the license plate data for vehicles in the set of records. Based on the results of the comparison of the license plate data, a set of vehicles is identified from the vehicles having records in the set of records. Vehicle fingerprint data is accessed for the first vehicle. The vehicle fingerprint data for the first vehicle is based on the image data for the first vehicle. Vehicle fingerprint data for a vehicle in the set of vehicles is accessed. Using a processing device, the vehicle fingerprint data for the first vehicle is compared with the vehicle fingerprint data for the vehicle in the set of vehicles. The vehicle in the set of vehicles is identified as the first vehicle based on results of the comparison of vehicle fingerprint data. | 12-04-2014 |
| 20140363051 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR SELECTING TARGET VEHICLES FOR OCCUPANCY DETECTION - Methods and systems for selecting a target vehicle for occupancy detection utilizing vehicle identification information. The vehicle identification information (e.g., license plate information) can be obtained from a vehicle identification unit (e.g., ALPR) to identify a vehicle approaching a high occupancy measurement zone. The vehicle identification information from the vehicle identification unit can be transferred to a vehicle occupancy unit having a flash illuminator unit and an image-capturing unit. The flash illuminator unit and the image-capturing unit are not enabled if the vehicle's occupancy state has already been measured at a prior location based on the vehicle identification information. The vehicle occupancy detection unit and the vehicle identification unit work together in a coordinated fashion to reduce the number of times the flash illuminator unit needs to fire and extends the life of the illuminator unit, thus reducing the cost of maintenance. | 12-11-2014 |
| 20140363052 | ADAPTIVE CHARACTER SEGMENTATION METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR AUTOMATED LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION - Methods, systems and processor-readable media for adaptive character segmentation in an automatic license plate recognition application. A region of interest can be identified in an image of a license plate acquired via an automatic license plate recognition engine. Characters in the image with respect to the region of interest can be segmented using a histogram projection associated with particular segmentation threshold parameters. The characters in the image can be iteratively validated if a minimum number of valid characters is determined based on the histogram projection and the particular segmentation threshold parameters to produce character images sufficient to identify the license plate. | 12-11-2014 |
| 20140369566 | Perimeter Image Capture and Recognition System - Provided is a system and method of electronically identifying a vehicle entering/leaving a predetermined geographical area by identifying a license plate and comparing the results to a predetermined database. The software aspect of the system runs on standard PC hardware and can be linked to other applications or databases. It first uses a series of image manipulation techniques to detect, normalize and enhance the image of the number plate. Optical character recognition (OCR) is used to extract the alpha-numeric characters of the license plate. The recognized characters are then compared to databases containing information about the vehicle and/or owner. | 12-18-2014 |
| 20140369567 | Authorized Access Using Image Capture and Recognition System - Provided is a system and method of electronically identifying a vehicle entering/leaving a predetermined geographical area by identifying a license plate and comparing the results to a predetermined database. The software aspect of the system runs on standard PC hardware and can be linked to other applications or databases. It first uses a series of image manipulation techniques to detect, normalize and enhance the image of the number plate. Optical character recognition (OCR) is used to extract the alpha-numeric characters of the license plate. The recognized characters are then compared to databases containing information about the vehicle and/or owner. | 12-18-2014 |
| 20140376778 | LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION SYSTEM AND LOCATION FORECASTING - A license plate recognition system may include a vehicle and an analysis server. The vehicle may include an image capture device and an on-board device. The image capture device may capture a vehicle image that includes a license plate of a target vehicle. The on-board device may capture various vehicle data of the target vehicle, such as speed, direction, and location. The analysis server may receive and process the vehicle image and/or vehicle data to determine whether alert criteria are met, e.g., if the target vehicle is stolen. If so, the analysis server may send an alert indication to the vehicle that may include a possible current location of the target vehicle. | 12-25-2014 |
| 20150049914 | License Plate Recognition - A license plate recognition and image review system and processes are described. The system includes grouping of images that are determined to be of the same vehicle, using an image encoded database such that verification of a license plate read is done through comparison of images of the actual vehicle to images from the encoded database and testing of the accuracy of a manual review process by interspersing previously identified images with real images being reviewed in a batch process. | 02-19-2015 |
| 20150092991 | METHOD FOR UTILIZING A CAMERA SYSTEM OF A MOTOR VEHICLE AS AN ANTI-THEFT ALARM SYSTEM, CAMERA SYSTEM AND MOTOR VEHICLE - A method for operating a camera system of a motor vehicle by: providing images of an environmental region of the motor vehicle by a camera of the camera system, wherein at least a region of a number plate of the motor vehicle is depicted in the images, examining the images for a change and/or an exchange of the number plate by an image processing device of the camera system, and outputting a control signal for effecting a predetermined safety measure by the image processing device after detection of the change and/or the exchange. | 04-02-2015 |
| 20150104073 | DELAYED VEHICLE IDENTIFICATION FOR PRIVACY ENFORCEMENT - A method for recognition of an identifier such as a license plate includes storing first visual signatures, each extracted from a first image of a respective object, such as a vehicle, captured at a first location, and first information associated with the first captured image, such as a time stamp. A second visual signature is extracted from a second image of a second object captured at a second location and second information associated with the second captured image is acquired. A measure of similarity is computed between the second visual signature and at least some of the first visual signatures to identify a matching one. A test is performed, which is a function of the first and the second information associated with the matching signatures. Only when it is confirmed that the test has been met, identifier recognition is performed to identify the identifier of the second object. | 04-16-2015 |
| 20150110358 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR DETECTING VEHICLE NUMBER PLATE - Provided is an apparatus and method for detecting a vehicle number plate that may determine whether an input image includes a number plate, based on an optimal feature to be used to determine whether the input image includes a number plate. | 04-23-2015 |
| 20150125041 | REINFORCEMENT LEARNING APPROACH TO CHARACTER LEVEL SEGMENTATION OF LICENSE PLATE IMAGES - Methods and systems for achieving accurate segmentation of characters with respect to a license plate image utilizing a reinforcement learning approach. A vehicle image can be captured by an image capturing unit and processed utilizing an ALPR (Automatic License Plate Recognition) unit. The reinforcement learning (RL) approach can be configured to initialize a segmentation agent with a starting location. A proper segmentation path (cuts) from top to bottom and from a darker to lighter area in a cropped license plate image can be identified by the segmentation agent during a training phase. Rewards can be provided based on a number of good and bad moves. The association between a current state and a sensory input with a preferred action can be learned by the segmentation agent at the end of the training phase. | 05-07-2015 |
| 20150125042 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR DATA COLLECTION USING PROCESSED IMAGE DATA - The present invention relates to a system and method for capturing data from vehicles and processing the captured vehicle data to generate a set of demographic data based on the set of captured demographic data. Specifically, the invention captures video or image data of one or more vehicles at a business location. Additional data may be gathered and transmitted with the image data. The captured data may then be compressed and sent to a remote server for further processing. The data is processed to identify a set of salient objects and to generate a set of demographic data from the identified set of objects. The demographic data is then associated one or more customer records. | 05-07-2015 |
| 20150294175 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR EFFICIENT IMAGE CROPPING AND ANALYSIS - A system and method for cropping a license plate image to facilitate license plate recognition by obtaining an image that includes the license plate image, dividing the image into multiple sub-blocks, computing an activity measure for each sub-block; determining an activity threshold, determining that a sub-block is an active sub-block by comparing the activity measure for the sub-block with the activity threshold, generating a second image of the license plate information, where the second image includes the active sub-block, and obtaining the license plate information based on the second image. | 10-15-2015 |
| 20150310293 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR RECORDING AND TRANSFERRING MOTOR VEHICLE INFORMATION - An improved system and method for capturing and uploading pertinent information related to a motor vehicle that is accurate, simple to use, and may be implemented on a wide array of mobile devices in a cost-effective manner. Methods are also disclosed for users of the mobile devices to send identifying information to a database, where the identifying information is compared to other motor vehicle identifying information located the database. | 10-29-2015 |
| 20150324654 | DETERMINING IMAGES HAVING UNIDENTIFIABLE LICENSE PLATES - An approach for processing an image is presented. A category specifying characteristics of a shape of a license plate of a vehicle is determined. Based on the category, characteristics of objects in the image are determined match the characteristics of the shape of the license plate. Another category specifying characteristics of a background color of the license plate is determined. Based on the other category, the characteristics of the objects in the image do not match the characteristics of the background color. Based on the characteristics of the objects in the image not matching the characteristics of the background color of the license plate, the image is determined to not include an identifiable license plate. Responsive to determining the image does not include the identifiable license plate, the image is determined to be invalid and a manual character recognition process for determining identifiers in license plates is bypassed. | 11-12-2015 |
| 20150363650 | Distracted Driving Violation Detection and Reporting Technology - A method and system for detecting and reporting distracted driving violations and sending a citation to the registered owner of the vehicle being driven by the distracted driver. The system involves a processing station receiving photographic images of the distracted driver, his or her license plate number, and optionally his or her vehicle by a patroller, processing the photographic images to identify the owner of the vehicle, generating a citation, and sending the citation to the registered owner. The registered owner can either pay the fine or dispute the allegation. If the allegation is disputed, the matter can be turned over the legal system for proper adjudication. | 12-17-2015 |
| 20150371109 | AUTOMATED VEHICLE RECOGNITION - A system for identifying a vehicle. A camera obtains at least one image of a vehicle. An image processor derives from the image a first sub-image and a second sub-image distinct from the first sub-image, extracts from the first sub-image a first set of image features, and extracts from the second sub-image a second set of image features. The image processor matches the first set of image features to corresponding image features derived from a previously obtained image of a vehicle to produce a first matching score, and also matches the second set of image features to corresponding image features derived from a previously obtained image of a vehicle to produce a second matching score. The image processor then fuses the first matching score and the second matching score to produce a fused score which indicates whether the at least one image is of the same vehicle as the previously obtained image. | 12-24-2015 |
| 20160004922 | IMAGE PICKUP DEVICE, VEHICLE NUMBER IMAGE PICKUP DEVICE, AND IMAGE PICKUP METHOD - A vehicle number image pickup device includes an image pickup means for taking an image including identification information for identifying a vehicle in a predetermined frame period, an image division means for dividing each frame image obtained from the image pickup means into at least two images, a difference processing means for determining whether a different is present between frame images divided by the image division means, and an image output means for successively outputting the divided frame images for each frame when the different is determined to be present between the frame images by the difference processing means. | 01-07-2016 |
| 20160019791 | FOLLOWING DISTANCE REMINDING DEVICE AND METHOD THEREOF - A device and method for reminding following distance are provided. The following distance reminding device (FDRD) adapted for a first vehicle is capable of computing a following distance between the first vehicle and a second vehicle. The FDRD comprises an image acquiring module, a reminding module, and a processing module. The image acquiring module receives a vehicle image of the second vehicle. The processing module extracts a license plate image from the vehicle image, and computes the following distance between the first vehicle and the second vehicle according to image characteristics of the license plate image. The processing module computes a safe distance according to a driving speed of the first vehicle and the image characteristics, and determines whether the following distance is more than the safe distance or not, in order to control the reminding module to correspondingly send a reminding message. | 01-21-2016 |
| 20160034778 | Method for detecting traffic violation - The present invention relates to a technical field of traffic monitoring, and more particularly to a method for detecting traffic violation. The present invention includes firstly localizing vehicle salient parts through salient features including vehicle license numbers and vehicle rear lights, and representing a vehicle with the vehicle salient parts, then tracking the vehicle with a Kalman filter based on the vehicle salient parts, and finally detecting vehicle violation through moving trajectory analysis and setting violating detecting areas. The present invention solves vehicle violation detection problems in complex engineering application conditions such as illumination change and detection noise, and is suitable for city traffic management under complex conditions. | 02-04-2016 |
| 20160132742 | IMAGE RECOGNITION DEVICE, IMAGE RECOGNITION METHOD, PROGRAM, AND RECORDING MEDIUM - An image recognition device includes an edge direction evaluation unit configured to evaluate a direction of an edge at each coordinate by assigning points to the coordinate when a deviation amount between a direction of an outline of an abundance ratio higher than a predetermined abundance ratio threshold value among directions of an outline of a character available for the vehicle number plate and the direction of the edge at each coordinate of the image is less than a predetermined deviation amount threshold value and a vehicle number plate region extraction unit configured to extract a region of the vehicle number plate from the image based on a distribution of the points assigned by the edge direction evaluation unit. | 05-12-2016 |
| 20160132743 | PORTABLE LICENSE PLATE READER, SPEED SENSOR AND FACE RECOGNITION SYSTEM - The invention provides a portable apparatus for reading a license plate, sensing speed and recognizing a face, which comprises a camera placed on the front right and front left and both sides of the system which enables the system to capture images and recognize faces, LED lighting located around the cameras which are directed towards a visual direction and which enable capturing of legible images even at night time, police lights placed at the front and rear faces of the base which can flash on and off when necessary, an alarm control device, Ethernet connection forming the network, cooling device which eliminates the heat formed inside the apparatus, a control card which operates the police lights, modem which continuously provide wireless communication and a top cover which encloses the entire system. | 05-12-2016 |
| 20160155020 | ADAPTED VOCABULARIES FOR MATCHING IMAGE SIGNATURES WITH FISHER VECTORS | 06-02-2016 |
| 20160171312 | VEHICLE MONITORING APPARATUS AND VEHICLE MONITORING METHOD | 06-16-2016 |
| 20160203379 | SYSTEMS, METHODS AND DEVICES FOR THE AUTOMATED VERIFICATION AND QUALITY CONTROL AND ASSURANCE OF VEHICLE IDENTIFICATION PLATES | 07-14-2016 |
| 20160203380 | ANNOTATION FREE LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION METHOD AND SYSTEM | 07-14-2016 |
| 20170236019 | OPTICALLY ACTIVE ARTICLES AND SYSTEMS IN WHICH THEY MAY BE USED | 08-17-2017 |
| 20190147306 | IMAGE PROCESSING DEVICE, IMAGING DEVICE, AND IMAGE PROCESSING METHOD | 05-16-2019 |
