Patent application number | Description | Published |
20090326863 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR SENSOR PHASING USING A SUBSTRATE EDGE SIGNAL - A system and method for measuring a substrate edge signal for image sensor phasing. An intermediate transfer substrate edge signal can be effectively mapped by a substrate edge sensor and recorded for at least one complete revolution. A substrate edge signal from an inter-document zone sampled from any region of a substrate in runtime by a process sensor can also be recorded. A comparison or cross-correlation can be applied between the bare intermediate transfer substrate edge signal and the substrate edge signal sensed in the inter-document zone. A cross-correlation algorithm returns a maximum peak value when the two signals are registered in-phase with one another. This information can then be used to register the bare belt process sensor signal and the process sensor signal over the region of interest in-phase with one another. A flat-fielding algorithm can also be applied to the phase-aligned process sensor data to remove artifacts and compensate for substrate (e.g., belt) induced non-uniformities. | 12-31-2009 |
20110052228 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR BANDING COMPENSATION USING ELECTROSTATIC VOLTMETER BASED SENSING - A method and system for compensating for an image quality defect in an image printing system comprising at least one marking station, the at least one marking station comprising a charging device for charging the image bearing surface, an exposing device for irradiating and discharging the image bearing surface to form a latent image, a developer unit for developing toner to the image bearing surface, and a transfer unit for transferring toner from the image bearing surface to an image accumulation surface is provided. The method includes sensing the image quality defect on an image bearing surface by an electrostatic voltmeter (ESV) in the image printing system and determining the frequency, amplitude, and/or phase of the image quality defect by a processor. In one embodiment, the method includes compensating for the image quality defect by modulating the power of an exposing device during an expose process. In another embodiment, the method includes compensating for the image quality defect by modifying image content. | 03-03-2011 |
20110102817 | IMAGE ON PAPER REGISTRATION USING IMAGE MARKS - An image transfer assembly and method capable of adjusting the registration of an image printed on paper. A first image location being determined on at least one first sheet by measuring for each of at least three corners of a first sheet the distance between the two adjoining edges of the respective corners to a portion of at least one first fiducial mark. For each of the measured first sheet corners the measured portion of the at least one first fiducial mark is closer to that respective corner than any other of the first sheet corners. Then a second image to be transferred is adjusted by changing, relative to at least one second sheet, at least one of a size, shear, position and orientation of the second image based on the determined first image location. The adjusted second image being then printed on the second sheet(s). | 05-05-2011 |
20110304886 | Image on Paper Registration Using Transfer Surface Marks - A method of adjusting the registration of an image printed on sheets. The method including determining a first image location relative to a first sheet, adjusting a second image to be printed based on the determined first image location and printing the adjusted second image to subsequent sheet(s). The first image location determination made by measuring at least one dimension of a fiducial mark disposed directly on a transfer surface. The fiducial mark formed by the engagement of the first sheet with the transfer surface, whereby an inner edge of the fiducial mark forms at least a partial outline of a periphery of the first sheet. Each measured fiducial mark dimension extending from the fiducial mark inner edge to an outer edge of the fiducial mark. The fiducial mark outer edge being disposed remote from the at least partial outline of the first sheet periphery. | 12-15-2011 |
20120106781 | SIGNATURE BASED DRIVE-THROUGH ORDER TRACKING SYSTEM AND METHOD - A system and method for providing signature-based drive-through order tracking. An image with respect to a vehicle at a POS unit can be captured at an order point and a delivery point (e.g., a payment point and a pick-up point) utilizing an image capturing unit by detecting the presence of the vehicle at each point utilizing a vehicle presence sensor. The captured image can be processed in order to extract a small region of interest and can be reduced to a unique signature. The extracted signature of the vehicle at the order point can be stored into a database together with the corresponding order and the vehicle image. The signature extracted at the delivery point can be matched with the signature stored in the database. If a match is found, the order associated with the vehicle together with the images captured at the delivery point and the order point can be displayed in a user interface at the delivery point to ensure that the right order is delivered to a customer. | 05-03-2012 |
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 |
20120274997 | PROCESS DIRECTION STREAK SOURCE DIAGNOSIS IN PRINTERS - Methods and systems print a multi-color test pattern using a printing device to create a printed test pattern when the printing device is producing a printing defect. The methods and systems scan the printed test pattern to produce a scanned image and decompose the scanned image into color blocks using the computerized device. The methods and systems create intensity profiles of the color blocks using the computerized device and compare at least two of the intensity profiles of different colors to determine whether the intensity profiles indicate correlated printing defects using the computerized device. The methods and systems indicate, through the computerized device, whether a potential defect within a common printing element of the printing device or is located within one or more of the color printing elements of the printing device, depending upon whether the intensity profiles have correlated printing defects. | 11-01-2012 |
20120294631 | DIAGNOSTIC METHOD FOR DETERMINING IMAGER CONTRIBUTION TO PRINTING DEFECTS - A method and device detect printing defects on prints produced by an electrostatic printing device and, in response, place the electrostatic printing device into a diagnostic mode. While in the diagnostic mode, the method and device charges an image bearing surface of the electrostatic printing device to a uniform potential charge and disables all light emitting devices of the electrostatic printing device that could alter the uniform potential charge. Next, this method and device transfer marking material to the image bearing surface to create a test image and print at least one test patch by transferring the test image from the image bearing surface to a sheet of media. This method and device evaluate whether the test patch includes the printing defects and identify whether said light emitting devices of the electrostatic printing device is defective, based on whether said test patch includes printing defects. | 11-22-2012 |
20130070277 | DETECTION OF IMAGE QUALITY DEFECTS IN GLOSS - A method for detecting gloss non-uniformities on printed documents is provided. The method includes printing a test pattern using a print engine, the test pattern having gloss; directing one or more light beams, using an illuminator, onto the test pattern to produce at least generally specular reflectance; scanning the test pattern, using a linear array sensor, to obtain image data, the image data corresponding to the generally specular reflectance from the test pattern; and enhancing contrast of the image data to facilitate detection of image quality non-uniformities in the gloss in the test pattern. | 03-21-2013 |
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 |
20130129365 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR TROUBLESHOOTING CHARGING AND PHOTORECEPTOR FAILURE MODES ASSOCIATED WITH A XEROGRAPHIC PROCESS - This disclosure provides methods and systems for troubleshooting charging and photoreceptor failure modes associated with a xerographic process. Specifically, according to an exemplary method the photoreceptor decay behavior, with and without the effects of depletion, are quantified and used to determine a performance state of one or more of the charging stations and the photoreceptor surface. | 05-23-2013 |
20130141586 | SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ASSOCIATING AN ORDER WITH AN OBJECT IN A MULTIPLE LANE ENVIRONMENT - Images with respect to an object at an ordering, payment, and delivery locations can be captured utilizing an image capturing system. Capture can be after detecting the presence of the object at each location utilizing an object presence sensor. The captured image can be processed to associate it with a signature and can also be processed in order to extract a small region of interest (e.g., license plate) and can be reduced to a unique signature. Signature can be stored into a database together with the corresponding order and images. Signatures can be matched. The order associated with the object matched by the system together with at least one of the images captured at the delivery point and the order point can be displayed at a user interface located at the payment/delivery point to ensure that the right order is delivered to the right customer asscoiated with the object. | 06-06-2013 |
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 |
20130229517 | VEHICLE SPEED MEASUREMENT METHOD AND SYSTEM UTILIZING A SINGLE IMAGE CAPTURING UNIT - A vehicle speed measurement method and system for identifying a violating vehicle utilizing single image capturing unit. A vehicle image can be captured by the image capturing unit in order to estimate speed of the vehicle utilizing an ALPR unit. The license plate characters can be located and extracted from the captured image. A distance of the license plate from the image capturing unit can be calculated utilizing a physical character height from a reference point of the image capturing unit and a pixel character height generated by the ALPR unit. A position of the license plate in the field of view of the image capturing unit along with the distance information can be be utilized to determine a height of the license plate from a road surface. The height of the license plate can be employed to accurately estimate the vehicle speed. | 09-05-2013 |
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 |
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 |
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 |
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 |
20130342706 | CAMERA CALIBRATION APPLICATION - A method and system for camera calibration comprises configuring a calibration target comprising calibration reflectors on a test vehicle. Video of a test scene is collected. Next the test vehicle is identified as it enters the test scene and recorded as it passes through the test scene. The position of the calibration target in each frame of the video is determined and the corresponding individual position of each calibration reflector for each frame of the recorded frames is used to construct a camera calibration map to calibrate the video camera. | 12-26-2013 |
20140079315 | METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR REDUCING MEMORY FOOTPRINTS ASSOCIATED WITH CLASSIFIERS - Methods and systems for reducing the required footprint of SNoW-based classifiers via optimization of classifier features. A compression technique involves two training cycles. The first cycle proceeds normally and the classifier weights from this cycle are used to rank the Successive Mean Quantization Transform (SMQT) features using several criteria. The top N (out of 512 features) are then chosen and the training cycle is repeated using only the top N features. It has been found that OCR accuracy is maintained using only 60 out of 512 features leading to an 88% reduction in RAM utilization at runtime. This coupled with a packing of the weights from doubles to single byte integers added a further 8× reduction in RAM footprint or a reduction of 68× over the baseline SNoW method. | 03-20-2014 |
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 |
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 |
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 |
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 |
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 |
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 |