Methods for mobile image capture of vehicle identification numbers in a non-document
AssigneeMitek Systems, Inc.
InventorsGrigori Nepomniachtchi, Nikolay Kotovich
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Various embodiments disclosed herein are directed to methods of capturing Vehicle Identification Numbers (VIN) from images captured by a mobile device. Capturing VIN data can be useful in several applications, for example, insurance data capture applications. There are at least two types of images supported by this technology: (1) images of documents and (2) images of non-documents.
Claims20
A method comprising using at least one hardware processor to:
- receive an image from which a vehicle identification number (VIN) is to be extracted;
- identify candidate text within the image by
- converting the image into both a direct grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is darker than a background, and an inverted grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is lighter than the background,
- converting the direct grayscale image and the inverted grayscale image into bi-tonal images, and
- performing text segmentation on the bi-tonal images to produce the candidate text;
- and
- perform optical character recognition (OCR) on the candidate text to identify the VIN.
A system comprising:
- at least one hardware processor;
- and
- one or more software modules configured to, when executed by the at least one hardware processor,
- receive an image from which a vehicle identification number (VIN) is to be extracted,
- identify candidate text within the image by converting the image into both a direct grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is darker than a background, and an inverted grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is lighter than the background, converting the direct grayscale image and the inverted grayscale image into bi-tonal images, and performing text segmentation on the bi-tonal images to produce the candidate text, and
- perform optical character recognition (OCR) on the candidate text to identify the VIN.
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon, wherein the instructions, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:
- receive an image from which a vehicle identification number (VIN) is to be extracted;
- identify candidate text within the image by
- converting the image into both a direct grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is darker than a background, and an inverted grayscale image, based on an assumption that the VIN is lighter than the background,
- converting the direct grayscale image and the inverted grayscale image into bi-tonal images, and
- performing text segmentation on the bi-tonal images to produce the candidate text;
- and
- perform optical character recognition (OCR) on the candidate text to identify the VIN.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.