Image processing apparatus and method

An image processing apparatus, comprising:

• an image acquiring device which acquires a first image and a second image obtained on a frame basis by sensing an image of a moving object from two different viewpoints using a first imaging device and a second imaging device;
• a first detecting device configured to detect a plurality of feature points from the first image;
• a stereo image processing device configured to obtain a disparity distribution representing a disparity for said each feature point by performing stereo image processing using the first image and the second image;
• a first determining device configured to determine a threshold for the disparities in the disparity distribution;
• a matching device configured to obtain a pair of corresponding feature points from each feature point detected at a first frame time and each feature point detected at a second frame time by the first detecting device;
• a measuring device configured to measure a moving velocity represented by a moving amount and moving direction between the pair of feature points to obtain a moving velocity distribution representing a moving velocity for each feature point by measuring;
• a second determining device configured to determine an identification boundary for identifying a moving object area or an area other than moving object area with respect to the moving velocity distribution;
• a classifying device configured to classify, as intra-moving-object feature points, a feature point having a disparity exceeding the threshold in the disparity distribution and a feature point corresponding to a moving object area identified by the identification boundary;
• and
• a second detecting device configured to detect an image area of the moving object in the first image by using the intra-moving-object feature points.

An image processing method, comprising:

• acquiring a first image and a second image obtained by sensing an image of a moving object from two different viewpoints using a first imaging device and a second imaging device;
• detecting a plurality of feature points from the first image;
• obtaining a disparity distribution representing a disparity for said each feature point by performing stereo image processing using the first image and the second image;
• determining a threshold for the disparities in the disparity distribution;
• classifying a feature point having a disparity exceeding the threshold in the disparity distribution as an intra-moving-object feature point;
• and
• detecting an image area of the moving object in the first image by using the intra-moving-object feature point.

An image processing method, comprising:

• acquiring a first image and a second image obtained on a frame basis by sensing an image of a moving object from two different viewpoints using a first imaging device and a second imaging device;
• detecting a plurality of feature points from the first image;
• obtaining a disparity distribution representing a disparity for said each feature point by performing stereo image processing using the first image and the second image;
• determining a threshold for the disparities in the disparity distribution;
• obtaining a pair of corresponding feature points from each feature point detected at a first frame time and each feature point detected at a second frame time;
• measuring a moving velocity represented by a moving amount and moving direction between the pair of feature points to obtain a moving velocity distribution representing a moving velocity for each feature point by;
• determining an identification boundary for identifying a moving object area or an area other than moving object area with respect to the moving velocity distribution;
• classifying, as intra-moving-object feature points, a feature point having a disparity exceeding the threshold in the disparity distribution and a feature point corresponding to a moving object area identified by the identification boundary;
• and
• detecting an image area of the moving object in the first image by using the intra-moving-object feature points.