Device and method for fast computation of region based image features

A method for computing statistical information over a region of an image, the method comprising:

• receiving image data of an inputted image;
• producing a cumulative image representation by propagating an aggregate function through the image data, where each data point in the cumulative image representation includes cumulative image information that is based on a value of previously propagated adjacent points as well as a value of the data point;
• identifying a generalized rectangular region in the cumulative image representation;
• identifying corners of the generalized rectangular region;
• characterizing each corner as one of a predefined corner type;
• assigning a value to each corner based on the type of each corner;
• and
• computing statistical information over the identified generalized rectangular region based on the value assigned to each corner and the cumulative image information at each corner.

A method for calculating an identifying descriptor for a person or object in an image, the method including:

• receiving image data from an inputted image;
• calculating an appearance labeled image from the image data;
• producing a cumulative image representation of the appearance labeled image by propagating an aggregate function through the appearance labeled image, where each data point in the cumulative image representation includes cumulative image information that is based on a value of previously propagated adjacent points as well as a value of the data point;
• identifying a first generalized rectangular region in the cumulative image representation;
• identifying corners of the first generalized rectangular region, and characterizing each corner as one of a predefined type;
• calculating a first image statistic over the first generalized rectangular region based on the type of each corner and the cumulative image information at each corner.