Methods for Detecting Vehicle Following Distance

A method for determining a following distance between a first vehicle and a second vehicle, the method comprising:

• accessing an image including a representation of the first vehicle from a perspective of the second vehicle behind the first vehicle, the image further representing a common lane of travel of the first vehicle and the second vehicle;
• determining, by at least one processor, a first vertical position in the image representing a bottom of the first vehicle;
• accessing, by the at least one processor, a second vertical position in the image representing a static physical distance from the second vehicle;
• determining a transformed first vertical position by applying, by the at least one processor, an image transformation matrix to the first vertical position;
• determining a transformed second vertical position by applying, by the at least one processor, the image transformation matrix to the second vertical position;
• determining an image distance between the transformed first vertical position and the transformed second vertical position;
• determining the following distance as a physical distance between the first vehicle and the second vehicle based on the determined image distance and the static physical distance;
• and
• outputting the determined following distance.