Method and system for identifying a license plate

A system for locating a license plate, said system comprising:

• a processor;
• a data bus coupled to said processor;
• a computer-usable medium embodying computer code, said computer-usable medium being coupled to said data bus, said computer program code comprising instructions executable by said processor and configured for:
• analyzing an image of a vehicle utilizing a top-down analysis method to identify a potential license plate area of a license plate by producing a binarized image of said image of said vehicle;
• locating and binarizing a busy area of said image of said vehicle and thereafter classifying a black run with respect to a binarized image and generating a plurality of objects based on a black run classification;
• classifying said black run of said binarized image into at least three categories based on length by a run classification unit;
• utilizing a run-length based filter to filter out non-text objects by retaining at least two smallest of said at least three categories of said black run in order to thereafter spatially cluster at least one leftover object;
• analyzing said at least one leftover object utilizing a bottom-up analysis method by examining a uniformity and a linearity of a clustered object of said at least one leftover object based on a linearity test in order to thereafter match a detected object with a plate edge characteristic in order to locate a license plate;
• and
• generating a license plate identification of said license plate.

A processor-readable non-transitory storage medium storing code representing instructions to cause a processor to perform a process to locate a license plate, said code comprising code to:

• analyze an image of a vehicle utilizing a top-down analysis method to identify a potential license plate area of a license plate by producing a binarized image of said image of said vehicle;
• locate and binarize a busy area of said image of said vehicle and thereafter classify a black run with respect to a binarized image and generate a plurality of objects based on a black run classification;
• classify said black run of said binarized image into at least three categories based on length by a run classification unit;
• utilize a run-length based filter to filter out non-text objects by retaining at least two smallest of said at least three categories of said black run in order to thereafter spatially cluster at least one leftover object;
• analyze said at least one leftover object utilizing a bottom-up analysis method by examining a uniformity and a linearity of a clustered object of said at least one leftover object based on a linearity test in order to thereafter match a detected object with a plate edge characteristic in order to locate a license plate;
• and
• generate a license plate identification of said license plate.