Image capture and identification system and process

#The invention relates an identification method and process for objects from digitally captured images thereof that uses image characteristics to identify an object from a plurality of objects in a database.

#There is a need to provide hyperlink functionality in known objects without modification to the objects, through reliably detecting and identifying the objects based only on the appearance of the object, and then locating and supplying information pertinent to the object or initiating communications pertinent to the object by supplying an information address, such as a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), pertinent to the object.

#There is a need to determine the position and orientation of known objects based only on imagery of the objects.

#FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram top-level algorithm flowchart;

#FIG. 2 is an idealized view of image capture;

#FIGS. 3A and 3B are a schematic block diagram of process details of the present invention;

#The present invention includes a novel process whereby information such as Internet content is presented to a user, based solely on a remotely acquired image of a physical object. Although coded information can be included in the remotely acquired image, it is not required since no additional information about a physical object, other than its image, needs to be encoded in the linked object. There is no need for any additional code or device, radio, optical or otherwise, to be embedded in or affixed to the object. Image-linked objects can be located and identified within user-acquired imagery solely by means of digital image processing, with the address of pertinent information being returned to the device used to acquire the image and perform the link. This process is robust against digital image noise and corruption (as can result from lossy image compression/decompression), perspective error, rotation, translation, scale differences, illumination variations caused by different lighting sources, and partial obscuration of the target that results from shadowing, reflection or blockage.

#Many different variations on machine vision “target location and identification” exist in the current art. However, they all tend to provide optimal solutions for an arbitrarily restricted search space. At the heart of the present invention is a high-speed image matching engine that returns unambiguous matches to target objects contained in a wide variety of potential input images. This unique approach to image matching takes advantage of the fact that at least some portion of the target object will be found in the user-acquired image. The parallel image comparison processes embodied in the present search technique are, when taken together, unique to the process. Further, additional refinement of the process, with the inclusion of more and/or different decomposition-parameterization functions, utilized within the overall structure of the search loops is not restricted. The detailed process is described in the following. FIG. 1 shows the overall processing flow and steps. These steps are described in further detail in the following sections.

#For image capture 10, the User 12 (FIG. 2) utilizes a computer, mobile telephone, personal digital assistant, or other similar device 14 equipped with an image sensor (such as a CCD or CMOS digital camera). The User 12 aligns the sensor of the image capture device 14 with the object 16 of interest. The linking process is then initiated by suitable means including: the User 12 pressing a button on the device 14 or sensor; by the software in the device 14 automatically recognizing that an image is to be acquired; by User voice command; or by any other appropriate means. The device 14 captures a digital image 18 of the scene at which it is pointed. This image 18 is represented as three separate 2-D matrices of pixels, corresponding to the raw RGB (Red, Green, Blue) representation of the input image. For the purposes of standardizing the analytical processes in this embodiment, if the device 14 supplies an image in other than RGB format, a transformation to RGB is accomplished. These analyses could be carried out in any standard color format, should the need arise.