Video Based Surveillance Systems

Monitoring of public and private sites has increasingly become a very sensitive issue resulting in a patchwork of privacy laws varying from country to country -though all aimed at protecting the privacy of the citizen. It is important to remember, however, that monitoring and vi sual surveillance capabilities can also be employed to aid the citizen. The focus of current development is primarily aimed at public and cor porate safety applications including the monitoring of railway stations, airports, and inaccessible or dangerous environments. Future research effort, however, has already targeted citizen-oriented applications such as monitoring assistants for the aged and infirm, route-planning and congestion-avoidance tools, and a range of environment al monitoring applications. The latest generation of surveillance systems has eagerly adopted re cent technological developments to produce a fully digital pipeline of digital image acquisition, digital data transmission and digital record ing. The resultant surveillance products are highly-fiexihle, capahle of generating forensic-quality imagery, and ahle to exploit existing Internet and wide area network services to provide remote monitoring capability.

Advanced Video-Based Surveillance Systems presents second generation surveillance systems that automatically process large sets of signals for performance monitoring tasks. Included is coverage of different architecture designs, customization of surveillance architecture for end-users, advances in the processing of imaging sequences, security systems, sensors, and remote monitoring projects. Examples are provided of surveillance applications in highway traffic control, subway stations, wireless communications, and other areas. This work will be of interest to researchers in image processing, computer vision, digital signal processing, and telecommunications.

Multimedia surveillance systems is an emerging field that includes signal and image processing, communications, and computer vision. Multimedia Video-Based Surveillance Systems: Requirements, Issues and Solutions, combines the most recent research results from these areas for use by engineers and end-users involved in the design of surveillance systems in the fields of transportation and services. The book covers emerging surveillance requirements, including new digital sensors for real-time acquisition of surveillance data, low-level image processing algorithms, and event detection methods. It also discusses problems related to knowledge representation in surveillance systems, wireless and wired multimedia networks, and a new generation of surveillance communication tools. Timely information is presented on digital watermarking, broadband multimedia transmission, legal use of surveillance systems, performance evaluation criteria, and other new and emerging topics, along with applications for transports and pedestrian monitoring. The information contained in Multimedia Video-Based Surveillance Systems: Requirements, Issues and Solutions, bridges the distance between present practice and research findings, and the book is an indispensable reference tool for professional engineers.

There is a growing interest in the development and deployment of intelligent surveillance systems in public and private locations. This book consists of a selection of extended versions of presentations made in two symposia on intelligent distributed surveillance systems (IDSS) and brings together the latest developments in the field.

Offering ready access to the security industry’s cutting-edge digital future, Intelligent Network Video provides the first complete reference for all those involved with developing, implementing, and maintaining the latest surveillance systems. Pioneering expert Fredrik Nilsson explains how IP-based video surveillance systems provide better image quality, and a more scalable and flexible system at lower cost. A complete and practical reference for all those in the field, this volume: Describes all components relevant to modern IP video surveillance systems Provides in-depth information about image, audio, networking, and compression technologies Discusses intelligent video architectures and applications Offers a comprehensive checklist for those designing a network video system, as well as a systems design tool on DVD Nilsson guides readers through a well-organized tour of the building blocks of modern video surveillance systems, including network cameras, video encoders, storage, servers, sensors, and video management. From there, he explains intelligent video, looking at the architectures and typical applications associated with this exciting technology. Taking a hands-on approach that meets the needs of those working in the industry, this timely volume, illustrated with more than 300 color photos, supplies readers with a deeper understanding of how surveillance technology has developed and, through application, demonstrates why its future is all about intelligent network video.

This book will provide an overview of techniques for visual monitoring including video surveillance and human activity understanding. It will present the basic techniques of processing video from static cameras, starting with object detection and tracking. The author will introduce further video analytic modules including face detection, trajectory analysis and object classification. Examining system design and specific problems in visual surveillance, such as the use of multiple cameras and moving cameras, the author will elaborate on privacy issues focusing on approaches where automatic processing can help protect privacy.

From the streets of London to subway stations in New York City, hundreds of thousands of surveillance cameras ubiquitously collect hundreds of thousands of videos, often running 24/7. How can such vast volumes of video data be stored, analyzed, indexed, and searched? How can advanced video analysis and systems autonomously recognize people and detect targeted activities real-time? Collating and presenting the latest information Intelligent Video Surveillance: Systems and Technology explores these issues, from fundamentals principle to algorithmic design and system implementation. An Integrated discussion of key research and applications Written and edited by a collection of industry experts, the book presents state-of-the-art technologies and systems in intelligent video surveillance. The book integrates key research, design, and implementation themes of intelligent video surveillance systems and technology into one comprehensive reference. The chapters cover the computational principles behind the technologies and systems and include system implementation issues as well as examples of successful applications of these technologies. Builds a foundation for future developments Changing appearance caused by changing viewpoints, illumination, expression, and movement, self/cross body occlusion, modeling of cluttered background capable of efficient background subtraction for object detection, and spatial and temporal alignment of multiple cameras are just a few of the challenges that remain in further developing and refining intelligent video surveillance technology and systems. Fully illustrated with line art, tables, and photographs demonstrating the collected video and results obtained using the related algorithms, including a color plate section, the book provides a high-level blueprint for advances and insights into future directions of the field.

Monitoring of public and private sites is increasingly becoming a very important and critical issue, especially after the recent flurry of terrorist attacks including the one on the Word Trade Center in September 2001. It is, therefore, imperative that effective multisensor surveillance systems be developed to protect the society from similar attacks in the future. The new generation of surveillance systems to be developed have a specific requirement: they must be able to automatically identify criminal and terrorist activity without sacrificing individual privacy to the extent possible. Privacy laws concerning monitoring and surveillance systems vary from country to country but, in general, they try to protect the privacy of their citizens. Monitoring and visual surveillance has numerous other applications. It can be employed to help invalids or handicapped and to monitor the activities of elderly people. It can be used to monitor large events such as sporting events, as well. Nowadays, monitoring is employ~d in several different contexts including transport applications, such as monitoring of railway stations and airports, dangerous environments like nuclear facilities or traffic flows on roads and bridges. The latest generation of surveillance systems mainly rely on hybrid analog-digital, or completely digital video communications and processing methods and take advantage of the greater of flexibility offered by video processing algorithms that are capable focusing a human operator's attention on a set of interesting situations.