Inventors:
David Whitney Wallen - Windsor CA, US
Richard Cary Dice - San Francisco CA, US
International Classification:
G06F 17/30
Abstract:
Images are processed by extracting a number of small, fixed size pixel arrays, here called tiles. The image is thus represented as a collection of small parts in almost cookie cutter fashion. For storage, the tile data are added to a database and indexed for fast recall. Stored images can be rescaled, possibly rotated, and inserted again for more robustness. A sample image for recall is likewise processed, the extracted tiles serving as keys to find their stored counterparts. The original image can thus be recognized from even a small portion of the original image, if the sample offers enough tiles for lookup. The invention includes an image collection module, an image processing module, a storage module, a recall module and an interactive module by which a user can query a sample image or sub-image against the stored information.
