Title:
Adaptive shadow removal for variable environmental conditions

dc.contributor.advisor Wills, Linda M.
dc.contributor.advisor Lerner, Lee W.
dc.contributor.author Danner, Jay C.
dc.contributor.committeeMember Vela, Patricio
dc.contributor.committeeMember Howard, Ayanna
dc.contributor.committeeMember Hamblen, James
dc.contributor.department Electrical and Computer Engineering
dc.date.accessioned 2018-05-31T18:11:33Z
dc.date.available 2018-05-31T18:11:33Z
dc.date.created 2017-05
dc.date.issued 2017-04-28
dc.date.submitted May 2017
dc.date.updated 2018-05-31T18:11:33Z
dc.description.abstract The motivation for this research is to provide a quantitative model for improving shadow detection in arbitrary environments. Many computer vision applications extract foreground pixels to capture moving objects in a scene. However, since shadows share movement patterns with foreground objects (and have a similar magnitude of intensity change compared to a background model), they tend to be extracted with the desired object pixels. Shadows generally contribute to inaccurate object classifications and impede proper tracking of foreground objects. Contemporary shadow removal algorithms have made great strides in discriminating between object pixels and shadow pixels, but lack scene-independence. In order to perform optimally, these leading methods require assumptions to be made about key factors of a scene, including illumination constancy, color content, and shadow intensity. As a result, no leading shadow removal method is robust enough to compensate for environmental change over time, nor are they suitable for deployment into a particular environment without a priori tuning of parameters. This research evaluates popular shadow removal methods, extracts corresponding algorithmic parameters that affect shadow removal, correlates these parameters with salient environmental aspects, and finally leverages this correlation to improve shadow removal efficacy across diverse environments. Data collection and validation were performed using a collection of widely-used computer vision datasets. Parameters, both algorithmic and environmental in nature, are identified, correlated, and evaluated using analytic tools. Using the average attenuation of dark foreground pixels, an adaptive model improves shadow detection by up to 10% and improves shadow-object discrimination by up to 28%. Additional indirect environmental factors are found to increase the effectiveness of this attenuation model. Brightness calculation methods are shown to improve attenuation correlation by 7% to 20%. Identifying low-contrast feature keypoints in a scene is also found to improve attenuation-correlation in some environments by up to 12%.
dc.description.degree M.S.
dc.format.mimetype application/pdf
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/1853/59809
dc.language.iso en_US
dc.publisher Georgia Institute of Technology
dc.subject Shadow removal
dc.subject Adaptation
dc.subject Computer vision
dc.title Adaptive shadow removal for variable environmental conditions
dc.type Text
dc.type.genre Thesis
dspace.entity.type Publication
local.contributor.advisor Wills, Linda M.
local.contributor.corporatename School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
local.contributor.corporatename College of Engineering
relation.isAdvisorOfPublication c965b932-6dbb-46d3-8e30-6d7809f2f9b6
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication 5b7adef2-447c-4270-b9fc-846bd76f80f2
relation.isOrgUnitOfPublication 7c022d60-21d5-497c-b552-95e489a06569
thesis.degree.level Masters
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