TR#437: Fast Lighting Independent Background Subtraction

Yuri Ivanov, Aaron Bobick and John Liu

This paper describes a new method of fast background subtraction based upon disparity verification that is invariant to run-time changes in illumination. Using two or more cameras, the method requires the off-line construction of disparity fields mapping the primary (or key) background image to each of the additional reference background images. At runtime, segmentation is performed by checking color intensity values at corresponding pixels. If more than two cameras are available, more robust segmentation can be achieved and in particular, the occlusion shadows can be generally eliminated as well. Because the method only assumes fixed background geometry, the technique allows for illumination variation at runtime. And, because no disparity search is performed at run time, the algorithm is easily implemented in real-time on conventional hardware.