Nighttime Vehicle Distance Measuring Systems
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Date
2007-01-01
Authors
W.-Y. Wang
M.-C. Lu
H.-L. Kao
C.-Y. Chu
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
IEEE Circuits and Systems Society
Abstract
In this brief, a nighttime vehicle distance measuring
system using charge-coupled device (CCD) cameras is proposed.
The authors use the proportionality of similar triangles to measure the distance between a CCD camera and taillights of a vehicle in front. At night, the taillights form two bright spots in the
CCD image, therefore producing two measurable signals. A circuit
for counting the number of external clock pulses between the two
bright spots is employed to calculate the interval between them in
the video image. Due to the proportionality of similar triangles,
there is a linear relationship between the actual distance and the
interval of the two taillights. Thus, the actual distance from the
CCD camera to the vehicle can be calculated from a simple formula. One does not have to use an expensive high-speed digital
signal processing microprocessor to identify the taillights of the vehicle or use pixels to measure distance, but just use simple circuits
to identify the taillights at night and use a simple formula to measure distance. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness
of the proposed system.