Dog Identification Method Based on Muzzle Pattern Image

Dong-Hwa Jang,Jong-Bok Kim,Jung-Kon Kim,Kyeong-Seok Kwon,Ka-Young Yang

doi:10.3390/app10248994

Abstract

Currently, invasive and external radio frequency identification (RFID) devices and pet tags are widely used for dog identification. However, social problems such as abandoning and losing dogs are constantly increasing. A more effective alternative to the existing identification method is required and the biometrics can be the alternative. This paper proposes an effective dog muzzle recognition method to identify individual dogs. The proposed method consists of preprocessing, feature extraction, matching, and postprocessing. For preprocessing, proposed resize and histogram equalization are used. For feature extraction algorithm, Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT), Speeded Up Robust Features (SURF), Binary Robust Invariant Scaling Keypoints (BRISK) and Oriented FAST, and Rotated BRIEF (ORB) are applied and compared. For matching, Fast Library for Approximate Nearest Neighbors (FLANN) is used for SIFT and SURF, and hamming distance are used for BRISK and ORB. For postprocessing, two techniques to reduce incorrect matches are proposed. The proposed method was evaluated with 55 dog muzzle pattern images acquired from 11 dogs and 990 images augmented by the image deformation (i.e., angle, illumination, noise, affine transform). The best Equal Error Rate (EER) of the proposed method was 0.35%, and ORB was the most appropriate for the dog muzzle pattern recognition.

Highlights

The number of animals lost or abandoned in South Korea increases every year
The performance of an identification system is typically evaluated with False Match Rate (FMR)
Equal Error Rate (EER) is the failure rate when FMR and False Non-Match Rate (FNMR) are same with an optimal matching threshold

Summary

Introduction

136,000 lost or abandoned animals were rescued, though only 40% were reunited with their original owner [1]. As of 2019, 797,000 dogs have been registered under this law. Dogs can be registered with invasive or external radio frequency identification (RFID) devices or pet tags. The method to inject the invasive RFID device into the epidermis is generally not preferred by the owners because of the concerns about negative side effects and animal welfare issue. External RFID devices and pet tags are generally ineffective, as owners often lose the devices or are not aggressive enough about ensuring that their pets are wearing them. In light of what seems to be intractable problems with existing methods, an alternative to invasive and external RFID devices and pet tags are needed. Image-based biometrics could be the solution because biometric information is less likely to be lost and nothing is injected into the dogs

Methods

Results

Conclusion