Event detection in real time on a personal camera phone image collection

Abstract

Grouping photos of the same event together is extremely useful for the management of personal photo collections. However, most methods cannot be applied to the problem of online event detection in embedded devices because they do not consider hardware constraints or a user’s photo-taking behavior. In this paper, we propose an efficient and effective event detection algorithm for managing personal photo collections in camera phones or digital cameras. The proposed algorithm fuses time and location information, which is deemed the most important information for personal photo management, and works in real time in embedded devices. We model event occurrences in a user’s photo-taking behavior as a Poisson process by imposing certain constraints on calculating the elapsed time. Location information is incorporated into event detection when confidence in a decision based on the Poisson process is not high enough. The algorithm is user-centric because it provides the unique capabilities of accepting and adjusting to user feedback. Our experiment results show that the proposed event detection method has the potential to support emerging multimedia applications in embedded devices.