Patent ID: 9288449
Filing Date: 2016-03-15
CPC Classification: H04N

Claim Text:
1. A method for controlling a camera to simultaneously maintain multiple objects within a field of view of the camera, the method comprising: identifying a plurality of object tracking constraint functions to be enforced with respect to the multiple objects that are simultaneously maintained within the field of view, each of the plurality of object tracking constraint functions relating to an attribute of the multiple objects determined from image data captured by the camera, wherein one object tracking constraint function of the plurality of object tracking constraint functions relates to a location of a mean position of the multiple objects that are simultaneously maintained within the field of view; identifying a priority ranking for the plurality of object tracking constraint functions such that more important object tracking constraint functions have a higher priority ranking than less important object tracking constraint functions, which have a lower priority ranking; determining, by a computing system that includes a processing device, each attribute from the image data captured by the camera, including the mean position of the multiple objects; and determining, by the computing system, a set of solutions that satisfy the plurality of object tracking constraint functions relative to an order of their priority ranking such that solutions that satisfy lower priority ranking object tracking constraint functions are only considered viable if they also satisfy any higher priority ranking object tracking constraint functions, each solution of the set of solutions providing an indication as to how to control the camera to simultaneously maintain the multiple objects within the field of view of the camera.