Patent ID: 7982748
Filing Date: 2011-07-19
Classification: G06K

Abstract:
1. A vehicle surroundings monitoring apparatus which monitors the surroundings of a vehicle by using an image captured by a camera mounted on the vehicle, comprising: an object extraction process unit which extracts an image area of an object from the image captured by the camera; a pedestrian determination process unit which determines whether or not the object is a pedestrian based on the image area of the object extracted by the object extraction process unit; and an object type determination process unit which determines an object type when the pedestrian determination process unit determines that the object is not a pedestrian and when the image area of the object includes a first object area of an inverse triangular shape and a second object area located below the first object area and within a predetermined range from the first object area, a first area width is given as a length of a side facing an apex angle located at a lowest position of the inverse triangular shape or a maximum value of a horizontal width of the inverse triangular shape, and a second area width is given as a maximum value of a horizontal width of the second object area, wherein the object type determination process unit determines the object type to be an animal other than a human being in a case where the second area width is greater than one half of the first area width and determines the object type to be an artificial structure in a case where the second area width is not greater than one half of the first area width.