Patent ID: 8681222

Claim:
A method for detecting a clear driving path for a vehicle, said method comprising: processing images from a camera to produce feature data for one or more patches from each of the images; analyzing the feature data for the one or more patches using a first trained classifier to determine a probability value; using patches whose probability value exceeds a first probability threshold value as training samples to train a second trained classifier, including storing data for the patches whose probability value exceeds the first probability threshold value as stored elements in a current data frame, a previous data frame, and a cluster data pool; analyzing the feature data for the one or more patches using the second trained classifier to determine a consistency value, including calculating minimum distances from the one or more patches to each of the stored elements in the current data frame, the previous data frame, and the cluster data pool, and using the minimum distances to compute the consistency value; evaluating the probability value and the consistency value to determine a confidence value for each of the one or more patches; and making a clear-driving-path or non-clear-path determination for each of the one or more patches based on the confidence value.