Patent ID: 8270674

Claim:
A method of tracking faces or other objects of interest in an image stream using a digital image acquisition device determined to be moving relative to said faces or other objects of interest, comprising: receiving first and second acquired images from said image stream including one or more face or other object regions; detecting said one or more face or other object regions in the first acquired image; receiving an indication of relative movement of said second acquired image relative to the first acquired image due to determined motion of the digital image acquisition device relative to said one or more face or other object regions, said second acquired image having an associated set of candidate face or other object regions, each candidate face region or other regions of interest having a given size and a respective location; adjusting focus or other capture setting based on the relative movement to optimize focus on the one or more detected face or other object regions or to otherwise optimize a representation of the one or more detected face or other object regions within a succeeding acquired image; and applying adjusted face or other object detection to at least a portion of said succeeding acquired image in the vicinity of said one or more candidate face or other object regions as a function of said determined motion of the digital image acquisition device relative to said one or more faces or other detected objects to remove variability of changes caused by said determined motion, to provide an updated set of candidate face or other object regions.