Patent ID: 8913791

Claim:
A method for automatically determining field of view overlap among multiple cameras as a function of the temporal overlap of object tracks, the method comprising: a processing unit determining a value of similarity for potential pairings of each of a plurality of object tracks determined in appearance information data of a field-of-view of a first camera with each of a plurality of object tracks determined in appearance information data of a field-of-view of a second camera, wherein said object tracks define movement of a tracked object over time through scene image data of respective ones of the first and second camera fields of view; the processing unit assigning into pairs each of the object tracks determined within the first camera field-of-view to ones each of the object tracks determined within the second camera field-of-view that each have a highest determined similarity value of the similarity values determined for their respective potential pairings; the processing unit determining that the assigned object track pairs correspond to overlapping portions of the fields-of-view of the first and second paired cameras if portions of each of the assigned object track pairs have a temporally overlapping period of time; the processing unit determining scene entry points on each of the tracks of the assigned object track pairs corresponding to the overlapping fields-of-view portions within their fields-of-view as locations of the object on the each of said tracks at a beginning of the temporally overlapping period of time; the processing unit determining scene exit points on each of tracks of the assigned object track pairs corresponding to the overlapping fields-of-view portions within their fields-of-view as locations of the object on the each of said tracks at an ending of the temporally overlapping period of time; and the processing unit defining boundary lines for the overlapping fields-of-view portions within their corresponding first and second camera fields-of-view as a function of the determined entry and exit points in their respective fields-of-view.