Patent ID: 6999604

Claim:
An apparatus for detecting a moving object in a sequence of color frame images, said color frame images having a plurality of pixels, each pixel having three color components, comprising: a color normalizer for normalizing color components of each color frame image to produce a normalized color frame image; a color transformer coupled to said color normalizer for color transforming said normalized color frame image to a first color transformed frame image, said first color transformed frame image having intensity levels such that pixels corresponding to said moving object are emphasized; a frame delay coupled to said color transformer for delaying said first color transformed frame image by one frame, said delayed first color transformed frame image being a second color transformed frame image; a motion detector coupled to said color transformer and said frame delay for detecting the motion of the moving object and further intensifying the intensity levels of said first color transformed frame image based on the detected motion; and the intensity level of said each pixel of said first color transformed frame image and the normalized color components of the pixel has a relationship as follows: Z ( x,y )= GF ( r ( x,y ), g ( x,y ))( x,y )ε1 where (x,y) is a coordinate of said pixel in said normalized frame image, Z(x,y) is the intensity level of said pixel of said first color transformed frame image at the coordinate (x,y), r(x,y) and g(x,y) are normalized color components of said pixel at the coordinate (x,y), and GF( ) is a 2-dimensional Gaussian distribution function.