Patent Document ID: 8144928
Application ID: 12084993
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. An object monitoring method performed by a computer for monitoring the presence or absence of a change in an object by performing a comparison between a reference image acquired by capturing the object at a first time and a comparison image acquired by capturing the object at a second time, the object monitoring method comprising: a pixel value correction step, performed by a processor, that causes an average and variance of pixel values of pixels in a second subregion, inclusive of a first subregion formed of one or more pixels, in the comparison image resolved into a plurality of pixels to match with an average and variance of pixel values in a subregion corresponding to the second subregion on the reference image similarly resolved into a plurality of pixels, thereby to execute a calculating operation that corrects the pixel value of each pixel in the first subregion in the comparison image by recognizing each of a plurality of subregions to be the first subregion, the plurality of subregions being obtained when the comparison image is divided into the plurality of subregions respectively inclusive of being formed of only one pixel; and a change determination step that determines the presence or absence of a change in the object by performing a comparison between the reference image and a post-correction comparison image acquired through the pixel value correction step, wherein the pixel value correction step is a step that executes correction in a manner that, where the average and variance of the pixel values in the second subregion inclusive of the first subregion in the event that either one pixel present in a position (x, y) in the comparison image or a set of plural pixels present in positions (x, y) when x, y is a variable are, respectively, represented by E 1 and S 1 2 , and the average and variance of the pixel values in the subregion corresponding to the second subregion of the reference image are, respectively, represented as E 0 and S 0 2 , a pixel value f 2 (x, y) of the pixel present in the position (x, y) in the comparison image is corrected to a post-correction pixel value g(x, y) in accordance with g ⁡ ( x , y ) = S 0 2 S 1 2 ⁢ ( f 1 ⁡ ( x , y ) - E 1 ) + E 0. ( 1 )