As technology moves forward, airborne and space-borne systems will continue generating progressively larger images – more bits per pixel and improved spatial, spectral and temporal resolutions. At the same time, the quantity of imagery and data requiring analysis will grow exponentially, and the traditional manual processes of analyzing data will no longer be useful due to the deluge of information.
In addition, combining images in such a way that the relevant information is not lost or degraded continues to be a challenge. Registration is particularly challenging when fusing imagery from different sensors with different resolutions, and when fusing images of a scene that has been derived from different aspects. Manual image registration techniques require the user to mentally correlate the features of one image with another in an attempt to get a more comprehensive understanding of the scene in question. This process is not only tedious but error-prone as well.
In order to avoid expensive and vital imagery to go to waste, the use of Automatic Image Registration is required to provide assistance to image analysts in performing their tasks. Automatic Image Registration (AIR) could be used to facilitate strategic, operational and tactical decisions, in both military and civilian applications.
In comparison with other registration methods, such as manual or intensity-based registration, AUG Signals’ AIR product has several advantages and innovations, providing:
Fully automatic multi-layer co-registration of images from similar or dissimilar sensors
Increased number of automatically identified control points between multi-sensor image pair;
Increased spatial registration accuracy for multi-sensor image co-registration;
Increased similarities between the images by extracting feature layers;
Automatic vector-to-image data conflation
Fully automatic processing, the algorithm does not require any prior knowledge of the images
Sub-pixel accuracy – in the RMS error sense
Automatic registration capabilities that employ different transformation functions,
Intelligent and efficient control points estimation and global consistency checking to eliminate mismatched points
Robust and works for many different kinds of multi-sensor images
For more information or a quote, please contact us.
Toronto, August 2008: AUG Signals, in collaboration with Akoostix Inc. and GeoSpectrum Technologies have selected by DRDC Atlantic to execute the Land Acoustics and Seismic Surveillance Literature Review. The purpose of this contract is to support DRDC Atlantic’s Land Acoustics and Seismic studies for Surveillance Operations (LASSO) project. The consortium will perform a rigorous investigation of acoustic and seismic sensors and tracking capabilities relevant to operational surveillance.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Dr. Abhijit Sinha at abhijit@augsignals.com
Toronto, July 2008: AUG Signals has secured a Defence Industrial Research (DIR) Program project entitled “Enhanced Military Capabilities with Rapid Covariance Equalization Change Detection.” Sponsored by the Department of National Defence, this two year project aims to develop a software product for macro-level change detection (i.e. detection and quantification of change) of SAR, IR, and electrooptical images. The innovation will be to develop Covariance Equalization (CE) change detection technique that will reduce the false changes detected because of the often unavoidable image misregistration. The resulting change detection technology can be applied strategically, operationally or tactically, with the focus on automatic and efficient processing of large volumes of data to flag regions of change at a macro-level for further analysis.
In operational theatres such as Afghanistan, adversaries make use of the local population as a means of concealing their activities from allied surveillance. For example, the IED (Improvised Explosive Device) system of supply and deployment is disguised amongst the day-to-day activities of the local population. Analysis of individual changes is of limited value in wide-area surveillance since there are too many changes occurring and specific changes of importance are difficult to identify. Macro-level change detection instead aims to take a high-level view and establish a normal range for the number of changes in an area of interest over a period of time. If the number of changes moves outside this band of normalcy, it is an indicator of activity in the area of interest and a possible precursor of an attack, a supply operation, or a movement of insurgents. Pattern recognition techniques in conjunction with human intelligence can be used to identify the nature of the change and can lead to a risk/threat evaluation.
The resulting capabilities will include identifying changes in enemy resources or activity during reconnaissance, detecting suspicious activity during surveillance, providing scouting ability for a moving convoy, and supporting situational awareness when protecting garrisons or high-value targets.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Dr. Ting Liu at tliu@augsignals.com
Toronto, March 2008: AUG Signals is pleased to announce we have secured a contract with Defence Research and Development Canada entitled “Flexible Association Algorithm Development”. The objective of this work is to develop data association algorithms that show robustness in terms of identification estimates when faced with association errors. Target to measurement association – denoted as association problem in tracking literature – is an essential component and probably the most challenging part in target tracking. Errors in data association can cause higher and sometimes unaccounted uncertainty in target kinematics. It can lead to early termination, coalescence and delayed detection of tracks.
The developed algorithm will take into consideration the association related uncertainties in identification and will be able to recover from identification errors once association uncertainties are over.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Dr. Abhijit Sinha at abhijit@augsignals.com.
Toronto, September 2007: AUG Signals has been chosen to develop an Intelligent Video Surveillance System in partnership with InfoWrap Systems Ltd., an Israeli-based video surveillance company. Funded by the Canada-Israel Industrial Research and Development Foundation (CIIRDF), the objective of the project is to develop an intelligent, multi-sensor video surveillance system, to be launched late next year.
Detection and Identification for Video Surveillance Systems (DIViSS) integrates several unique and powerful capabilities into a video surveillance platform, revolutionizing how video cameras can be applied to surveillance applications. These include motion detection, automatic detection of abandoned objects, resolution enhancement, object identification, content protection, and integration of multiple sensors. Features are provided through a simple interface, allowing operators to easily use these advanced analysis functions.
Potential applications include: surveillance, identification of suspicious and/or abandoned objects in crowded areas, monitoring of confidential materials, traffic monitoring and many more.
For more information, or to request a demonstration of the system, please contact Tatyana Litvak.
Toronto, April 2007: AUG Signals is pleased to announce we have secured the Canadian Space Agency’s support for our new project, entitled “Conflation Capabilities for Spaceborne Remote Sensing: Automatic Co-registration and Vector Image Alignment.”
The objective of this work is to advance and expand the existing registration software of AUG Signals. Specifically, novel technologies will be developed to automatically register vector and image data, EO and SAR data at a user defined high registration accuracy.
The uniqueness of the technology lies in its simultaneous utilization of multiple common feature image pairs generated from originally different data sources. Due to the different image characteristics of the different sensors, automatic registration of EO and SAR is always a challenge. Poor accuracy of the geo-information of the vector data and/or image data causes large discrepancies between vectors and the same features presented in the image data when the two datasets are directly overlaid. AUG Signals’ new technology solves these problems by identifying correct control point pairs in the multi-layer feature image pairs. This will lead to novel approaches and solutions that will exploit currently available techniques resulting in increased registration/conflation performance for images from multiple sensors.
These conflation capabilities offer a significant value-added tool for registration – one of the fundamental tools for data analysis – and can be applied to a variety of diverse markets, from agriculture, forestry, and environmental applications to natural resources, topographic mapping, military and defence, etc.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Yifeng Li.
Toronto, February 2007: AUG Signals has been awarded a CSA (Canadian Space Agency) contract to develop a polarimetric constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detector using Markov chains. This is an innovative technique that will result in a new class of CFAR detectors, which may either stand alone or complement traditional CFAR detection performance. The anticipated CFAR detection improvement is expected to be as much as 30%.
Target detection is a fundamental analysis tool essential for almost all remote sensing applications. Unlike conventional CFAR detectors that have been designed to detect objects described by point data or with low image resolution, a high-performance Markov chain CFAR detector will make optimal use of the higher resolution information provided by RADARSAT-2. The Markov chain CFAR detector will exploit the finer resolution and selective polarization provided by RADARSAT-2 in order to yield greater detection performance.
This new technology can be used for a variety of military and defense applications such as coastal surveillance, ship detection, detection of land targets, iceberg monitoring, etc. In addition, Markov chain CFAR detector can also be employed in commercial applications, anything from agriculture (compliance monitoring, crop monitoring) and forestry to sea ice monitoring.
Markov chain CFAR detector will solidify Canada’s position as a global leader in remote sensing data provision, applications, and innovative technology.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Dr. Chuhong Fei.
Toronto, February 2007: AUG Signals has been chosen to lead an Intelligent Drinking Water monitoring project in partnership with EPCOR Water Services, University of Toronto, Public Health Agency of Canada, Queen’s University Centre for Water and the Environment, and University of Calgary. Funded by Precarn, the objective of the project is to develop an Intelligent Situation Assessment Unit (ISAU) that will detect drinking water contaminants by using inputs from multiple sensors and public health syndromic surveillance data. The water quality analysis will be communicated to water system operators, providing them with early warning of contamination and allowing for an immediate response.
Emerging sensor and intelligent systems technologies create an opportunity for drinking water distribution monitoring to be significantly enhanced. Current methods of laboratory sampling can be improved upon, reducing detection times and the costs of water monitoring. This is particularly true in smaller municipalities and rural regions, where water treatment procedures may not be as sophisticated and water testing facilities and expertise may be limited.
The fusion of sensor and non-sensor information pertaining to water quality is an entirely new application of intelligent systems and may lead to revolutionary methods of detecting drinking water contamination. The project establishes Canada as a leader in drinking water monitoring technology research and innovation.
For more information, please contact the Project Manager, Xia Liu.
Toronto, January 2007: AUG Signals has been awarded a Canadian Space Agency-supported contract to transfer AUG Signals’ automatic registration technology for temporal hyperspectral and polarimetric images from its original application of earth observation to applications for the defence industry and military. The technology will support the use of multiple types of sensors, including infrared, electro-optical, etc.
Toronto, November 2006: Our leading edge image processing, dedicated to specific data processing applications for EO, SAR and other image data, is now available in modules.
