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Help Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR)

Okay, scratch number 2) off my list. I still don't reckon a bbc could OCR plate details from a video feed though :p .
 
There isn't really a useful application for this, really just a novelty. You could use it to gather and store license plates you've seen around, but unless you need the picture translated into editable text for use in something (what?), why not just take photos?

I say it's nice to have, but doesn't serve a purpose by itself as a standalone function.
 
I'd use it to build a hate list of rubbish drivers :rofl:

(Although I doubt the memory would be big enough to store 99% of the cars I see...)
 
Pryomancer said:
There isn't really a useful application for this, really just a novelty. You could use it to gather and store license plates you've seen around, but unless you need the picture translated into editable text for use in something (what?), why not just take photos?

I say it's nice to have, but doesn't serve a purpose by itself as a standalone function.
Click to expand...

There's a very useful application for it. The industry I work in, it would be handy for me to log cars in to a site and out, along with how many times the vehicle has been seen (two different purposes)

The first purpose could be rolled in to a handheld app to check when a car arrived on site on patrols too.

The second option could be used on personal protection basis - with the application running on the dashboard and telling you if you see the same vehicle more than once, i.e. if a vehicle may be tailing you.
 
paultgreen said:
There's a very useful application for it. The industry I work in, it would be handy for me to log cars in to a site and out, along with how many times the vehicle has been seen (two different purposes)

The first purpose could be rolled in to a handheld app to check when a car arrived on site on patrols too.

The second option could be used on personal protection basis - with the application running on the dashboard and telling you if you see the same vehicle more than once, i.e. if a vehicle may be tailing you.
Click to expand...

Wow, what industry do you work in that you are worried about being tailed? Or will you have to kill me if you tell me? :eek:
 
paultgreen said:
There's a very useful application for it. The industry I work in, it would be handy for me to log cars in to a site and out, along with how many times the vehicle has been seen (two different purposes)

The first purpose could be rolled in to a handheld app to check when a car arrived on site on patrols too.

The second option could be used on personal protection basis - with the application running on the dashboard and telling you if you see the same vehicle more than once, i.e. if a vehicle may be tailing you.
Click to expand...

Also, when a car tails you it's usually from behind (oooh) so an Android phone on the dashboard wouldn't be able to see the car behind anyway! D'oh!!!
 
Bonce34 said:
Wow, what industry do you work in that you are worried about being tailed? Or will you have to kill me if you tell me? :eek:
Click to expand...


I image that there could be quite a few, like securicor and people like that who drive those vans about collecting money ?!

All though im not sure how useful an app for your phone with ANPR would be you would probably want a permenant camera on the van
 
adam1985 said:
I image that there could be quite a few, like securicor and people like that who drive those vans about collecting money ?!

All though im not sure how useful an app for your phone with ANPR would be you would probably want a permenant camera on the van
Click to expand...

That would be an ideal world situation, but like everyone, we don't work in ideal world situations, and effective compromises have to be sought. A tail could be from either end, if someone's doing it properly, they'll have more than one vehicle, and won't just be behind, and although we don't convey world-leaders, we do have some heavily harassed/stalked/papped clientele.
 
ANPR for the UK was on the Iphone Autotrader application, which did a valueation of a car from a number plate and told you what the car was. But the Autotrader withdrew this after the DVLA said that they were miss using the database by doing this service.
So I am not sure there will ever be a good ANPR application which does very much.
 
There many libraries out there available for consumer applications:

JavaANPR is written in Java, probably it is the most suitable for embedded systems
JavaANPR - Automatic number plate recognition system

Alternatively, you could send the captured picture across the internet and perform the image processing in a server, in this case there are many options available. Just google 'plate recognition SDK' :p. For example

CARMEN FreeFlow
CARMEN FreeFlow - License Plate Recognition Software Engine, Automatic Number Plate Recognition Software Engine

SimpleLPR
http://www.warelogic.com

...
 
The picture I have in my mind right now is holding my Desire close to a car number plate and letting the ANPR app read the number (kinda like the barcode scanner app), then connecting to a website and returning some details after a few minutes. That's about the best we could possibly expect.

I hardly think the video and processing capabilities of ANY smartphone would be up to the task of monitoring streaming video, such as when used as a dash mounted system.

Speccy forever ;)
 
I believe there was a forum rollback recently. If so, they reverted to a backup of the forum database, which didn't have the most up to date posts. Either that or a mod culled some topics.
 
The only reason I can see using the ANPR sytem is to get the details of the tit that just cut you up :) or I could ask my mate to "flag" the car :D
 
If it was good enough you could have the Desire in a cradle with the camera pointing forward, input your friends registration numbers and recognise them as you passed. Of course you could also input the local unmarked traffic cars and get it to sound an alarm but I can't think why anyone would want to do that... ;)
 
Walton1 said:
If it was good enough you could have the Desire in a cradle with the camera pointing forward, input your friends registration numbers and recognise them as you passed. Of course you could also input the local unmarked traffic cars and get it to sound an alarm but I can't think why anyone would want to do that... ;)
Click to expand...

*IF* it was good enough (that demo definitley is not good enough for ANPR on the move) and *IF* you had a database of the local unmarked cars.
 
I've used ANPR in the real world and getting it to work right is not simple. I've seen it fail so many times, read railings "1111111111111111", windows "AAAAAAAAAAAAA" and mis-read plates a thousand times. There are so many issues, around recognising a plate from the rest of the picture (you can't simply zoom in at the right height for most plates - cars don't remain stationary relative to one another!), correctly reading the plate, especially when it's at an angle. The technology is getting better, but it doesn't run off an HTC, more a pretty high end PC!

For static reading where most cars come in a gate (for example) life is simpler, but I still don't think an HTC would do a great job of it.
 
DVLA don't allow any consumer applications to query their database via ANPR, this is why the autotrader app got pulled. I know cos the company I work for where going to build a similar app.

All you could really do is OCR the reg and store it as text.
 
first off, i ve got the java software you guys are talking about.

It recognizes all letters and numbers used in license plates. (in my case:
Dutch, european plates)
Also anyone in the netherlands can request the registration info via the internet:

https://ovi.rdw.nl/

I use the 'simpleLPR UI' software to recognize the plate digits. It works really well! Its free and very easy:

License plate recognition SDK

Ive put some of the anpr result screenshots below!

So all i need to do is make a live camera feed, bond these two features, (copy/paste 'plate number' to the www.ovi.rdw.aspx) and make them android compatible. Then we wil have a working ANPR System!

But i dont really know how to do this. I'm no java expert. Can anyone here create android (java) apps? Please help me out!
Thank you!

ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting
ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting
ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting
 
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