What is Homography?
Homography is a transformation that maps the points in one point to the corresponding point in another image. The homography is a 3×3 matrix :
If 2 points are not in the same plane then we have to use 2 homographs. Similarly, for n planes, we have to use n homographs. If we have more homographs then we need to handle all of them properly. So that is why we use feature matching.
Importing Image Data : We will be reading the following image :
Above image is the cover page of book and it is stored as ‘img.jpg’.
Python
# importing the required libraries import cv2 import numpy as np # reading image in grayscale img = cv2.imread( "img.jpg" , cv2.IMREAD_GRAYSCALE) # initializing web cam cap = cv2.VideoCapture( 0 ) |
Feature Matching : Feature matching means finding corresponding features from two similar datasets based on a search distance. Now will be using sift algorithm and flann type feature matching.
Python
# creating the SIFT algorithm sift = cv2.xfeatures2d.SIFT_create() # find the keypoints and descriptors with SIFT kp_image, desc_image = sift.detectAndCompute(img, None ) # initializing the dictionary index_params = dict (algorithm = 0 , trees = 5 ) search_params = dict () # by using Flann Matcher flann = cv2.FlannBasedMatcher(index_params, search_params) |
Now, we also have to convert the video capture into grayscale and by using appropriate matcher we have to match the points from image to the frame.
Here, we may face exceptions when we draw matches because infinitely there will we many points on both planes. To handle such conditions we should consider only some points, to get some accurate points we can vary the distance barrier.
Python
# reading the frame _, frame = cap.read() # converting the frame into grayscale grayframe = cv2.cvtColor(frame, cv2.COLOR_BGR2GRAY) # find the keypoints and descriptors with SIFT kp_grayframe, desc_grayframe = sift.detectAndCompute(grayframe, None ) # finding nearest match with KNN algorithm matches = flann.knnMatch(desc_image, desc_grayframe, k = 2 ) # initialize list to keep track of only good points good_points = [] for m, n in matches: #append the points according #to distance of descriptors if (m.distance < 0.6 * n.distance): good_points.append(m) |
Homography : To detect the homography of the object we have to obtain the matrix and use function findHomography() to obtain the homograph of the object.
Python
# maintaining list of index of descriptors # in query descriptors query_pts = np.float32([kp_image[m.queryIdx] .pt for m in good_points]).reshape( - 1 , 1 , 2 ) # maintaining list of index of descriptors # in train descriptors train_pts = np.float32([kp_grayframe[m.trainIdx] .pt for m in good_points]).reshape( - 1 , 1 , 2 ) # finding perspective transformation # between two planes matrix, mask = cv2.findHomography(query_pts, train_pts, cv2.RANSAC, 5.0 ) # ravel function returns # contiguous flattened array matches_mask = mask.ravel().tolist() |
Everything is done till now, but when we try to change or move the object in another direction then the computer cannot able to find its homograph to deal with this we have to use perspective transform. For example, humans can see near objects larger than far objects, here perspective is changing. This is called Perspective transform.
Python
# initializing height and width of the image h, w = img.shape # saving all points in pts pts = np.float32([[ 0 , 0 ], [ 0 , h], [w, h], [w, 0 ]]) .reshape( - 1 , 1 , 2 ) # applying perspective algorithm dst = cv2.perspectiveTransform(pts, matrix) |
At the end, lets see the output
Python
# using drawing function for the frame homography = cv2.polylines(frame, [np.int32(dst)], True , ( 255 , 0 , 0 ), 3 ) # showing the final output # with homography cv2.imshow( "Homography" , homography) |
Output :
Python OpenCV: Object Tracking using Homography
In this article, we are trying to track an object in the video with the image already given in it. We can also track the object in the image. Before seeing object tracking using homography let us know some basics.