Image characterization for automatic target recognition algorithm evaluations

Image processing to accomplish automatic recognition of military vehicles has promised increased weapons systems effectiveness and reduced timelines for a number of Depariment of Defense missions. Automatic Target Recognizers (ATh) are often claimed to be able to recognize many different types of vehicles as possible targets in military targeting applications. The targeting scenario conditions include different vehicle poses and histories as well as a variety of imaging geometries, intervening atmospheres, and background environments. Testing these ATh subsystems in most cases has been limited to a handful of the scenario conditions of interest, as is represented by imagery collected with the desired imaging sensor. The question naturally arises as to how robust the performance of the ATh is for all scenario conditions of interest, not just for the set of imagery upon which an algorithm was trained.© (1990) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.