A robust visual tracking of an arbitrary-shaped object by a new active contour method for a virtual reality application

This paper presents a real-time, highly reliable, open field visual tracking system, which can automatically detect an arbitrary-shaped object in 3-D space and find out its location so that the 2-DOF camera platform can be controlled to keep the target centered in the monitor image. The total processing period of the proposed visual servo system is less than 34 ms. Next, the visual servo system is to play the role as a military light-of-sight on the air fighter to lock an enemy fighter. Incidentally, the 2-DOF information of the camera platform is adopted to the autopilot control of an air fighter to track the foregoing target. The overall system is experimented and verified in a virtual reality environment, which can further be developed as an entertainment or military training platform.