A Luminous-free Remote Surveillance System with Inherent Video Overlay and IP Encoder

Abstract

Electro-optic and thermal imaging cameras provide video output in various media formats. Since both these types differ in terms of operating principle, the electro-optic camera provides a sharp and coloured video output in good lighting conditions. However, this arrangement is rendered ineffective in dark areas with low lighting conditions and a thermal imaging camera is deemed suitable for said purpose. The raw video formats obtained by such cameras are not compliant for video streaming over the network in majority cases and are required to be IP encoded to facilitate remote access. In this work, we perform real-time data fusion of videos obtained by an electro-optic camera and a thermal imaging camera for enhanced surveillance. Furthermore, we develop an IP encoder for facilitation of remote access of the overlay video obtained from both the cameras. This system is pragmatic especially from a security-oriented viewpoint where the combined video of thermal and electro-optic cameras is streamed over an IP network in real-time so that no unnecessary movement goes unnoticed; thus enabling remote access along with an enhanced user experience.