Optical processing for model-based vision

Recent advances in smart filters make correlator architectures (optical or digital) attractive for automatic target recognition (ATR). They allow one to significantly reduce the search space typically required in matched filter template matching. Use of a hierarchy of correlation filters allows one to address all levels of model based vision including detection (prescreening), segmentation (image enhancement and edge detection), recognition (reduction of false alarms, pose, and size estimation, etc.), and classification (identification of the object type). This significantly reduces the object geometry and contrast search space required.