Object-detection with a varying number of eigenspace projections

We present a method allowing a significant speed-up of the eigen-detection method (detection based on principle component analysis). We derive a formula for an upper bound on the class-conditional probability (or equivalently a lower bound on the Mahalanobis distance) on which detection is based. Often, the lower bound of Mahalanobis distance (MD) reaches a preset threshold after computation of only a few eigen-projections. In this case the computation of MD can be immediately terminated. Regardless of the precise value of MD, the detection hypothesis (object from class /spl Omega/ is detected) can be rejected. While provably obtaining results identical to the standard technique, we achieved a two- to three-fold speed-up in face detection experiments on images from the CMU database.