Centroid tracker and aimpoint selection

Ronda Venkateswarlu; K. V. Sujata; B. Venkateswara Rao

doi:10.1117/12.138205

25 November 1992 Centroid tracker and aimpoint selection

Ronda Venkateswarlu, K. V. Sujata, B. Venkateswara Rao

Proceedings Volume 1697, Acquisition, Tracking, and Pointing VI; (1992) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.138205
Event: Aerospace Sensing, 1992, Orlando, FL, United States

Abstract

Autonomous fire and forget weapons have gained importance to achieve accurate first pass kill by hitting the target at an appropriate aim point. Centroid of the image presented by a target in the field of view (FOV) of a sensor is generally accepted as the aimpoint for these weapons. Centroid trackers are applicable only when the target image is of significant size in the FOV of the sensor but does not overflow the FOV. But as the range between the sensor and the target decreases the image of the target will grow and finally overflow the FOV at close ranges and the centroid point on the target will keep on changing which is not desirable. And also centroid need not be the most desired/vulnerable point on the target. For hardened targets like tanks, proper aimpoint selection and guidance up to almost zero range is essential to achieve maximum kill probability. This paper presents a centroid tracker realization. As centroid offers a stable tracking point, it can be used as a reference to select the proper aimpoint. The centroid and the desired aimpoint are simultaneously tracked to avoid jamming by flares and also to take care of the problems arising due to image overflow. Thresholding of gray level image to binary image is a crucial step in centroid tracker. Different thresholding algorithms are discussed and a suitable algorithm is chosen. The real-time hardware implementation of centroid tracker with a suitable thresholding technique is presented including the interfacing to a multimode tracker for autonomous target tracking and aimpoint selection. The hardware uses very high speed arithmetic and programmable logic devices to meet the speed requirement and a microprocessor based subsystem for the system control. The tracker has been evaluated in a field environment.

Citation Download Citation

Ronda Venkateswarlu, K. V. Sujata, and B. Venkateswara Rao "Centroid tracker and aimpoint selection", Proc. SPIE 1697, Acquisition, Tracking, and Pointing VI, (25 November 1992); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.138205

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