DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF AN AUTOMATED CAR PLATE NUMBER RECOGNITION SYSTEM, A RESEARCH PROJECT TOPIC ON MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
- Background of Study
Massive integration of information technology into all aspects of modern life caused demand for processing vehicles as conceptual resources in information systems. Because a standalone information system without any data has no sense, there was also a need to transform information about vehicles between the reality and information systems. This can be achieved by a human agent, or by special intelligent equipment which is able to recognize vehicles by their number plates in a real environment and reflect it into conceptual resources. Because of this, various recognition techniques have been developed and car plate recognition systems are today used in various traffic and security applications, such as parking, access and border control, or tracking of stolen cars.
A vehicle registration plate is a metal or plastic plate attached to a motor vehicle for official identification purposes. The registration identifier is a numeric or alphanumeric code that uniquely identifies the vehicle within the issuing region’s database. In some countries, the identifier is unique within the entire country, while in others it is unique within a state or province. Whether the identifier is associated with a vehicle or a person also varies by issuing agency. Depending on the country, the vehicle registration plate may be called a license plate, tag, car plate or number plate. Most governments require a registration plate to be attached to both the front and rear of a vehicle, although certain jurisdictions or vehicle types, such as motorboats, require only one plate, which is usually attached to the rear of the vehicle. National databases relate this number to other information describing the vehicle; such as the make, model, color, year of manufacture, engine size, type of fuel used, Vehicle Identification (Chassis) Number, and the name and address of the vehicle’s registered owner or keeper.
The term access control refers to the practice of restricting entrance to a property, a building, or a room to authorized persons. Physical access control can be achieved by a human (a guard, bouncer, or receptionist) through mechanical means such as locks and keys, or through technological means such as access control systems.
Automatic car plate recognition (ACPR) is a mass surveillance method that uses optical character recognition on images to read vehicle registration plates. They can use existing closed-circuit television or road-rule enforcement cameras, or ones specifically designed for the task. They are used by various police forces and as a method of electronic toll collection on pay-per-use roads and cataloging the movements of traffic or individuals.
ACPR can be used to store the images captured by the cameras as well as the text from the license plate, with some configurable to store a photograph of the driver. Systems commonly use infrared lighting to allow the camera to take the picture at any time of the day. ACPR technology tends to be region-specific, owing to plate variation from place to place.
