VCA revisited

So, the ObjectVideo “patent agreement seeking” rampage seems to have come to an end for now, with Panasonic System Networks being the latest to be added to the global, portfolio-wide patent license wish list (others include Tyco Security Products, Sony, Vivotek, Pelco by Schneider and Bosch Security Systems, for anyone who is keeping score). More solution providers are revisiting the technology side of things this year, with more concrete deployment scenarios and ROI agreement, such as this one from Axis Communications, a similar one from AMG Systems, and the one below from Wavestore.

Recent advances have helped overcome many of the problems previously associated with VCA tools, and 2013 will therefore see more powerful and tangible performance in real-life action, predicted Phil Ewers, Business Development Manager at Wavestore. His extensive experience includes playing a key role in a successful bid to deliver and supply Westfield London Shopping Centre with Europe's largest people-counting solution. Ewers is confident that VCA will be requested more in the list of features when video management systems are being designed.

First, there are a number of manufacturers who have increased the processing power of the DSP chipsets incorporated into their video surveillance cameras, highlighted Ewers. “These cameras, therefore, have the potential to be able to perform all their standard functions, while at the same time being able to efficiently handle analytics software.” Second, a tough economic environment is inevitably encouraging end users to demand a higher ROI in a video system solution. Last but not least is the fact that forward thinking video solution providers, such as Wavestore, have incorporated into their VMS the facility for leading technologies, such as video analytics in all its various forms, to work in harmony and interact with each other using a metadata engine. “This enables to offer customers an effective single-source solution.”

VCA is proving to be extremely valuable to the retail sector, but there are many opportunities in environments such as sports stadiums, airports, train stations and so on — any area where there is people movement.

People-counting capability deserves to be near or at the top of the list, as it can provide highly valuable data to allow a business to become more efficient, increase sales or just simply make their premises a safe place to visit or work in, Ewers said. “A hot spot identified by the use of analytics could perhaps generate an alert that there is an escalating risk of people being crushed.”

ALPR has obvious benefits to those involved in traffic management and parking enforcement, as well as verifying that a driver/vehicle is authorized to enter a restricted area. Biometrics in the form of facial recognition deserves a mention as well, as it can be a very powerful tool to identify specific individuals. “When analyzing what may have been thousands of hours of prerecorded video, facial recognition offers the possibility of matching against what could be a large database of undesirable visitors,” Ewers shared. New developments are seeing facial recognition providing invaluable statistics for retailers as to who is checking out a particular product stand, visiting a store or a defined area within a store or shopping complex.