Automatic target retrieval in a video-surveillance task

In this paper we face the automatic target search problem. While performing an object tracking task, we address the problem of identifying a previously selected target when it is lost due to masking, occlusions, or quick and unexpected movements. Firstly a candidate target is identified in the scene through motion detection techniques, subsequently using a semantic categorization and content based image retrieval techniques, the candidate target is identified whether it is the correct one (i.e. the previous lost target), or not. Content Based Image Retrieval serves as support to the search problem and is performed using a reference data base which was populated a priori.