Estimating the Number of People in Buildings Using Visual Information

Real time pedestrian flow information and the count of people in determined areas is essential for a multitude of management and monitoring functions. The range of applications is wide and the focus here is on the development of statistical methods for people volume estimation in buildings. To count people, visual information from surveillance cameras is used. This is the first of a series of reports, where the problem is divided in estimation classes of increasing difficulty. In the initial stage, probability models are derived for the basic counting scenario, using data gathered from a single camera. The methodology is extended to more complex problems, making use of several cameras covering the same field of view. The consideration of all possible classes of estimation problems leads to solutions that culminate in the assessment of the total number of people in a building.