Real-time goal-mouth detection in MPEG soccer video

Abstract

We report our work in real-time detection of goal-mouth appearances in MPEG soccer video. Processing on sub-optimal quality images after MPEG-decoding, the system constrains the Hough Transform-based line-mark detection to only the dominant green regions typically seen in soccer video. The vertical goal-posts and horizontal goal-bar are then isolated by color-based region (pole)-growing. We demonstrate its application for quick video browsing and virtual content insertion. Extensive test over a large data set of about 15 hours of MPEG-1 soccer video @1.15Mbps, CIF-resolution, shows the robustness of our method.