2D Barcode localization and motion deblurring using a flutter shutter camera

Abstract

We describe a system for localizing and deblurring motion-blurred 2D barcodes. Previous work on barcode detection and deblurring has mainly focused on 1D barcodes, and has employed traditional image acquisition which is not robust to motion blur. Our solution is based on coded exposure imaging which, as we show, enables well-posed de-convolution and decoding over a wider range of velocities. To serve this solution, we developed a simple and effective approach for 2D barcode localization under motion blur, a metric for evaluating the quality of the deblurred 2D barcodes, and an approach for motion direction estimation in coded exposure images. We tested our system on real camera images of three popular 2D barcode symbologies: Data Matrix, PDF417 and Aztec Code.