JP2013037615A - Vehicle detection device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a vehicle detection device for, even when a preceding vehicle which is traveling in the other lane ahead the own-vehicle performs lane change to the lane in which the own-vehicle is traveling, determining whether or not the other vehicle is present in the own-lane.SOLUTION: The vehicle detection device specifies the position of a preceding vehicle with respect to the own-vehicle according to a distance to the preceding vehicle acquired by a radar 30, detects a pair of lane boundaries forming the lane in which the preceding vehicle whose position has been specified is traveling according to an image acquired by a front camera 20, and detects that the preceding vehicle has crossed one of the pair of lane boundaries forming the lane in which the detected preceding vehicle is traveling, from the inside to outside of the lane to detect the lane change of the preceding vehicle. When detecting the lane change of the preceding vehicle, the vehicle detection device acquires the position information of the preceding vehicle after the lane change by the radar 30, and detects that the preceding vehicle after the lane change is traveling in the lane in which the own-vehicle is traveling according to the acquired position information.

Description

  The present invention relates to a vehicle detection device that detects that a vehicle traveling ahead is present in a lane in which the host vehicle is traveling.

  Conventionally, when the host vehicle changes lanes, the lane change is detected, and the travel track before the lane change of the host vehicle is moved by the lane width in the direction of the lane change. There is a technique for determining a vehicle on a new own vehicle traveling locus as a new following vehicle as the own vehicle traveling locus (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

Japanese Patent No. 3183501

  In the technique described in Patent Document 1, when the host vehicle changes lanes, the forward vehicle on the new lane after the lane change can be determined as a new following vehicle. However, the preceding vehicle determination for a case where another vehicle traveling other than the own lane changes to the own lane is not considered. That is, there is a problem that only the lane change of the own vehicle is supported, and when the other vehicle traveling in the other lane has changed to the own lane, the other vehicle cannot be determined as the following vehicle. there were.

  The present invention has been made in view of these problems. Even when a preceding vehicle traveling in the other lane in front of the host vehicle has changed to a lane in which the host vehicle is traveling, is the other vehicle on the own lane? It is an object of the present invention to provide a vehicle detection device capable of determining the above.

  In this column, in order to facilitate understanding of the invention, the reference numerals used in the “Mode for Carrying Out the Invention” column are attached as necessary, which means that the scope of claims is limited by this reference numeral. is not.

  The vehicle detection device (1) according to claim 1, which is made to solve the problem described in the above “problem to be solved by the invention”, includes a surrounding image acquisition unit (10) and a front image acquisition unit (20). , Preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30), own lane detection means (40), lane boundary detection means (40), preceding vehicle lane change detection means (40) and same lane travel detection means (40). .

  The surrounding image acquisition means (10) acquires an image around the own vehicle (5), and the forward image acquisition means (20) is far from the image acquired by the surrounding image acquisition means (10). A front image is acquired and a preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30) acquires the position information with respect to the own vehicle (5) of the preceding vehicle (7) ahead of the own vehicle (5).

The own lane detecting means (40) detects a pair of lane boundary lines forming the lane in which the own vehicle (5) is traveling from the surrounding image of the own vehicle (5) acquired by the surrounding image acquiring means (10). To do.
The lane boundary detection means (40) specifies the position of the preceding vehicle (7) relative to the host vehicle (5) based on the position information of the preceding vehicle (7) acquired by the preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30), A pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane in which the preceding vehicle (7) whose position is specified is traveling is detected from the image acquired by the front image acquisition means (20).

  The preceding vehicle lane change detection means (40) is a pair of lane boundary lines that form a lane in which the preceding vehicle (7) is traveling, in which the preceding vehicle (7) is detected by the lane boundary detection means (40). Is detected to cross the vehicle from the inside to the outside of the lane, thereby detecting the lane change of the preceding vehicle (7).

  The same lane travel detection means (40) detects the preceding vehicle after the lane change by the preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30) when the preceding vehicle lane change detection means (40) detects the lane change of the preceding vehicle (7). The position information of (7) is acquired, and the preceding vehicle (7) after changing the lane travels in the lane in which the own vehicle (5) is detected by the own lane detection means (40) from the acquired position information. Detect that you are doing.

  Such a vehicle detection device (1) allows the other vehicle even when the preceding vehicle (7) traveling in the other lane ahead of the host vehicle changes the lane to the lane in which the host vehicle (5) is traveling. Can be determined whether the vehicle is on its own lane. The reason will be described below.

  Based on the position information of the preceding vehicle (7) acquired by the preceding vehicle position information acquiring means (30) by the lane boundary detection means (40), the position of the preceding vehicle (7) relative to the host vehicle (5) is specified, A pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane in which the preceding vehicle (7) whose position is specified is traveling is detected from the image acquired by the front image acquisition means (20).

  Then, the preceding vehicle lane change detecting means (40) detects the preceding vehicle (7) by the lane boundary detecting means (40) and forms a lane in which the preceding vehicle (7) is traveling. A lane change of the preceding vehicle (7) is detected by detecting crossing the boundary line from the inside to the outside of the lane.

In this way, first, it can be detected that the preceding vehicle (7) has changed lanes.
Furthermore, when it is detected that the preceding vehicle (7) has changed lanes, when the preceding vehicle lane change detecting means (40) detects a lane change of the preceding vehicle (7) by the same lane travel detecting means (40). The preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30) acquires the position information of the preceding vehicle (7) after the lane change, and from the acquired position information, the preceding vehicle (7) after the lane change is detected by the own lane detection means (40 It is detected that the vehicle (5) detected in (1) is traveling in the traveling lane.

  In this way, even if the preceding vehicle (7) traveling in the other lane in front of the host vehicle has changed to the lane in which the host vehicle (5) is traveling, is the other vehicle on the own lane? Can be determined.

  By the way, although various things can be considered as a preceding position information acquisition means (30), as the position information of the preceding vehicle (7) with respect to the own vehicle (5) as described in claim 2, the own vehicle ( 5) to obtain the relative distance and azimuth from the preceding vehicle (7), and the lane boundary detection means (40) from the own vehicle (5) obtained by the preceding vehicle position information obtaining means (30). The position of the preceding vehicle (7) relative to the host vehicle (5) may be specified from the distance and azimuth to the preceding vehicle (7).

In this way, for example, the preceding position information acquisition unit (30) can be easily configured using a radar that can acquire the relative distance and the azimuth at the same time.
Further, as described in claim 3, the preceding vehicle position information acquisition means (30) is acquired by the first GPS onboard device (52) and the first GPS onboard device (52) that acquire the position of the preceding vehicle (7). A preceding vehicle mounting device (50) mounted on the preceding vehicle (7) is provided, which has transmission means (54) for transmitting the position of the preceding vehicle (7) to the host vehicle (5).

  Furthermore, the receiving means (64) for receiving the position of the preceding vehicle (7) transmitted by the transmitting means (54), the second GPS on-vehicle device (62) for acquiring the position of the host vehicle (5), and the second GPS on-vehicle device ( 62) The preceding vehicle position for calculating the position information of the preceding vehicle (7) relative to the own vehicle (5) from the position of the own vehicle (5) acquired in 62) and the position of the preceding vehicle (7) received by the receiving means (64). It is good to provide the own vehicle mounting apparatus (60) mounted in the own vehicle (5) which has a calculation means (66).

  If it does in this way, what is called a vehicle between the own vehicle (5) provided with the GPS onboard equipment (52, 62) and the preceding vehicle (7) through the transmission means (54) and the reception means (64). By performing inter-vehicle communication, position information of the preceding vehicle (7) can be acquired in the host vehicle (5).

  Accordingly, it is possible to acquire position information of the preceding vehicle (7) ahead of the host vehicle (5) with respect to the host vehicle (5).

It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the outline of a vehicle detection apparatus. It is a flowchart which shows the flow of control processing. It is a figure which shows the content of a control process typically. It is an example of the actual image obtained by control processing. It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the outline of a vehicle detection apparatus.

Embodiments to which the present invention is applied will be described below with reference to the drawings. The embodiment of the present invention is not limited to the following embodiment, and can take various forms as long as they belong to the technical scope of the present invention.
[First Embodiment]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of a vehicle detection apparatus 1 to which the present invention is applied. The vehicle detection device 1 includes a peripheral camera 10, a front camera 20, a radar 30, and a control processing unit 40.

  The peripheral camera 10 acquires an image around the preceding vehicle 7 (see FIG. 3), and the front camera 20 acquires an image ahead of the host vehicle 5 (see FIG. 3) farther than the image acquired by the peripheral camera 10. .

  The radar 30 is a pulse radar, an FMCW radar, or the like, and acquires position information of the preceding vehicle 7 in front of the own vehicle 5 with respect to the own vehicle 5. The position information of the preceding vehicle 7 with respect to the own vehicle 5 is acquired. The relative distance and azimuth angle from the host vehicle 5 to the preceding vehicle 7 are acquired.

The control processing unit 40 includes a CPU, a ROM, a RAM, an I / O, an image processing FPGA, and the like (not shown), and executes the control processes shown in the following (A) to (D) by a program stored in the ROM.
(A) A pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane in which the host vehicle 5 is traveling are detected from the surrounding image of the host vehicle 5 acquired by the surrounding camera 10 (own lane detection process).
(A) The position of the preceding vehicle 7 relative to the own vehicle 5 is identified from the radar information (distance and azimuth angle from the own vehicle 5 to the preceding vehicle 7) acquired by the radar 30, and the preceding vehicle 7 whose position has been identified travels. A pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane is detected from an image acquired by the front camera 20 (lane boundary line detection processing).
(C) The preceding vehicle 7 moves one lane boundary line from the inner side of the lane to the outer side among the pair of lane boundary lines that form the lane in which the preceding vehicle 7 detected by the control processing unit 40 is traveling. A lane change of the preceding vehicle 7 is detected by detecting crossing (preceding vehicle lane change detection process).
(D) When the lane change of the preceding vehicle 7 is detected by the preceding vehicle lane change detection means, the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 after the lane change is acquired by the radar 30, and the preceding information after the lane change is obtained from the acquired position information. It is detected that the vehicle 7 is traveling in the lane in which the host vehicle 5 is detected by the control processing unit 40.
(Control processing)
Next, control processing executed by the control processing unit 40 will be described based on FIGS. 2, 3, and 4. FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the flow of the control process, and FIG. 3 is a diagram schematically showing the contents of the control process. FIG. 4 is an example of an actual image obtained by the control process.

In the control process, first, radar information is acquired from the radar 30 in S100. The radar information acquired from the radar 30 is the distance and azimuth from the own vehicle 5 to the preceding vehicle 7.
In subsequent S105, it is determined whether or not the preceding vehicle 7 has been detected in S100, that is, whether or not the distance and azimuth to the preceding vehicle 7 have been acquired. If it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 has been detected (S105: Yes), the process proceeds to S110. If it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 has not been detected (S105: No), the process returns to S100, and control processing is performed. repeat.

In S110, an image around the host vehicle 5 is acquired from the peripheral camera 10, and in the subsequent S115, a front image of the host vehicle 5 is acquired from the front camera 20.
In subsequent S120, a lane boundary line of the lane in which the host vehicle 5 is traveling (hereinafter referred to as the own lane boundary line) is detected by image processing from the peripheral image acquired in S110.

  Specifically, a pair of line segments is extracted from the surrounding image by binarization processing, Hough transform, and color identification that identifies the white color of the lane, and the extracted pair of line segments is the vehicle in the surrounding image. If it extends forward from both the left and right sides of 5, it is defined as the own lane boundary line. The own lane boundary line extracted in this way is indicated by A1 and A2 in FIG.

  In continuing S125, the image around the preceding vehicle 7 is cut out from the front image acquired from the front camera 20 in S115. Specifically, from the distance and direction to the preceding vehicle 7 acquired in S100, the angle in the horizontal direction of the preceding vehicle 7 with respect to the central axis of the host vehicle 5 and the distance to the preceding vehicle 7 are acquired. Then, with respect to the scale of the front image, it is calculated which length and angle the acquired angle and distance are in the front image, and a predetermined area corresponding to the corresponding length and angle is cut out from the front image.

  In subsequent S130, the preceding vehicle 7 is detected from the image cut out in S125 by image processing such as binarization processing, Hough transform, color identification, or pattern matching with the vehicle shape. The detected preceding vehicle 7 is stored as an image in the RAM. The preceding vehicle 7 detected in this way is shown in FIG. 4A and FIG. 4B, which is an enlarged view thereof.

  In subsequent S135, the lane boundary line in which the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling is detected. Specifically, a pair of line segments is extracted from the image cut out in S125 by image processing such as binarization processing, Hough transform, and color identification, and the extracted pair of line segments is detected in S130 in the image. When the vehicle extends in the traveling direction of the preceding vehicle 7, it is set as the preceding vehicle lane boundary line. Further, the detected preceding vehicle lane boundary line is stored as an image in the RAM. The preceding vehicle lane boundary lines extracted in this way are indicated by B1 and B2 in FIG.

  In subsequent S140, it is determined whether or not the preceding vehicle 7 is changing lanes. That is, the preceding vehicle 7 detected in S130 moves from the inside of the lane to the outside in the image of the preceding vehicle lane boundary detected in S135, crosses the preceding vehicle lane boundary, and the host vehicle 5 travels. The image of the preceding vehicle 7 (stored in the RAM) in several loops before the control processing loop, whether or not it is moving in the left-right direction across the own lane boundary line of the lane that is running Judge by comparison.

  If it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 is changing the lane (S140: Yes), the process proceeds to S145. If it is determined that the lane is not being changed (S140: No), the process is returned to S100, and the control process is performed. repeat.

  In S150, it is determined whether or not the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling on the own lane. That is, the distance and azimuth of the preceding vehicle 7 are acquired from the radar 30, and it is determined whether or not the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling inside the pair of host vehicle lane boundaries detected in S120. That is, it is determined whether or not the position of the preceding vehicle 7 is within a region sandwiched between the pair of vehicle lane boundary lines.

  In this way, FIG. 3B shows a case where the preceding vehicle 7 is determined to be in a region sandwiched by the own vehicle lane boundary line, and an example of the image of the own vehicle 7 is shown in FIG. FIG. 4D is an enlarged view.

  When it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling within the own vehicle lane boundary line (S150: Yes), the processing is shifted to S155, and when it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 is not traveling within the own vehicle lane boundary line ( S150: No), the process is returned to S100, and the control process is repeated.

In S155, the preceding vehicle 7 determined to be traveling in the own vehicle lane boundary line in S150 is regarded as the preceding vehicle 7 traveling in the own vehicle lane boundary line as an identification symbol (for example, “destination 1”, The data is stored in the RAM together with “Destination 2”,.
(Characteristics of the vehicle detection device 1)
Based on the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 acquired in the preceding vehicle position information acquisition process by the lane boundary detection processing, the position of the preceding vehicle 7 relative to the host vehicle 5 is specified, and the preceding vehicle 7 specifying the position is traveling. A pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane is detected from an image acquired by the front camera 20.

  Then, by the preceding vehicle lane change detection process, the pair of lane boundary lines forming the lane in which the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling, detected by the preceding vehicle 7 by the lane boundary detection process, are moved from the inside to the outside of the lane. A lane change of the preceding vehicle 7 is detected by detecting crossing toward the vehicle.

In this way, first, it can be detected that the preceding vehicle 7 has changed lanes.
Further, when it is detected that the preceding vehicle 7 has changed lanes, the lane change of the preceding vehicle 7 is detected in the preceding vehicle lane change detection process by the same lane traveling detection process. The position information of the preceding vehicle 7 after the change is acquired, and the preceding vehicle 7 after the lane change is traveling in the lane in which the host vehicle 5 detected by the own lane detection process is acquired from the acquired position information. Is detected.

  By such processing, even when the preceding vehicle 7 traveling in the other lane in front of the host vehicle changes the lane to the lane in which the host vehicle 5 is traveling, it is determined whether the other vehicle is on the own lane. Can do it.

Further, as the preceding position information acquisition process, the relative distance and azimuth angle from the own vehicle 5 to the preceding vehicle 7 are acquired by the radar 30 as the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 with respect to the own vehicle 5, and the lane boundary detection process Thus, since the position of the preceding vehicle 7 relative to the own vehicle 5 is specified from the distance and azimuth angle from the own vehicle 5 to the preceding vehicle 7 obtained by the preceding vehicle position information obtaining process, the vehicle detection device 1 can be easily used. Can be configured.
[Second Embodiment]
Next, the vehicle detection device 2 in which the radar 30 is replaced with so-called inter-vehicle communication in the vehicle detection device 1 of the first embodiment will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 5 is a block diagram illustrating a schematic configuration of the vehicle detection device 2.

  The vehicle detection device 2 according to the second embodiment includes a radar 30 of the vehicle detection device 1 according to the first embodiment, and a vehicle-mounted device 50 and a vehicle-mounted device that performs vehicle-to-vehicle communication between the vehicle 7 and the vehicle 5. Since the other components and the contents of the control processing are the same as those of the vehicle detection device 1 in the first embodiment, the same reference numerals are used for the steps of the same components and the same processing details. A description thereof will be omitted.

As shown in FIG. 5, the vehicle detection device 2 includes a preceding vehicle mounting device 50 and a host vehicle mounting device 60 as means for acquiring position information of the preceding vehicle 7.
The preceding vehicle mounting device 50 is mounted on the preceding vehicle 7 (see FIG. 3), and the first GPS onboard device 52 that acquires the position of the preceding vehicle 7 and the position of the preceding vehicle 7 acquired by the first GPS onboard device 52 are obtained. The transmitter 54 which transmits with respect to the own vehicle 5 is provided.

  The own vehicle mounting device 60 is mounted on the own vehicle 5 (see FIG. 3), and receives the position of the preceding vehicle 7 transmitted from the transmitter 54 of the preceding vehicle mounting device 50. Predecessor for calculating position information of the preceding vehicle 7 relative to the own vehicle 5 from the second GPS on-board device 62 for acquiring the position and the position of the own vehicle acquired by the second GPS on-vehicle device 62 and the position of the preceding vehicle 7 received by the receiver 64. A vehicle position calculation unit 66 is provided.

  3, instead of acquiring the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 from the radar 30, the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 is acquired from the preceding vehicle position calculating unit 66. .

  In S105, whether or not the preceding vehicle 7 has been detected is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 has been detected when the distance to the preceding vehicle 7 acquired in S100 is equal to or less than a predetermined distance. When it is larger, it is determined that the preceding vehicle 7 could not be detected.

  In such a vehicle detection device 2, so-called vehicle-to-vehicle communication is performed between the own vehicle 5 including the GPS onboard devices 52 and 62 and the preceding vehicle 7 via the transmitter 54 and the receiver 64. In the own vehicle 5, the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 can be acquired.

That is, as with the radar 30, the position information of the preceding vehicle 7 in front of the host vehicle 5 with respect to the host vehicle 5 can be acquired.
[Other Embodiments]
As mentioned above, although embodiment of this invention was described, this invention is not limited to this embodiment, A various aspect can be taken.

  For example, the images are acquired by two cameras, the peripheral camera 10 and the front camera 20, but the images may be acquired by one camera. That is, it is possible to acquire an image of a region including a lane boundary line ahead of the traveling direction of the lane in which the host vehicle 5 is traveling, and an image of a front region farther than that region (a region where the preceding vehicle 7 is traveling). You may make it acquire an image with one camera which has an angle of view and resolution.

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1, 2 ... Vehicle detection apparatus, 5 ... Own vehicle, 7 ... Prior vehicle, 10 ... Peripheral camera, 20 ... Front camera, 30 ... Radar, 40 ... Control processing part, 50 ... Prior vehicle mounting apparatus, 52 ... 1st GPS vehicle mounting , 54 ... transmitter, 60 ... own vehicle mounting device, 62 ... second GPS on-board device, 64 ... receiver, 66 ... preceding vehicle position calculation unit.

Claims (3)

Surrounding image acquisition means for acquiring an image around the own vehicle;
Forward image acquisition means for acquiring an image ahead of the host vehicle farther than the image acquired by the peripheral image acquisition means;
Preceding vehicle position information acquisition means for acquiring position information of the preceding vehicle ahead of the own vehicle with respect to the own vehicle;
An own lane detection means for detecting a pair of lane boundary lines forming a lane in which the own vehicle is traveling, from a peripheral image of the own vehicle acquired by the peripheral image acquisition means;
Based on the position information of the preceding vehicle acquired by the preceding vehicle position information acquiring means, the position of the preceding vehicle with respect to the host vehicle is specified, and a pair forming the lane in which the preceding vehicle specifying the position is traveling Lane boundary line detecting means for detecting the lane boundary line from the image acquired by the front image acquiring means,
One of the pair of lane boundary lines forming the lane in which the preceding vehicle is traveling, which is detected by the lane boundary line detection means, is directed from the inside to the outside of the lane. Preceding vehicle lane change detecting means for detecting a lane change of the preceding vehicle by detecting crossing the vehicle,
When the preceding vehicle lane change detecting means detects a lane change of the preceding vehicle, the preceding vehicle position information acquiring means acquires the position information of the preceding vehicle after the lane change, and from the acquired position information, The same lane travel detection means for detecting that the preceding vehicle after the lane change is traveling in the lane in which the host vehicle is detected detected by the own lane detection means;
A vehicle detection apparatus comprising: The vehicle detection device according to claim 1,
The preceding vehicle position information acquisition means
As the positional information of the preceding vehicle with respect to the own vehicle, a relative distance and an azimuth angle from the own vehicle to the preceding vehicle are acquired,
The lane boundary detection means is
A vehicle detection device that identifies a position of the preceding vehicle relative to the own vehicle from a distance and an azimuth angle from the own vehicle to the preceding vehicle acquired by the preceding vehicle position information acquisition unit. The vehicle detection device according to claim 1,
The preceding vehicle position information acquisition means
1st GPS onboard equipment which acquires the position of the preceding vehicle, and a preceding vehicle mounted on the preceding vehicle, which has transmission means for transmitting the position of the preceding vehicle acquired by the first GPS onboard equipment to the own vehicle. Equipment,
Receiving means for receiving the position of the preceding vehicle transmitted by the transmitting means, a second GPS onboard device for acquiring the position of the own vehicle, and a position of the own vehicle acquired by the second GPS onboard device and receiving by the receiving means. A host vehicle mounting device mounted on the host vehicle, having a leading vehicle position calculation means for calculating position information of the preceding vehicle relative to the host vehicle from the position of the preceding vehicle;
A vehicle detection device comprising: