Optical coin discrimination systems and methods for use with consumer-operated kiosks and the like

摘要

Systems and associated methods for optical coin discrimination are disclosed herein. In one embodiment, a method for discriminating coins includes obtaining a digital image of a coin, identifying the outline of the coin using a suitable algorithm, and determining the diameter of the coin using the outline of the coin. The method of this embodiment further includes generating a rectangular image of the coin using, for example, a log-polar transform, generating a series of, for example, Fourier transforms from the rectangular image, and identifying spectral peak locations and intensities in the Fourier transform results. The diameter of the coin, spectral peak location, spectral peak intensity of the coin and/or other aspects of the coin can then be compared to known values for different coins to discriminate the coin.

主权项

1. A method for identifying coins, the method comprising:
obtaining an image of a coin; generating a rectangular image from the image of the coin: based on the rectangular image of the coin, generating a 2D image of spectral features of the coin using a 2D spectral transform; identifying an intensity of one of the spectral features; and comparing the intensity of one of the spectral features to at least one known coin property.