Time-Lapse Video Capture With Optimal Image Stabilization

摘要

Traditionally, time-lapse videos are constructed from images captured at time intervals called “temporal points of interests” or “temporal POIs.” Disclosed herein are systems and methods of constructing improved, motion-stabilized time-lapse videos using temporal points of interest and image similarity comparisons. According to some embodiments, a “burst” of images may be captured, centered around the aforementioned temporal points of interest. Then, each burst sequence of images may be analyzed, e.g., by performing an image similarity comparison between each image in the burst sequence and the image selected at the previous temporal point of interest. Selecting the image from a given burst that is most similar to the previous selected image, while minimizing the amount of motion with the previous selected image, allows the system to improve the quality of the resultant time-lapse video by discarding “outlier” or other undesirable images captured in the burst sequence and motion stabilizing the selected image.

主权项

1. A non-transitory program storage device, readable by a programmable control device and comprising instructions stored thereon to cause one or more processing units to:
acquire a first digital image from an image sensor at a first time; acquire a plurality of second digital images from the image sensor, wherein acquisition times of the plurality of second digital images are temporally centered around a determined second time; determine a similarity value for each of the plurality of second digital images, wherein the similarity values comprise an assessment of the similarity of a respective image from the second plurality of digital images and the first digital image; discard, from the plurality of second digital images, those images having a similarity value below a threshold value; select, from among the non-discarded images of the plurality of second images, a second digital image that minimizes a motion difference with the first digital image; and combine the first digital image and the selected second digital image into a time lapse video.