A License Plate Recognition and Speed Detection System - Index of

Our video camera served two functions. One, it had to capture high quality images of
passing license plates for the recognition software to extract and recognize license plate
characters, and two, it was used as a trigger to detect the presence of a license plate in an image.
We had to make sure the camera was capable of performing both functions. We also needed to
know how to setup the camera to perform both functions. To answer these questions we would
have to solve for the three distances shown in green in figure 26.
Fig. 26 Three distances to calculate for camera setup
Distance 1, the “Camera to Vehicle Distance” would tell us where to focus the camera on
the street lane. This distance was found to be 40.88 feet. Distance 2, the “Maximum Vehicle
Travel Distance” is the maximum distance a vehicle could travel within our camera’s field of
view. This distance was found to be 6.69 feet. From this distance we deduced that once a
vehicle’s speed reached over 136.84 mph, it may be possible for the vehicle to pass the camera
undetected. Distance 3, the “Camera Field of View Distance”, is the amount of distance covered
by the camera’s field of view. This distance was found to be 51.42 inches. From the “Camera
Field of View Distance” we deduced that a vehicle could veer up to 19.71” inches from the
center of its lane and still be sensed by the camera. From these calculations we predicted that our
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