Ryad B. Benosman, Professor at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Carnegie Mellon University and Sorbonne Universitas, presents the “What is Neuromorphic Event-based Computer Vision? Sensors, Theory and Applications” tutorial at the May 2018 Embedded Vision Summit.
In this presentation, Benosman introduces neuromorphic, event-based approaches for image sensing and processing. State-of-the-art image sensors suffer from severe limitations imposed by their very principle of operation. These sensors acquire the visual information as a series of “snapshots” recorded at discrete point in time, hence time-quantized at a predetermined frame rate, resulting in limited temporal resolution, low dynamic range and a high degree of redundancy in the acquired data. Nature suggests a different approach: Biological vision systems are driven and controlled by events happening within the scene in view, and not – like conventional image sensors – by artificially created timing and control signals that have no relation to the source of the visual information.
Translating the frameless paradigm of biological vision to artificial imaging systems implies that control over the acquisition of visual information is no longer imposed externally on an array of pixels but rather the decision making is transferred to each individual pixel, which handles its own information individually. Benosman introduces the fundamentals underlying such bio-inspired, event-based image sensing and processing approaches, and explores their strengths and weaknesses. He shows that bio-inspired vision systems have the potential to outperform conventional, frame-based vision acquisition and processing systems and to establish new benchmarks in terms of data compression, dynamic range, temporal resolution and power efficiency in applications such as 3D vision, object tracking, motor control and visual feedback loops, in real-time.
