Image Processing Approach to Detect Road Signs in Indian Roads

ABSTARCT: Most of the Indian rural and suburban roads are not ideal for driving due to improper and invisible road signs. This has led to many accidents causing loss of lives and severe damage to vehicles. Many techniques have been proposed in the past to detect these problems using image processing methods. But there has been little work specifically carried out for detecting the issue of road sign detection in Indian roads. To address this acute problem, the study is undertaken with the objectives like, to make a survey of Indian roads, to suggest the method to detect road signs and their classification and to suggest automated driver guidance system. In this regard, Color Segmentation and Shape Modeling with Thin Spline Transformation (TPS) is used with nearest neighbor classifier for road sign detection and Classification. Therefore, the attempt is made to invent an automated driver guidance mechanism to make the driving safe and easier in Indian roads. The experimental results obtained are tested with real time image database collected across different roads in sub-urban areas in India and found satisfactory.