SICE-ICASE International Joint Conference 2006 Oct.

18-2 1, 2006 in Bexco, Busan, Korea

Internet-Based Visual Snow-Cover Monitoring and Measuring System

Sung-Hyun Lim 1, Gook-Hwan Kim2, Soon-Geul Lee3, Sungsoo Rhim3 'Taemin Mechatronix, Seoul, Korea (Tel: +82-2-592-8888; E-mail: trevengparan.com) 2Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Korea (Tel: +82-31-201-2945; E-mail: meceng93ghanmail.net) 3Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Korea (Tel: +82-31-201-{2506, 3248}; E-mail: {sglee, ssrhim}gkhu.ac.kr)
Abstract: In this paper, an Internet-based snow-cover monitoring system is developed which analyzes visual image of drifted snow and measures the amount of snowing. The system is composed with a reference ruler, a CCD camera, and a PC with an image processing unit. The snow-depth is estimated based on the position of the lowest uncovered marker on the ruler which is extracted from the captured image. An image processing algorithm is devised to obtain proper resolution and good accuracy of the uncovered marker position in spite of the week intensity of ambient light and disturbances from the light rays of outdoors. The system also acts as monitoring server, which transfers the raw images in real-time to a remotely located client using TCP/IP. With bi-direction communication through Internet, users can adjust the orientation of the camera view. Experimental results show that this system improves reliability and accuracy of measurement of drifted snow. Keywords: snow-cover, remote measurement, image processing 1. INTRODUCTION

casualties and financial losses. The magnitude of the damage caused by the snow has been increased partially due to the lack of prompt warnings for sudden snowfalls and heavy-snow's. Although the abnormal sudden change of weather makes it difficult to make the meteorological forecast promptly and accurately, prompt warnings would allow us to manage effectively the distribution and the operation of limited amount of snow-removing equipments such as snowplows. Snow piled on the ground impacts us in many direct and indirect ways. In order to prevent the meteorological disasters and enhance the positive exploitation of water resources, it became one of the most important meteorological observation agenda to predict the snowfall and measure the property of snow-cover as accurate as possible. Conventionally the depth of the snow-cover is measured down to the resolution of one tenth of centimeter. Generally the locations whose snow-cover conditions we want to measure are remotely located mountainous places and difficult to approach due to the piled snow. The traditional way of snow-cover measurement is to get to the target location and measure the height of snow-cover with the eye against the mark on a vertical ruler mounted on the ground. With the development of technology in sensor and measurement more accurate and convenient ways of snow-cover measurement have been introduced [1] [2]. The balance for measuring amount of precipitation (BMAP) and the depth-of-snow-cover meter (DSCM) are the examples. The BMAP measures the snow-cover

The occasional heavy snow and sudden snow in the warm southern region of Korea have caused tremendous

depth by converting the mass of the precipitation to the height of snow. This type of measuring device is prone to result in unreliable measurement due to the inclusion of foreign materials such as leaves and dirt and so forth. The DSCM uses the ultra-sonar signal to measure the distance from the ultra-sonar signal emitter to the surface of the snow cover. This type of measuring device, however, results in false measurements when alien objects obstruct the propagation of the ultra-sonar signal. To improve the performance and enhance the convenience of the measuring process the authors developed an internet-based visual snow-cover monitoring and measuring system, so-called Cliview-High, where a CCD camera installed locally captures the images of the vertical measure ruler buried under snow and a newly developed image processing algorithm analyzes the captured images to extract the information about the snow-cover. Also the remote accessibility through internet in Cliview-High enhances the promptness in preparing for the possible climatic disasters. The paper is to describe the characteristics of Clieview-High and the newly developed image processing algorithm which properly compensates the various irregular factors discussed above.
2. SYSTEM CONFIGURATION

Fig. 1 shows the configuration of Cliview-High. Cliveiw-High consists of a snow-cover measure ruler, a CCD camera attached to a main control unit on a PC. The snow-cover measure ruler is a 1.5 meter long vertical structure installed in the local instrument shelter and it has a array of even-spaced marks. The CCD

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Fig. 1. Configuration of Cliview-High.

Calibration

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Comparison between Image and Reference Measure

Obtain Distortion Compensation Factors
Generate Distortion Compensation DB X X

Noise Removal by Filtering

Apply Weighting Factors to Image

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of the CCD camera and the lights can be remotely controlled. The central control unit in VSCMS includes a web-based image transport system that transports in real-time the images taken by the CCD via network or internet. The Cliview-High system includes the lighting system which enhances the image quality in night time. In one of the older versions of Clieview High rulers with an array of evenly spaced LED emitting lights installed on the ruler have been used. Even though this approach saves us an extra lighting system for the night time but the resolution of the measuring system is completely dependent on the distance between the neighboring LED's. The conventional outdoor lighting system has been tested with a typical CCD camera. This approach, however, has caused complains from the neighbors and the infrared lighting with an infrared camera filters are used in residential areas. The measurement of the piled snow can be performed either automatically at a pre-set rate or manually by the operator located remotely. Cliview-High transfers the captured images real-time to the remotely located central control station via internet. Generally the locations whose snow-cover conditions we want to measure are remotely located mountainous places and difficult to approach due to the piled snow. The snowfall during the night time could result in more serious results than that of daytime. Using the vision and internet technologies, Cliview-High resolves problems of remote accessibility and uni-directionality. It allows us to monitor and measure snow-cover even in inclement weather.
3. VISUAL RECOGNITION ALGORITHM

Extraction of Snow-Cover

Boundary
Height

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Convert Pixel Data to Actual

Snow-Cover Measurement

Fig. 2. Flowchart of image processing in Cliview-High. camera captures the image of the uncovered ruler along with the image of the circumference of the ruler. From the captured images the image processing unit determines the depth of the snow-cover. The operation

The process of visual recognition in Clieview-High is illustrated in the flowchart shown in Fig. 2. During the extraction process, we extract the characteristic features from the pre-processed text-based data and establish a particular vector based on the image characteristics [3][4]. The most important function of the recognition process is to recognize the mark on the ruler from the captured images in spite of the two major difficulties. First difficulty is that the required resolution can not be achieved with nominal CCD cameras. Second the measurement system is located outdoor and the direct rays of the sun and dispersion of the sun light distorts the image and works as noise. To resolve these issues a customized masking and extraction algorithm is devised and put in tests. During the process of image capturing, the background image can be varying. In order to minimize the effect of the changes in the environment on the measurement, we established a mask and applied to the captured image where the measuring ruler is supposed to be. Based on the images captured with measuring ruler in, we have come up with a final mask that would help

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Fig. 3. Pictures of captured image of .measuring ruler by infrared camera and image mask for the ruler(note: images are 90 deg turned clockwise).

the measuring process by minimizing the various noises in the image. Figure 4 shows the captured image of the ruler with environment and the mask developed for the image processing. The original image shown in (a) is captured by a infrared camera.
4. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
Fig. 4. Pictures of Cliview-High graphical user interface with captured images of ruler which is installed in outdoor environment.
Table 1. Measured snow-depth (experimental results). Snow-Cover Measurement Difference | By Eyes By Cliview-High (cm) 0.1 0.1 O 0.5 0.5 0 1.3 1.4 0.1 0 2.5 2.5

The performance of Clieview-High has been tested in various actual environments. The ruler has been installed at a mountainous area in Gangwon Province where the frequent snow causes problems. Figure 3 shows the graphical user interface where the captured images of the measuring bar is captured by the CCD camera installed locally where the ruler is installed. In a certain 10 day period during winter, the depth of piled snow has been measured by Cliview-High system and the measurements are compared to the conventional eye-measurements. Table 1 shows exemplary results obtained from experiments. The snow cover measurement using Cliview-High has been doen for various snow-depth conditions and lighting conditions. The snow-depth measurement obtained by the automated Cliview-High image processing has been compared to the measurements obtained by a well trained observer in the conventional eye-measurement. Measurements are obtained for 10 different levels of snow-depths and the minimum depth tested is about 0.1 cm and the maximum is 46 cm. The difference between the measurements obtained by two different approaches is limited under 0.1 cm, which is considered to be much smaller than the acceptable error in usual snow-depth measuring

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practices. The average difference between the two approaches is calculated to be 0.06 cm. Also the real-time image transferring capability of the system has been tested and proved to be robust in terms of function quality.

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5. CONCLUSIONS A CCD-camera-based snow-depth measuring system which is called Clieview-High is developed. The system is locally installed and automatically measures the depth of snow with a newly developed image processing algorithm. For the enhanced measurement accuracy, a image mask has been developed and applied to the captured images during the measuring process. A set of experiments has performed with a Cliview-High system installed in a remote location. The measurement by Cliview-High has been compared to the measurement obtained by the conventional eye-measurement. The difference between the two approaches are limited under 0.1cm, which is considered to be much smaller than the magnitude of the error usually accepted in the current snow measuring practices.

REFERENCES
[1] Labine, C., "Automatic Monitoring of Snow Depth," Proc. of the Int. Snow Science Workshop, Banff, Canada, pp. 179. [2] Chang, A., et. al. "Estimation of snow depth from AMSR-E in the GAME/CEOP Siberia experiment region," Proc. of EEE IGARSS, pp.3670-3673, 2004. [3] Edward R. Dougherty, "Digital Image Processing Methods", Marcel Dekker, 1994. [4] S.H. Lee, J.H Kim, and GT. Park, "Visual Data Processor Effective H/W for Mask/Logic Operations", KAC, 1993.

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