E-CHUM: Event-based Cameras for Human Detection and Urban Monitoring

TL;DR

This paper reviews how event-based cameras can enhance urban monitoring by capturing dynamic city activities with privacy-preserving advantages, especially when combined with other sensors.

Contribution

It introduces the potential of event-based cameras for urban dynamics, analyzing their benefits, challenges, and integration with other sensors for improved city monitoring.

Findings

Event-based cameras excel in low-light urban conditions.

Multi-sensor fusion enhances urban monitoring capabilities.

Event-based cameras offer privacy advantages over traditional methods.

Abstract

Understanding human movement and city dynamics has always been challenging. From traditional methods of manually observing the city's inhabitant, to using cameras, to now using sensors and more complex technology, the field of urban monitoring has evolved greatly. Still, there are more that can be done to unlock better practices for understanding city dynamics. This paper surveys how the landscape of urban dynamics studying has evolved with a particular focus on event-based cameras. Event-based cameras capture changes in light intensity instead of the RGB values that traditional cameras do. They offer unique abilities, like the ability to work in low-light, that can make them advantageous compared to other sensors. Through an analysis of event-based cameras, their applications, their advantages and challenges, and machine learning applications, we propose event-based cameras as a medium for capturing information to study urban dynamics. They offer the ability to capture important information while maintaining privacy. We also suggest multi-sensor fusion of event-based cameras and other sensors in the study of urban dynamics. Combining event-based cameras and infrared, event-LiDAR, or vibration has to potential to enhance the ability of event-based cameras and overcome the challenges that event-based cameras have.