Premnath Dubey, research assistant at the National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre, said the programme relied on an optical character recognition system to read a plate in terms of an ASCII code recorded on a server.

The system comes with a digital camera which captures a car's license plate when the car enters the car park. The system will scan the licence plate from left to right and then change it into text before sending the information to server where a record is kept.

"One of the most important tasks in the system is the detection of the plate. It involves locating the area in a picture actually occupied by the plate," said Premnath.

He said the system utilised a new license plate detection and segmentation technique to detect plates in a way that reduces the banding noise which causes the connections between characters that make it difficult to identify them.

The resulting image is cleaner and easier for searches.

The system can be integrated with various vehicle systems such as Intelligent Transport System to protect cars or trace them when lost. The system can compare or cross check information with police and official transport databases.

In addition, the system can also check how many cars there are in a car park and monitor the empty spaces.

It also reduces the cost of hiring staff to monitor cars at the entrance since the system can offer a fully automatic service.

jirapan@nationgroup.com

Jirapan Boonnoon

The Nation