CBIR vs. foods

This program (hw2) of content-based image retrieval reminds me a paper I read before:

IBM VeggieVision: a high-tech version of the bar code scanner that will recognize fruits and vegetables and automatically enter the price into the checkout system. With the system shown in figure 15, user can put things on it, and the system will also match the item with database images according to color and texture as well.

I’m thinking about applying this to our research project “Smart kitchen.” Currently, when there is a new ingredient entering our system, we require user to tell us the name of it, e.g. bacon, meet, etc. However, this may be a tedious job for the cook, esp. when the dinner preparation is complex – lots of ingredients to prepare. Thus, if we can also match the foods with the database images, it is possible to output a list for users to choose from, or simply identify it or ask user. Moreover, since the food items in the kitchen should be limited, perhaps it’s easier, and the system can also do some learning to increase the accuracy when the users cook much and much more.

I will keep surveying and thinking if it’s worth applying