Question

I am trying to use the people detection function in OpenCV:

cv::HOGDescriptor hog;
hog.setSVMDetector(cv::HOGDescriptor::getDefaultPeopleDetector());
std::vector<cv::Rect> found;
hog.detectMultiScale(noMask, found, 0.2, cv::Size(8,8), cv::Size(16,16), 1.05, 2);

But I get the following assertion:

OpenCV Error: Assertion failed (img.type() == CV_8U || img.type() ==
CV_8UC3) in computeGradient, file
/Users/robin/Projects/OpenCVForiPhone/opencv/opencv/modules/objdetect/src/hog.cpp,
line 174

And it makes sense because I am passing a CV_8UC4 image.

So I guessed I should create a cvmat with this characteristics. Right now I have these 2 methods. which allow me to get gray or color cvmats (CV_8UC1/CV_8UC4)

For Color:

-(cv::Mat)CVMat
{

    CGColorSpaceRef colorSpace = CGImageGetColorSpace(self.CGImage);
    CGFloat cols = self.size.width;
    CGFloat rows = self.size.height;

    cv::Mat cvMat(rows, cols, CV_8UC4); // 8 bits per component, 4 channels

    CGContextRef contextRef = CGBitmapContextCreate(cvMat.data,                 // Pointer to backing data
                                                    cols,                      // Width of bitmap
                                                    rows,                     // Height of bitmap
                                                    8,                          // Bits per component
                                                    cvMat.step[0],              // Bytes per row
                                                    colorSpace,                 // Colorspace
                                                    kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast |
                                                    kCGBitmapByteOrderDefault); // Bitmap info flags

    CGContextDrawImage(contextRef, CGRectMake(0, 0, cols, rows), self.CGImage);
    CGContextRelease(contextRef);

    return cvMat;
}

For Grayscale:

-(cv::Mat)CVGrayscaleMat
{
    CGColorSpaceRef colorSpace = CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceGray();
    CGFloat cols = self.size.width;
    CGFloat rows = self.size.height;

    cv::Mat cvMat = cv::Mat(rows, cols, CV_8UC1); // 8 bits per component, 1 channel

    CGContextRef contextRef = CGBitmapContextCreate(cvMat.data,                 // Pointer to backing data
                                                    cols,                      // Width of bitmap
                                                    rows,                     // Height of bitmap
                                                    8,                          // Bits per component
                                                    cvMat.step[0],              // Bytes per row
                                                    colorSpace,                 // Colorspace
                                                    kCGImageAlphaNone |
                                                    kCGBitmapByteOrderDefault); // Bitmap info flags

    CGContextDrawImage(contextRef, CGRectMake(0, 0, cols, rows), self.CGImage);
    CGContextRelease(contextRef);
    CGColorSpaceRelease(colorSpace);

    return cvMat;
}

And this is my guess to make it 3 channels:

-(cv::Mat)CVMat3Channels
{

    //CGColorSpaceRef colorSpace = CGImageGetColorSpace(self.CGImage);
    CGColorSpaceRef colorSpace = CGColorSpaceCreateDeviceRGB();
    CGFloat cols = self.size.width;
    CGFloat rows = self.size.height;

    cv::Mat cvMat(rows, cols, CV_8UC3); // 8 bits per component, 3 channels

    CGContextRef contextRef = CGBitmapContextCreate(cvMat.data,                // Pointer to backing data
                                                    cols,                      // Width of bitmap
                                                    rows,                     // Height of bitmap
                                                    8,                          // Bits per component
                                                    cvMat.step[0],              // Bytes per row
                                                    colorSpace,                 // Colorspace
                                                    kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast |
                                                    kCGBitmapByteOrderDefault); // Bitmap info flags

    CGContextDrawImage(contextRef, CGRectMake(0, 0, cols, rows), self.CGImage);
    CGContextRelease(contextRef);
    CGColorSpaceRelease(colorSpace);

    return cvMat;
}

But I get the following error:

<Error>: CGBitmapContextCreate: invalid data bytes/row: should be 
         at least 9792 for 8 integer bits/component, 3 components, 
         kCGImageAlphaNoneSkipLast. 
<Error>: CGContextDrawImage: invalid context 0x0

So my question is, What is the correct way of creating a 8UC3 compatible CGBitmapContext?
(I assume the 8UC3 means 8 bits per pixel with RGB channels)

Thank you.

PD: The image transformation code is from Robin Summerhill.

Answer 1

You are correctly creating a 3-channel image by using CV_8UC3. Since CGBitmapContextCreate expects 9792 bytes/row, that means there should be 3264 columns (of 3-channel pixels). If I run the following code,

int cols = 3264;
int rows = 1960; // assuming a ~1.66 aspect ratio here...
Mat temp(rows, cols,  CV_8UC3);
cout << temp.step[0] << endl;

it outputs 9792 as is required by CGBitmapContextCreate. Can you tell what cvMat.step[0] is returning in your code? It looks correct, but maybe something else is going on.

Also, note OpenCV natively stores data in BGR format if you’re getting the image data from OpenCV functions like imread etc. So, if the color looks weird, pay attention to that.