Question

What are the parameters/factors that a QR detector need to detect/check before(during) decoding the QR code itself.
From what I know:
1. it need to find/locate three finder patterns
2. need to locate alignment patterns (if there is any)
3. need to check luminance
Is there anything else that need to be determined/checked?

Answer 1

I suppose that there are many ways to detect a QR code, and it’s not required to do it one particular way or the other as long as the detection succeeds. There is a reference algorithms in the QR code specification, though in my opinion it is too slow to be practical, though it’s quite thorough.

I can tell you how zxing does it. Yes, it first locates the three finder patterns. This is done by looking for 1:1:3:1:1 black/white/black/white/black crossings horizontally and vertically. It figures out which one is which by looking at the vectors between them.

Then it needs a fourth point since four points are needed to correct for perspective distortion. It uses the location of the 3 finder patterns to guess about where it is and scans for it similarly (looking for 1:1:1:1:1). You don’t need to find all alignment patterns, though doing so would allow you to correct for warping in the QR code, which is very rare.

Then you can sample the image to get the black/white modules by computing the perspective transform and reversing it. Then the decoding proceeds, the processing of those black/white modules, which is a fair bit of work too but nothing to do with detection or image processing anymore.

Looking at luminance is really a step before all this, so you even have a notion of black and white in the image to begin with. That’s different.