Applications of Image Recognition for Real-Time Water Level and Surface Velocity

In this paper, we present two types of the real-time water monitoring system using the image processing technology, the water level recognition and the surface velocity recognition. According to the bridge failure investigation, floods in the river often pose potential risk to bridges, and scouring could undermine the pier foundation and cause the structures to collapse. It is very important to develop monitoring techniques for bridge safety in the field. In this study, we installed two high-resolution cameras on the in-situ bridge site to get the real-time water level and surface velocity image. For the water level recognition, we use the image processing techniques of the image binarization, character recognition, and water line detection. For the surface velocity recognition, the proposed system apply the PIV(Particle Image Velocimetry, PIV) method to obtain the recognition of the water surface velocity by the cross correlation analysis. Finally, the proposed systems are used to record and measure the variations of the water level and surface velocity for a period of three days. The good results show that the proposed systems have potential to provide real-time information of water level and surface velocity during flood periods.