International Journal of Information Technology and Knowledge Management July-December 2008, Volume 1, No. 2, pp. 311-325 LICENSE PLATE RECOGNITION SYSTEM FOR INDIAN VEHICLES SHISHIR KUMAR, SHASHANK AGARWAL & KUMAR SAURABH ABSTRACT This work deals with problematic from field of image processing and machine vision in construction of a license plate recognition system for Indian vehicles (LPRSIV). This problematic includes mathematical principles and algorithms, which ensure a process of number plate normalization, processes of proper characters segmentation, normalization and recognition. Work comparatively deals with methods achieving invariance of systems towards image skew using homography and various plate conditions. Work also contains few snapshots as example which will help in understanding the system and its functions. Keywords: Projection, Skew Correction, Homograph, Stroke, Gamma Correction, Correlation 1. INTRODUCTION Massive integration of information technologies into all aspects of modern life in India caused demand for processing vehicles as conceptual resources in information systems. In India we have various kinds of number plates. Old number plate vehicles following 1939 series as well as the vehicles following the latest number plate format are seen on Indian lanes. The number plates following the new format can be of lengths 8, 9 or 10. As the number of vehicles entering the Indian lanes are increasing each day, so an automated number plate recognition system is becoming a necessity for tracking these vehicles. Number plate recognition systems can today be used in various traffic and security applications, such as parking, access and border control, or tracking of stolen cars. Automatic number plate recognition systems can be used in access control. A sample of the Indian License Plate is given in the figure below. Digits should be engrossed rather than painted. Font must be Arial Black Hologram Actual Registration number, first and second character can be alphabet in accordance with the length of the number plate, rest all have to be digits Written- IND State information-always alphabets with length 2 District Information " " " # ! Figure 1: A Sample of Indian Number Plate $