Apparatus and method to facilitate identification of items
A control circuit accesses a digitized image of a particular item and then processes that digitized image to thereby assign various aspects of the digitized image to various dimensions in N-dimensional Euclidean space to thereby provide an N-dimensional representation. The control circuit then accesses a database containing a plurality of various clustered groups of N-dimensional representations. At least some of the clustered groups have a corresponding identifying label. Conducting a nearest neighbor search serves to identify a clustered group to which the particular item most likely belongs to thereby provide an identified cluster group. When the identified cluster group does not have a corresponding identifying label, the control circuit can then further determine whether a predetermined condition has also been met. When true, the control circuit alerts a user via a user interface that the identified cluster group should be assigned an identifying label.
1. A method comprising:
by a control circuit:
accessing a digitized image of a particular item, wherein the particular item is an item being offered for sale at retail;
processing the digitized image to thereby assign various aspects of the digitized image to various dimensions in N-dimensional Euclidian space to thereby provide an N-dimensional representation (where N comprises an integer);
accessing a database containing a plurality of clustered groups of other N-dimensional representations, wherein at least some of the clustered groups have a corresponding identifying label, and conducting a nearest neighbor search to identify a clustered group to which the particular item most likely belongs to thereby provide an identified clustered group;
when the identified clustered group does not have a corresponding identifying label, determining whether the identified clustered group that does not have a corresponding identifying label has at least a predetermined number of members, wherein the predetermined number of members is an integer greater than one;
when the identified clustered group that does not have a corresponding identifying label does have at least the predetermined number of members, alerting a user via a user interface that the identified clustered group should be assigned an identifying label.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein Nis an even number.
3. The method of claim 2 wherein N equals 512.
4. The method of claim 1 wherein the corresponding identifying label for any given one of the plurality of clustered groups identifies any item that corresponds to that clustered group.
5. An apparatus comprising:
a memory having stored therein a database containing a plurality of clustered groups of N-dimensional image representations, wherein at least some of the clustered groups have a corresponding identifying label;
a user interface;
a control circuit operably coupled to the memory and the user interface and configured to:
access a digitized image of a particular item, wherein the particular item is an item being offered for sale at retail;
process the digitized image to thereby assign various aspects of the digitized image to various dimensions in N-dimensional Euclidian space to thereby provide an N-dimensional image representation (where N comprises an integer);
access the database and conduct a nearest neighbor search to identify a clustered group to which the particular item most likely belongs to thereby provide an identified clustered group;
when the identified clustered group does not have a corresponding identifying label, determine whether the identified clustered group that does not have a corresponding identifying label has at least a predetermined number of members, wherein the predetermined number of members is an integer greater than one;
when the identified clustered group that does not have a corresponding identifying label does have at least the predetermined number of members, alert a user via a user interface that the identified clustered group should be assigned an identifying label.
6. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein N is an even number.
7. The apparatus of claim 6 wherein N equals 512.
8. The apparatus of claim 5 wherein the corresponding identifying label for any given one of the plurality of clustered groups identifies any item that corresponds to that clustered group.