YOLOv8-SMOT: An Efficient and Robust Framework for Real-Time Small Object Tracking via Slice-Assisted Training and Adaptive Association

Tracking small, agile multi-objects (SMOT), such as birds, from an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) perspective is a highly challenging computer vision task. The difficulty stems from three main sources: the extreme scarcity of target appearance features, the complex motion entanglement caused by the combined dynamics of the camera and the targets themselves, and the frequent occlusions and identity ambiguity arising from dense flocking behavior. This paper details our championship-winning solution in the MVA 2025 "Finding Birds" Small Multi-Object Tracking Challenge (SMOT4SB), which adopts the tracking-by-detection paradigm with targeted innovations at both the detection and association levels. On the detection side, we propose a systematic training enhancement framework named \textbf{SliceTrain}. This framework, through the synergy of 'deterministic full-coverage slicing' and 'slice-level stochastic augmentation, effectively addresses the problem of insufficient learning for small objects in high-resolution image training. On the tracking side, we designed a robust tracker that is completely independent of appearance information. By integrating a \textbf{motion direction maintenance (EMA)} mechanism and an \textbf{adaptive similarity metric} combining \textbf{bounding box expansion and distance penalty} into the OC-SORT framework, our tracker can stably handle irregular motion and maintain target identities. Our method achieves state-of-the-art performance on the SMOT4SB public test set, reaching an SO-HOTA score of \textbf{55.205}, which fully validates the effectiveness and advancement of our framework in solving complex real-world SMOT problems. The source code will be made available at https://github.com/Salvatore-Love/YOLOv8-SMOT.

Unlocking Thermal Aerial Imaging: Synthetic Enhancement of UAV Datasets

Thermal imaging from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) holds significant potential for applications in search and rescue, wildlife monitoring, and emergency response, especially under low-light or obscured conditions. However, the scarcity of large-scale, diverse thermal aerial datasets limits the advancement of deep learning models in this domain, primarily due to the high cost and logistical challenges of collecting thermal data. In this work, we introduce a novel procedural pipeline for generating synthetic thermal images from an aerial perspective. Our method integrates arbitrary object classes into existing thermal backgrounds by providing control over the position, scale, and orientation of the new objects, while aligning them with the viewpoints of the background. We enhance existing thermal datasets by introducing new object categories, specifically adding a drone class in urban environments to the HIT-UAV dataset and an animal category to the MONET dataset. In evaluating these datasets for object detection task, we showcase strong performance across both new and existing classes, validating the successful expansion into new applications. Through comparative analysis, we show that thermal detectors outperform their visible-light-trained counterparts and highlight the importance of replicating aerial viewing angles. Project page: https://github.com/larics/thermal_aerial_synthetic.

Hardware-Aware Feature Extraction Quantisation for Real-Time Visual Odometry on FPGA Platforms

Accurate position estimation is essential for modern navigation systems deployed in autonomous platforms, including ground vehicles, marine vessels, and aerial drones. In this context, Visual Simultaneous Localisation and Mapping (VSLAM) - which includes Visual Odometry - relies heavily on the reliable extraction of salient feature points from the visual input data. In this work, we propose an embedded implementation of an unsupervised architecture capable of detecting and describing feature points. It is based on a quantised SuperPoint convolutional neural network. Our objective is to minimise the computational demands of the model while preserving high detection quality, thus facilitating efficient deployment on platforms with limited resources, such as mobile or embedded systems. We implemented the solution on an FPGA System-on-Chip (SoC) platform, specifically the AMD/Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+, where we evaluated the performance of Deep Learning Processing Units (DPUs) and we also used the Brevitas library and the FINN framework to perform model quantisation and hardware-aware optimisation. This allowed us to process 640 x 480 pixel images at up to 54 fps on an FPGA platform, outperforming state-of-the-art solutions in the field. We conducted experiments on the TUM dataset to demonstrate and discuss the impact of different quantisation techniques on the accuracy and performance of the model in a visual odometry task.

UAVD-Mamba: Deformable Token Fusion Vision Mamba for Multimodal UAV Detection

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) object detection has been widely used in traffic management, agriculture, emergency rescue, etc. However, it faces significant challenges, including occlusions, small object sizes, and irregular shapes. These challenges highlight the necessity for a robust and efficient multimodal UAV object detection method. Mamba has demonstrated considerable potential in multimodal image fusion. Leveraging this, we propose UAVD-Mamba, a multimodal UAV object detection framework based on Mamba architectures. To improve geometric adaptability, we propose the Deformable Token Mamba Block (DTMB) to generate deformable tokens by incorporating adaptive patches from deformable convolutions alongside normal patches from normal convolutions, which serve as the inputs to the Mamba Block. To optimize the multimodal feature complementarity, we design two separate DTMBs for the RGB and infrared (IR) modalities, with the outputs from both DTMBs integrated into the Mamba Block for feature extraction and into the Fusion Mamba Block for feature fusion. Additionally, to improve multiscale object detection, especially for small objects, we stack four DTMBs at different scales to produce multiscale feature representations, which are then sent to the Detection Neck for Mamba (DNM). The DNM module, inspired by the YOLO series, includes modifications to the SPPF and C3K2 of YOLOv11 to better handle the multiscale features. In particular, we employ cross-enhanced spatial attention before the DTMB and cross-channel attention after the Fusion Mamba Block to extract more discriminative features. Experimental results on the DroneVehicle dataset show that our method outperforms the baseline OAFA method by 3.6% in the mAP metric. Codes will be released at https://github.com/GreatPlum-hnu/UAVD-Mamba.git.

EvDetMAV: Generalized MAV Detection from Moving Event Cameras

Existing micro aerial vehicle (MAV) detection methods mainly rely on the target's appearance features in RGB images, whose diversity makes it difficult to achieve generalized MAV detection. We notice that different types of MAVs share the same distinctive features in event streams due to their high-speed rotating propellers, which are hard to see in RGB images. This paper studies how to detect different types of MAVs from an event camera by fully exploiting the features of propellers in the original event stream. The proposed method consists of three modules to extract the salient and spatio-temporal features of the propellers while filtering out noise from background objects and camera motion. Since there are no existing event-based MAV datasets, we introduce a novel MAV dataset for the community. This is the first event-based MAV dataset comprising multiple scenarios and different types of MAVs. Without training, our method significantly outperforms state-of-the-art methods and can deal with challenging scenarios, achieving a precision rate of 83.0\% (+30.3\%) and a recall rate of 81.5\% (+36.4\%) on the proposed testing dataset. The dataset and code are available at: https://github.com/WindyLab/EvDetMAV.

Experimental Assessment of Neural 3D Reconstruction for Small UAV-based Applications

The increasing miniaturization of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) has expanded their deployment potential to indoor and hard-to-reach areas. However, this trend introduces distinct challenges, particularly in terms of flight dynamics and power consumption, which limit the UAVs' autonomy and mission capabilities. This paper presents a novel approach to overcoming these limitations by integrating Neural 3D Reconstruction (N3DR) with small UAV systems for fine-grained 3-Dimensional (3D) digital reconstruction of small static objects. Specifically, we design, implement, and evaluate an N3DR-based pipeline that leverages advanced models, i.e., Instant-ngp, Nerfacto, and Splatfacto, to improve the quality of 3D reconstructions using images of the object captured by a fleet of small UAVs. We assess the performance of the considered models using various imagery and pointcloud metrics, comparing them against the baseline Structure from Motion (SfM) algorithm. The experimental results demonstrate that the N3DR-enhanced pipeline significantly improves reconstruction quality, making it feasible for small UAVs to support high-precision 3D mapping and anomaly detection in constrained environments. In more general terms, our results highlight the potential of N3DR in advancing the capabilities of miniaturized UAV systems.

Language-guided Learning for Object Detection Tackling Multiple Variations in Aerial Images

Despite recent advancements in computer vision research, object detection in aerial images still suffers from several challenges. One primary challenge to be mitigated is the presence of multiple types of variation in aerial images, for example, illumination and viewpoint changes. These variations result in highly diverse image scenes and drastic alterations in object appearance, so that it becomes more complicated to localize objects from the whole image scene and recognize their categories. To address this problem, in this paper, we introduce a novel object detection framework in aerial images, named LANGuage-guided Object detection (LANGO). Upon the proposed language-guided learning, the proposed framework is designed to alleviate the impacts from both scene and instance-level variations. First, we are motivated by the way humans understand the semantics of scenes while perceiving environmental factors in the scenes (e.g., weather). Therefore, we design a visual semantic reasoner that comprehends visual semantics of image scenes by interpreting conditions where the given images were captured. Second, we devise a training objective, named relation learning loss, to deal with instance-level variations, such as viewpoint angle and scale changes. This training objective aims to learn relations in language representations of object categories, with the help of the robust characteristics against such variations. Through extensive experiments, we demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, and our method obtains noticeable detection performance improvements.

CrosswalkNet: An Optimized Deep Learning Framework for Pedestrian Crosswalk Detection in Aerial Images with High-Performance Computing

With the increasing availability of aerial and satellite imagery, deep learning presents significant potential for transportation asset management, safety analysis, and urban planning. This study introduces CrosswalkNet, a robust and efficient deep learning framework designed to detect various types of pedestrian crosswalks from 15-cm resolution aerial images. CrosswalkNet incorporates a novel detection approach that improves upon traditional object detection strategies by utilizing oriented bounding boxes (OBB), enhancing detection precision by accurately capturing crosswalks regardless of their orientation. Several optimization techniques, including Convolutional Block Attention, a dual-branch Spatial Pyramid Pooling-Fast module, and cosine annealing, are implemented to maximize performance and efficiency. A comprehensive dataset comprising over 23,000 annotated crosswalk instances is utilized to train and validate the proposed framework. The best-performing model achieves an impressive precision of 96.5% and a recall of 93.3% on aerial imagery from Massachusetts, demonstrating its accuracy and effectiveness. CrosswalkNet has also been successfully applied to datasets from New Hampshire, Virginia, and Maine without transfer learning or fine-tuning, showcasing its robustness and strong generalization capability. Additionally, the crosswalk detection results, processed using High-Performance Computing (HPC) platforms and provided in polygon shapefile format, have been shown to accelerate data processing and detection, supporting real-time analysis for safety and mobility applications. This integration offers policymakers, transportation engineers, and urban planners an effective instrument to enhance pedestrian safety and improve urban mobility.

MatchPlant: An Open-Source Pipeline for UAV-Based Single-Plant Detection and Data Extraction

Accurate identification of individual plants from unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) images is essential for advancing high-throughput phenotyping and supporting data-driven decision-making in plant breeding. This study presents MatchPlant, a modular, graphical user interface-supported, open-source Python pipeline for UAV-based single-plant detection and geospatial trait extraction. MatchPlant enables end-to-end workflows by integrating UAV image processing, user-guided annotation, Convolutional Neural Network model training for object detection, forward projection of bounding boxes onto an orthomosaic, and shapefile generation for spatial phenotypic analysis. In an early-season maize case study, MatchPlant achieved reliable detection performance (validation AP: 89.6%, test AP: 85.9%) and effectively projected bounding boxes, covering 89.8% of manually annotated boxes with 87.5% of projections achieving an Intersection over Union (IoU) greater than 0.5. Trait values extracted from predicted bounding instances showed high agreement with manual annotations (r = 0.87-0.97, IoU >= 0.4). Detection outputs were reused across time points to extract plant height and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index with minimal additional annotation, facilitating efficient temporal phenotyping. By combining modular design, reproducibility, and geospatial precision, MatchPlant offers a scalable framework for UAV-based plant-level analysis with broad applicability in agricultural and environmental monitoring.

Efficient Edge Deployment of Quantized YOLOv4-Tiny for Aerial Emergency Object Detection on Raspberry Pi 5

This paper presents the deployment and performance evaluation of a quantized YOLOv4-Tiny model for real-time object detection in aerial emergency imagery on a resource-constrained edge device the Raspberry Pi 5. The YOLOv4-Tiny model was quantized to INT8 precision using TensorFlow Lite post-training quantization techniques and evaluated for detection speed, power consumption, and thermal feasibility under embedded deployment conditions. The quantized model achieved an inference time of 28.2 ms per image with an average power consumption of 13.85 W, demonstrating a significant reduction in power usage compared to its FP32 counterpart. Detection accuracy remained robust across key emergency classes such as Ambulance, Police, Fire Engine, and Car Crash. These results highlight the potential of low-power embedded AI systems for real-time deployment in safety-critical emergency response applications.