Tracking the translational and rotational movement of the ball using high-speed camera movies

Skills to spin the ball are important for athletes in many sports such as baseball, soccer and tennis. Recently, re- searchers in aerodynamics and sports science started to an- alyze the correlation of the rotation and the trajectory of the ball; high speed cameras are used to analyze the rotation of the ball. However, the analysis had to be done either man- ually, or under special lighting condition. In this paper, we propose a new algorithm to track the translation and rota- tion of the ball shot by high speed cameras under outdoor ambient light condition. Using our system, the athletes can analyze their skills by shooting their motion and the resul- tant rotation of the ball. It can also be used as a tool to enhance sports TV programs by providing further scientific information to the audience.