The is the first release of the PixCompare engine for command line use. It takes 2 jpeg files and returns a similarity value.

I have several Axis webcams in use, and sometimes their built-in motion recognition just runs amok – it saves a picture every second even though there is no motion at all. Therefore, before copying the pictures away, I use this command to compare the current picture with the last picture taken. If it is different enough, it gets saved.

Download pixo_cmd

Usage:
% pixo_cmd picture1.jpg picture2.jpg

It returns a float value 0 or higher, where

• 0.00 – 2.00 very similar or identical
• 2.00 – 10.00 pretty similar
• 10.00 – 20.00 somewhat similar, e.g. some colors are the same
• > 20.00 different