Master Thesis Opportunity: Computer Vision for Motorsport Video Analysis
About the Opportunity
At Toyota Racing, we are continuously advancing the use of AI and computer vision to unlock insights from complex race environments. We offer an exciting Master’s thesis opportunity focused on state-of-the-art computer vision methods for analysing race video data in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC).The goal of this thesis is to enhance an existing automated race-video analysis system by improving its robustness, accuracy, and real-world performance using modern deep learning approaches.
Your Challenge
During WEC races, large volumes of video data are generated from multiple cameras and perspectives. These videos contain valuable information about vehicle positions, movements, and interactions within a highly dynamic environment.
Your work will focus on transforming this raw video data into structured and actionable insights by improving current computer vision models.
Key tasks include:
- Reviewing and selecting state-of-the-art object detection and video analysis methods
- Designing and implementing improvements to an existing baseline model
- Enhancing robustness against real-world challenges such as: Occlusions, Lighting variability, Complex camera perspectives, Visually similar vehicles
- Evaluating performance improvements using objective metrics
- Generating structured outputs (e.g. vehicle detection and relative positioning) for further analysis
- Documenting findings, limitations, and recommendations for future development
Technologies & Environment
You will work in a modern machine learning environment, including:
- Python-based ML stack (e.g. PyTorch, OpenCV)
- Object detection frameworks (e.g. YOLO or similar)
- AWS-based data access and processing
- Large-scale motorsport video datasets from past WEC events
Duration & Start
Start date: Earliest 1st August 2026
Duration: Minimum of 6 months
Your Profile
- Master’s student in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science, Mathematics, Physics, or a related field
- Hands-on experience with machine learning and computer vision in Python
- Experience with at least one deep learning framework (preferably PyTorch)
- Basic understanding of object detection, image processing, or video analysis
- Experience with OpenCV, YOLO-style models, tracking, segmentation, or data annotation is a plus
- Strong analytical mindset and ability to evaluate models using objective metrics
- Interest in motorsport and applied AI systems is beneficial
Why Join Us
- Work on real-world data from top-tier motorsport
- Apply cutting-edge AI methods in a high-performance environment
- Contribute to systems used in professional race engineering
- Gain hands-on experience with production-relevant ML pipelines