Abstract: A system and method for performing object recognition using chords is disclosed, A chord is a feature representing the distance between edge pixels and/or the angle of a line segment connected to edge pixels. The object recognition system preferably includes: an edge detector, a plurality of transforms, a chord generator, and a summing circuit. The edge detector is configured to detect a plurality of edge pixels in the acquired image and reference image. Each transform is associated with a scale which is the ratio of an input chord length and an output chord length for associated with the transform. The chord generator is configured to generate a first plurality of chords representing a point in the acquired image, and a second plurality of chords representing a point in the reference image.