An object detection system comprises a polarizer configured to polarize an incoming image scene, a motor controller configured to control a spin rate of the polarizer, a lens configured to collect scene data from the polarized image scene, a first integrated circuit configured to measure the collected scene data at two different and orthogonal polarizations, a second integrated circuit configured to determine a degree of polarization (DoP) and an angle of polarization (AoP) for each image frame pair and to generate pre-processed data, and a processor configured to match the pre-processed data to target criteria. The first integrated circuit can be a DROIC imager and the second integrated circuit can be a FPGA. The AoP and DoP can be determined at a pixel level. The second integrated circuit is configured to apply spatial filtering having a DoP greater than 70% or where AoP is unique to immediate surroundings of AoP.