1. A method for performing pattern matching to locate an instance of one or more of a plurality of template images in a target image, wherein each template image comprises a plurality of pixels, the method comprising: determining a unified signal transform from the set of template images; applying the unified signal transform for at least one generalized frequency to each of the set of template images to calculate a corresponding at least one generalized frequency component value for each of the set of template images; receiving the target image; applying the unified signal transform for the at least one generalized frequency to one or more portions of the target image to calculate a corresponding at least one generalized frequency component value for the target image; determining a best match between the at least one generalized frequency component value of the target image and the at least one generalized frequency component value of each of the template images; and generating information indicating a best match template image from the set of template images.