Techniques are disclosed for detecting commercials or other particular types of video content in a video signal. In an illustrative embodiment, color histograms are extracted from frames of the video signal. For each of at least a subset of the extracted color histograms, the extracted color histogram is compared to a family histogram. If the extracted color histogram falls within a specified range of the family histogram, the family histogram is updated to include the extracted color histogram as a new member. If the extracted color histogram does not fall within the specified range of the family histogram, the family histogram is considered complete and the extracted color histogram is utilized to generate a new family histogram for use in processing subsequent extracted color histograms. The resulting family histograms are utilized to detect commercials or other particular type of video content in the video signal.