Methods and apparatus are provided for example-based object retrieval that can retrieve objects from video images in real-time. An object of interest is identified in a sequence of images by obtaining an identification from a user of an example object having at least one attribute of interest; generating a query object based on the identified example object, wherein the query object has a substantially similar viewpoint as objects in the sequence of images and wherein the query object comprises a plurality of attributes that are substantially similar as the example object; and processing the sequence of images to identify the object of interest based on a similarity metric to the query object.