Can't make cv.matchTemplate efficient

Python
1

I followed a tutorial on how to use cv.matchTemplate and the guy had a 98% match while i got a 51% which was in a completely different part of the picture. When he showed his result picture(comparison of his two pictures) he had a very bright spot while i didn’t (even though i took a screenshot of my screenshot).
First, Is there a way to get a higher match value?
And second, instead of selecting the brightest white pixel as a result of cv.matchTemplate, is it possible to get a match by selecting the most amount of white pixels within a certain surface area?

Keep in mind i’m not an computer engineer, i just started coding

import cv2 as cv
import numpy as np


haystack = cv.imread('gamepictures/haystack.png', cv.IMREAD_REDUCED_COLOR_2)
grayhaystack = cv.cvtColor(haystack, cv.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)

needle = cv.imread('gamepictures/needle.png', cv.IMREAD_REDUCED_COLOR_2)
grayneedle =cv.cvtColor(needle, cv.COLOR_BGR2GRAY)
#cv.imshow('Haystack', haystack)
result = cv.matchTemplate(haystack, grayneedle, cv.TM_CCOEFF_NORMED)

#1to10 min white , max white, location
min_val, max_val, min_loc, max_loc = cv.minMaxLoc(result)

print('Best match top left position: %s' % str(max_loc))
print("Best match confidence: %s" % max_val)

needle_w = needle.shape[1]
needle_h = needle.shape[0]
top_left = max_loc

bottom_right = (top_left[0] + needle_w, top_left[1] + needle_h)

cv.rectangle(haystack, top_left, bottom_right, (0, 255,0), 2, cv.LINE_4)

cv.imshow('Haystack', haystack)

cv.imshow('Result', result)

cv.waitKey()
2

same rules as everywhere else: post data and code, a “minimal reproducible example”. can’t work with abstractions and hypotheticals.