The Segmentation Problem

Computer Graphics and Image Processing

Lecture 6

Muhammad Usman Ghani Khan

Department of Computer Science & Engineering

UET, Lahore

Autumn Semester

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Outline

1 The Segmentation Problem

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Agenda

Today Discussion
So far we have been considering image processing
techniques used to transform images for human
interpretation
Today we will begin looking at automated image analysis
by examining the thorny issue of image segmentation:
The segmentation problem
Finding points, lines and edges

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The Segmentation Problem

+ Segmentation attempts to partition the pixels of an image

into groups that strongly correlate with the objects in an
image.
+ Typically the first step in any automated computer vision
application

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Segmentation Examples

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Detection Of Discontinuities

There are three basic types of grey level discontinuities that we

tend to look for in digital images:
1 Points
2 Lines
3 Edges
We typically find discontinuities using masks and correlation

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Point Detection
Point detection can be achieved simply using the mask below:

Points are detected at those pixels in theandsubsequent

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Point Detection

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Line Detection

The next level of complexity is to try to detect lines

The masks given above extract lines that are one pixel
thick and running in a particular direction

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Line Detection

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Edge Detection

An edge is a set of connected pixels that lie on the boundary

between two regions

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Edges & Derivatives

We have already spoken about how

derivatives are used to find
discontinuities
1st derivative tells us where an
edge is
2nd derivative can be used to
show edge direction

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Derivatives & Noise

Derivative based edge detectors are extremely sensitive to

noise

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Common Edge Detectors

Given a 3 ∗ 3 region of an image the following edge detection

filters can be used

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Edge Detection Example

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Edge Detection Example

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Edge Detection Example

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Edge Detection Example

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Edge Detection Problems

Often, problems arise in edge detection in that there are is

too much detail
For example, the brickwork in the previous example
One way to overcome this is to smooth images prior to
edge detection

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Edge Detection Example With Smoothing

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Laplacian Edge Detection

We encountered the 2nd-order derivative based Laplacian filter

already

The Laplacian is typically not used by itself as it is too

sensitive to noise
Usually hen used for edge detection the Laplacian is
combined with a smoothing Gaussian filter

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Laplacian Of Gaussian

The Laplacian of Gaussian (or Mexican hat) filter uses the

Gaussian for noise removal and the Laplacian for edge
detection

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Laplacian Of Gaussian - Example

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Summary

In this section we have begun looking at segmentation,

and in particular edge detection
Edge detection is massively important as it is in many
cases the first step to object recognition
Next section is about thresholding techniques.

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Thresholding

Thresholding is usually the first step in any segmentation

approach
We have talked about simple single value thresholding
already
Single value thresholding can be given mathematically as
follows:

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Thresholding Example

Imagine a poker playing robot that needs to visually

interpret the cards in its hand

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Thresholding Example: Be careful

If you get the threshold wrong the results can be disastrous

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Basic Global Thresholding

Based on the histogram of an image

Partition the image histogram using a single global
threshold
The success of this technique very strongly depends on
how well the histogram can be partitioned

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Basic Global Thresholding Algortithm

The basic global threshold T is calculated as follows:
1 Select an initial estimate for T (typically the average grey
level in the image)
2 Segment the image using T to produce two groups of
pixels: G1 consisting of pixels with grey levels > T and G2
consisting pixels with grey levels ≤ T
3 Compute the average grey levels of pixels in G1 to give µ1
and G2 to give µ2
µ1 + µ2
T = (1)
2
4 Repeat steps 2 − 4 until the difference in T in successive
iterations is less than a predefined limit T∞
This algorithm works very well for finding thresholds when the
histogram is suitable
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Thresholding Example 1

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Thresholding Example 2

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Problems With Single Value Thresholding

Single value thresholding only works for bimodal

histograms
Images with other kinds of histograms need more than a
single threshold

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Problems With Single Value Thresholding

Let’s say we want to isolate the contents of the bottles

Think about what the histogram for this image would look
like
What would happen if we used a single threshold value?

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Single Value Thresholding and Illumination

Uneven illumination can really upset a single valued

thresholding scheme

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Basic Adaptive Thresholding

An approach to handling situations in which single value

thresholding will not work is to divide an image into sub
images and threshold these individually
Since the threshold for each pixel depends on its location
within an image this technique is said to adaptive

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Basic Adaptive Thresholding Example

The image below shows an example of using adaptive

thresholding with the image shown previously

As can be seen success is mixed

But, we can further subdivide the troublesome sub images
for more success

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Basic Adaptive Thresholding Example

These images show the

troublesome parts of the previous
problem further subdivided
After this sub division successful
thresholding can be achieved

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Summary

In this section we have begun looking at segmentation,

and in particular thresholding
We saw the basic global thresholding algorithm and its
shortcomings
We also saw a simple way to overcome some of these
limitations using adaptive thresholding

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