Analytical Representation of Contours
Abstract
The interpretation and recognition of noisy contours, such as silhouettes, have proven to be difficult. One obstacle to the solution of these problems has been the lack of a robust representation for contours. In this paper, the author presents an analytical representation for contours. The contour is represented by a set of pairwise tangent circular arcs. The advantage of such an approach is that mathematical properties such as orientation and curvature are explicitly represented. He introduces a smoothing criterion for the contour that optimizes the tradeoff between the complexity of the contour and the proximity of the data points. The complexity measure is the number of extrema of curvature present in the contour. The smoothing criterion leads him to a true scale-space for contours. He describes the computation of the contour representation as well as the computation of relevant properties of the contour. He also considers the potential application of the representation, the smoothing paradigm, and the scale-space to contour interpretation and recognition.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 1992
- Accession Number
- ADA260151
Entities
People
- Ronald D. Chaney
Organizations
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology