Patent · US Expired

Machine vision systems and methods for morphological transformation of an image with zero or other uniform offsets

US6236769A · kind A · utility

7Cited by
137References
24Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventor

Key dates

Filing dateJan 28, 1998
Grant dateMay 22, 2001
Priority date
Expiry dateJan 28, 2018

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06T5/30
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

The invention provides machine vision systems for morphological transformation of a source image e.g., adapted for use with zero or uniform offsets. The systems have application, for example, in image erosion or dilation of images of varied image quality. Systems according to the invention compare each pixel in a first row (or line) of the image with a corresponding pixel in a second row of the image. In each comparison, the system identifies the pixel intensity of selected rank. Where the system effects a dilation-type transformation, for example, the comparison seeks a maximum of the compared pixels. For an erosion-type transformation, the comparison seeks a minimum. The pixel intensity value of selected rank (e.g., minimum or maximum) determined from each comparison is retained and, in turn, compared with the intensity values of the corresponding pixels in every other row in the image. These maximum/minimum values are, in turn, compared with the each other and, more particularly, with the values of selected rank (e.g., maximum or minimum) for the neighboring columns. The intensity value of selected rank from among each set of compared values is retained in the transformation ima…

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.