The paper presents a new technique for efficient polygon approximation of digitized planar curves. The polygon approximation algorithms based on sequential scan, split-and-merge and iterative techniques have some drawbacks: they shift the corner points of the given curve, they distort the original symmetry of the curve, polygon approximation is dependent on starting point and the starting points are taken as break points, they cannot preserve the identity of the segments whose lengths lie between (epsilon) and 2 (epsilon) , where (epsilon) is allowed maximum absolute deviation error. The proposed technique grows the edges of polygon approximation which is based on principle of merging. The edge/s are grown at point/s where the minimum merging error is produced. This simultaneous growing of edges overcomes the drawbacks present in the sequential scan, the split-and-merge, and the iterative techniques of polygon approximation. Merging is done on the sides of the initial polygon approximation obtained by template matching. The technique provides a scope for parallel implementation of the total task.

Date Published: 1 November 1992
PDF: 11 pages
Proc. SPIE 1823, Machine Vision Applications, Architectures, and Systems Integration, (1 November 1992); doi: 10.1117/12.132071

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 1823:
Machine Vision Applications, Architectures, and Systems Integration
Bruce G. Batchelor; Susan Snell Solomon; Frederick M. Waltz, Editor(s)