Method for detecting perforations on the edge of an image of a form

A method utilizing a computer for detecting whether perforations are present on the edge of an image of a form, comprising:

• obtaining a bitmap of said image, which said image has a black background
• utilizing said black, background to identify a selected portion of said bitmap corresponding to at least said edge, said selected portion including a matrix of a plurality of rows and columns of brightness values;
• applying a low pass filter to each of said columns of brightness values to create a second matrix of a plurality of rows and columns of first filtered brightness values;
• selecting a particular one of said rows of first filtered brightness values
• applying a high pass filter to said particular one of said rows of first filtered brightness values to create a plurality of high pass filtered brightness values by identifying a first row of pixels having a grayscale value generally equal to black and identifying a second row of pixels having a grayscale value corresponding to white so that said second particular row is between said row and said second row;
• performing a transform of said high pass filtered brightness values to generate a transformed output;
• and
• determining whether a series of perforations is present based on said transformed output.