Back to results
US 9,430,843 B2Granted
Edge detection in images
AssigneeWelch Allyn, Inc.
InventorMiguel C. Mudge
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An edge detection engine operates to scan an image to identify edges within the image. An annular aperture is used to locate the edges in the image. An output image is generated by the edge detection engine that identifies the locations of the edges found in the image.
Claims19
A method of detecting edges within a digital image, the method comprising:
- processing at least a portion of the digital image, using a computing device, in a pixel-by-pixel manner including at an analysis point in the digital image, by:
- identifying pixels surrounding the analysis point;
- identifying a location of a bisection that divides the pixels surrounding the analysis point into two halves;
- determining an angle of the bisection that maximizes a difference in intensities of the pixels between the two halves, the determined angle of the bisection identifying the presence of an edge in the digital image;
- storing the determined angle of the bisection, in correspondence with a pixel location, in a computer readable non-transitory storage device to identify an edge point in the image.
2 more elements
An edge detection system comprising:
- a computing device comprising:
- a processing device;
- and
- a computer readable non-transitory storage device storing data instructions that, when executed by the processing device generates an edge detection engine comprising:
- an annular aperture generator that operates to generate an annular aperture using a circle drawing algorithm;
- a line generator that generates lines representative of a set of bisectors of the annular aperture, wherein each of the bisectors divides the annular aperture into a first half having a first intensity value and a second half having a second intensity value;
- an image scanning engine that utilizes the annular aperture as a mask to scan a digital image, that utilizes the set of bisectors to identify a bisection angle that results in a greatest difference of intensity between the first and second intensity values for the set of bisectors and that identifies edges within the digital image;
- and
- an output data generator that utilizes the lines to represent the edges in the output image.
6 more elements
A medical instrument comprising:
- a processing device;
- an image capture device operable under direction of the processing device to capture an input image;
- and
- a non-transitory storage device including an edge detection engine, the edge detection engine including instructions executable by the processor to process the input image to detect edges within the input image by:
- processing the image using an annular aperture mask and a set of bisectors of the annular aperture mask, wherein each of the bisectors divides the annular aperture mask into a first half having a first intensity and a second half having a second intensity;
- utilizing the set of bisectors to identify a bisection angle that results in a greatest difference of intensity between the first and second intensity values for the set of bisectors;
- and
- comparing the greatest difference of intensity to a threshold value to detect an image edge.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.