Contextual Boundary Formation by Scan Line Matching

In this paper an algorithm is given for generating linked edge boundaries between adjacent regions of different gray levels. In contrast with peak following algorithms, edges are treated as variable width regions, and the edge linking procedure is really a region grower. Edge linking is a parallel process on all the edges in pairs of adjacent scan lines, and contextual information in the direction of the scan lines is used to resolve ambiguous linking situations. The procedure relies heavily upon a one- dimensional edge detector that defers the formation of local edge interpretations until more informed decisions can be made by the edge linking procedure.