Subpixel Localization of Isolated Edges and Streaks in Digital Images

J Imaging. 2020 May 18;6(5):33. doi: 10.3390/jimaging6050033.

Abstract

Many modern sensing systems rely on the accurate extraction of measurement data from digital images. The localization of edges and streaks in digital images is an important example of this type of measurement, with these techniques appearing in many image processing pipelines. Several approaches attempt to solve this problem at both the pixel level and subpixel level. While the subpixel methods are often necessary for applications requiring best-possible accuracy, they are often susceptible to noise, use iterative methods, or require pre-processing. This work investigates a unified framework for subpixel edge and streak localization using Zernike moments with ramp-based and wedge-based signal models. The method described here is found to outperform the current state-of-the-art for digital images with common signal-to-noise ratios. Performance is demonstrated on both synthetic and real images.

Keywords: Zernike moments; edge localization; image processing; streak localization; subpixel.