Image segmentation based on region growing and edge detection

We present a method that incorporates region-growing and edge-detection techniques for performing image segmentation tasks. We first apply edge detection techniques to obtain a difference in strength map. We then employ the region growing technique to work on the map. The idea is this: when a region grows to such extent that it touches an edge pixel, a criterion proposed in this paper is used to determine whether the growing process should be terminated in this direction. In this manner, one can obtain more accurate boundary of region by clearly separating regions from edges. After all pixels of the map have been processed, a map of primitive region is generated. Finally, a merge process based on a similarly measurement (i.e., connectivity degree and averaged gray level between regions) is employed to aggregate regions to obtain the final segmentation result.