The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 28, 2000
Filed:
Nov. 26, 1997
Andreas E Savakis, Rochester, NY (US);
Eastman Kodak Company, Rochester, NY (US);
Abstract
Document image thresholding using foreground and background is disclosed. A document (16) is scanned and a region (30) and a sub-region (32) of the document is selected. The intensity value of a pixel in the region is compared to an average intensity value of pixels in a foreground cluster and to an average intensity value of pixels in a background cluster (50). The pixel is assigned to the foreground cluster (53) if the intensity value of the pixel is closer to the average intensity of the foreground cluster, or to the background cluster (54) if the pixel intensity is closer to the average intensity value of the background cluster. A new average intensity value is calculated for the foreground cluster (55) and the background cluster (56). A new pixel is compared to the new average intensity values for the foreground and background clusters and the process is repeated until all pixels in the region have been compared (57). A threshold value is computed (62) based on a function of the average intensity value of pixels in the foreground and background cluster. Each pixel in the sub-region is then converted to a white pixel if the pixel intensity level is greater than the threshold value, or converted to a black pixel if the pixel intensity level is less than the threshold value (62).