Color‐edge detection based on discrimination of noticeable color contrasts

Color‐edge detection is an important research task in the field of image processing. Efficient and accurate edge detection will lead to higher performance of subsequent image processing techniques, including image segmentation, object‐based image coding, and image retrieval. To improve the performance of color‐edge detection while considering that human eyes are ultimate receiver of color images, the perceptually insignificant edges should avoid being over‐detected. In this article, a color‐edge detection scheme based on the perceptual color contrast is proposed. The perceptual color contrast is defined as the visible color difference across an edge in the CIE‐Lab color space. A perceptual metric for measuring the visible color difference of a target color pixel is defined by utilizing the associated perceptually indistinguishable region. The perceptually indistinguishable region for each color pixel in the CIE‐Lab color space is estimated by the design of an experiment that considers the local property due to local changes in luminance. Simulation results show that the perceptual color contrast is effectively defined and the color edges in color images are detected while most of the perceptually insignificant edges are successfully suppressed through the proposed color‐edge detection scheme. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Imaging Syst Technol, 19, 332–339, 2009