A Novel Deep Convolutional Neural Network Architecture Based on Transfer Learning for Handwritten Urdu Character Recognition

Deep convolutional neural networks (CNN) have made a huge impact on computer vision and set the state-of-the-art in providing extremely definite classification results. For character recognition, where the training images are usually inadequate, mostly transfer learning of pre-trained CNN is often utilized. In this paper, we propose a novel deep convolutional neural network for handwritten Urdu character recognition by transfer learning three pre-trained CNN models. We fine-tuned the layers of these pre-trained CNNs so as to extract features considering both global and local details of the Urdu character structure. The extracted features from the three CNN models are concatenated to train with two fully connected layers for classification. The experiment is conducted on UNHD, EMILLE, DBAHCL, and CDB/Farsi dataset, and we achieve 97.18% average recognition accuracy which outperforms the individual CNNs and numerous conventional classification methods

Evaluation of handwritten Urdu text by integration of MNIST dataset learning experience

© 2019 IEEE. The similar nature of patterns may enhance the learning if the experience they attained during training is utilized to achieve maximum accuracy. This paper presents a novel way to exploit the transfer learning experience of similar patterns on handwritten Urdu text analysis. The MNIST pre-trained network is employed by transferring it's learning experience on Urdu Nastaliq Handwritten Dataset (UNHD) samples. The convolutional neural network is used for feature extraction. The experiments were performed using deep multidimensional long short term (MDLSTM) memory networks. The obtained result shows immaculate performance on number of experiments distinguished on the basis of handwritten complexity. The result of demonstrated experiments show that pre-trained network outperforms on subsequent target networks which enable them to focus on a particular feature learning. The conducted experiments presented astonishingly good accuracy on UNHD dataset

Sub-sampling Approach for Unconstrained Arabic Scene Text Analysis by Implicit Segmentation based Deep Learning Classifier

The text extraction from the natural scene image is still a cumbersome task to perform. This paper presents a novel contribution and suggests the solution for cursive scene text analysis notably recognition of Arabic scene text appeared in the unconstrained environment. The hierarchical sub-sampling technique is adapted to investigate the potential through sub-sampling the window size of the given scene text sample. The deep learning architecture is presented by considering the complexity of the Arabic script. The conducted experiments present 96.81% accuracy at the character level. The comparison of the Arabic scene text with handwritten and printed data is outlined as well

A Study of Techniques and Challenges in Text Recognition Systems

The core system for Natural Language Processing (NLP) and digitalization is Text Recognition. These systems are critical in bridging the gaps in digitization produced by non-editable documents, as well as contributing to finance, health care, machine translation, digital libraries, and a variety of other fields. In addition, as a result of the pandemic, the amount of digital information in the education sector has increased, necessitating the deployment of text recognition systems to deal with it. Text Recognition systems worked on three different categories of text: (a) Machine Printed, (b) Offline Handwritten, and (c) Online Handwritten Texts. The major goal of this research is to examine the process of typewritten text recognition systems. The availability of historical documents and other traditional materials in many types of texts is another major challenge for convergence. Despite the fact that this research examines a variety of languages, the Gurmukhi language receives the most focus. This paper shows an analysis of all prior text recognition algorithms for the Gurmukhi language. In addition, work on degraded texts in various languages is evaluated based on accuracy and F-measure

UTRNet: High-Resolution Urdu Text Recognition In Printed Documents

In this paper, we propose a novel approach to address the challenges of printed Urdu text recognition using high-resolution, multi-scale semantic feature extraction. Our proposed UTRNet architecture, a hybrid CNN-RNN model, demonstrates state-of-the-art performance on benchmark datasets. To address the limitations of previous works, which struggle to generalize to the intricacies of the Urdu script and the lack of sufficient annotated real-world data, we have introduced the UTRSet-Real, a large-scale annotated real-world dataset comprising over 11,000 lines and UTRSet-Synth, a synthetic dataset with 20,000 lines closely resembling real-world and made corrections to the ground truth of the existing IIITH dataset, making it a more reliable resource for future research. We also provide UrduDoc, a benchmark dataset for Urdu text line detection in scanned documents. Additionally, we have developed an online tool for end-to-end Urdu OCR from printed documents by integrating UTRNet with a text detection model. Our work not only addresses the current limitations of Urdu OCR but also paves the way for future research in this area and facilitates the continued advancement of Urdu OCR technology. The project page with source code, datasets, annotations, trained models, and online tool is available at abdur75648.github.io/UTRNet.Comment: Accepted at The 17th International Conference on Document Analysis and Recognition (ICDAR 2023

Refining Parkinson’s neurological disorder identification through deep transfer learning

© 2019, Springer-Verlag London Ltd., part of Springer Nature. Parkinson’s disease (PD), a multi-system neurodegenerative disorder which affects the brain slowly, is characterized by symptoms such as muscle stiffness, tremor in the limbs and impaired balance, all of which tend to worsen with the passage of time. Available treatments target its symptoms, aiming to improve the quality of life. However, automatic diagnosis at early stages is still a challenging medicine-related task to date, since a patient may have an identical behavior to that of a healthy individual at the very early stage of the disease. Parkinson’s disease detection through handwriting data is a significant classification problem for identification of PD at the infancy stage. In this paper, a PD identification is realized with help of handwriting images that help as one of the earliest indicators for PD. For this purpose, we proposed a deep convolutional neural network classifier with transfer learning and data augmentation techniques to improve the identification. Two approaches like freeze and fine-tuning of transfer learning are investigated using ImageNet and MNIST dataset as source task independently. A trained network achieved 98.28% accuracy using fine-tuning-based approach using ImageNet and PaHaW dataset. Experimental results on benchmark dataset reveal that the proposed approach provides better detection of Parkinson’s disease as compared to state-of-the-art work

Document image analysis and recognition: a survey

This paper analyzes the problems of document image recognition and the existing solutions. Document recognition algorithms have been studied for quite a long time, but despite this, currently, the topic is relevant and research continues, as evidenced by a large number of associated publications and reviews. However, most of these works and reviews are devoted to individual recognition tasks. In this review, the entire set of methods, approaches, and algorithms necessary for document recognition is considered. A preliminary systematization allowed us to distinguish groups of methods for extracting information from documents of different types: single-page and multi-page, with text and handwritten contents, with a fixed template and flexible structure, and digitalized via different ways: scanning, photographing, video recording. Here, we consider methods of document recognition and analysis applied to a wide range of tasks: identification and verification of identity, due diligence, machine learning algorithms, questionnaires, and audits. The groups of methods necessary for the recognition of a single page image are examined: the classical computer vision algorithms, i.e., keypoints, local feature descriptors, Fast Hough Transforms, image binarization, and modern neural network models for document boundary detection, document classification, document structure analysis, i.e., text blocks and tables localization, extraction and recognition of the details, post-processing of recognition results. The review provides a description of publicly available experimental data packages for training and testing recognition algorithms. Methods for optimizing the performance of document image analysis and recognition methods are described.The reported study was funded by RFBR, project number 20-17-50177. The authors thank Sc. D. Vladimir L. Arlazarov (FRC CSC RAS), Pavel Bezmaternykh (FRC CSC RAS), Elena Limonova (FRC CSC RAS), Ph. D. Dmitry Polevoy (FRC CSC RAS), Daniil Tropin (LLC “Smart Engines Service”), Yuliya Chernysheva (LLC “Smart Engines Service”), Yuliya Shemyakina (LLC “Smart Engines Service”) for valuable comments and suggestions