Iterative graph cuts for image segmentation with a nonlinear statistical shape prior

Shape-based regularization has proven to be a useful method for delineating objects within noisy images where one has prior knowledge of the shape of the targeted object. When a collection of possible shapes is available, the specification of a shape prior using kernel density estimation is a natural technique. Unfortunately, energy functionals arising from kernel density estimation are of a form that makes them impossible to directly minimize using efficient optimization algorithms such as graph cuts. Our main contribution is to show how one may recast the energy functional into a form that is minimizable iteratively and efficiently using graph cuts.Comment: Revision submitted to JMIV (02/24/13

Level Set Gait Analysis for Synthesis and Reconstruction

We describe a new technique to extract the boundary of a walking subject, with ability to predict movement in missing frames. This paper uses a level sets representation of the training shapes and uses an interpolating cubic spline to model the eigenmodes of implicit shapes. Our contribution is to use a continuous representation of the feature space variation with time. The experimental results demonstrate that this level set-based technique can be used reliably in reconstructing the training shapes, estimating in-between frames to help in synchronizing multiple cameras, compensating for missing training sample frames, and the recognition of subjects based on their gai

Alternating patterns of mango: Quantification at the growth unit level on four cultivars

As in other fruit species, the alternate bearing of mango trees is a main concern for orchard profitability. In this paper, we focused on the effect of the fate (vegetative, flowering or fruiting) of the terminal growth units of a growing cycle on the flowering and fruiting of terminal growth units of the following growing cycles. Flowering and fruiting of twelve young mango trees belonging to four cultivars ('Cogshall', 'Irwin', 'Jose' and 'Kensington Pride') have been exhaustively described at the growth unit level during three successive growing cycles. Contrasted patterns were evidenced. For example, 'Irwin' and 'Kensington Pride' showed high flowering and fruit setting on terminal growth units across the three growing cycles. On the opposite, 'Cogshall' and 'Jose' were characterized by various alternating patterns between reproductive and vegetative fates, whether at the tree or at the growth unit level. Our study highlighted cultivar-specific alternate bearing patterns beginning from the first crops. Mango alternate bearing appeared to be related to complex relationships between vegetative and reproductive growths, which strongly varied according to the cultivar

Experience based treatment of head lice

Segmentation involves separating distinct regions in an image. In this note, we present a novel variational approach to perform this task within the level-sets framework. We propose an energy functional that naturally combines two segmentation techniques usually applied separately: intensity thresholding and geometric active contours. Although our method can deal with more complex statistics, we assume that the pixel intensities of the regions have Gaussian distributions, in this work. The proposed approach affords interesting properties that can lead to sensible segmentation results.