This book thoroughly covers the remote sensing visualization and analysis techniques based on computational imaging and vision in Earth science. Remote sensing is considered a significant information source for monitoring and mapping natural and man-made land through the development of sensor resolutions that committed different Earth observation platforms. The book includes related topics for the different systems, models, and approaches used in the visualization of remote sensing images. It offers flexible and sophisticated solutions for removing uncertainty from the satellite data. It introduces real time big data analytics to derive intelligence systems in enterprise earth science applications. Furthermore, the book integrates statistical concepts with computer-based geographic information systems (GIS). It focuses on image processing techniques for observing data together with uncertainty information raised by spectral, spatial, and positional accuracy of GPS data. The book addresses several advanced improvement models to guide the engineers in developing different remote sensing visualization and analysis schemes. Highlights on the advanced improvement models of the supervised/unsupervised classification algorithms, support vector machines, artificial neural networks, fuzzy logic, decision-making algorithms, and Time Series Model and Forecasting are addressed. This book guides engineers, designers, and researchers to exploit the intrinsic design remote sensing systems. The book gathers remarkable material from an international experts' panel to guide the readers during the development of earth big data analytics and their challenges.

Visualization, Visual Analytics and Virtual Reality in Medicine: State-of-the-art Techniques and Applications describes important techniques and applications that show an understanding of actual user needs as well as technological possibilities. The book includes user research, for example, task and requirement analysis, visualization design and algorithmic ideas without going into the details of implementation. This reference will be suitable for researchers and students in visualization and visual analytics in medicine and healthcare, medical image analysis scientists and biomedical engineers in general. Visualization and visual analytics have become prevalent in public health and clinical medicine, medical flow visualization, multimodal medical visualization and virtual reality in medical education and rehabilitation. Relevant applications now include digital pathology, virtual anatomy and computer-assisted radiation treatment planning.

This book offers a comprehensive introduction to advanced methods for image and video analysis and processing. It covers deraining, dehazing, inpainting, fusion, watermarking and stitching. It describes techniques for face and lip recognition, facial expression recognition, lip reading in videos, moving object tracking, dynamic scene classification, among others. The book combines the latest machine learning methods with computer vision applications, covering topics such as event recognition based on deep learning,dynamic scene classification based on topic model, person re-identification based on metric learning and behavior analysis. It also offers a systematic introduction to image evaluation criteria showing how to use them in different experimental contexts. The book offers an example-based practical guide to researchers, professionals and graduate students dealing with advanced problems in image analysis and computer vision.

Digital Functions and Data Reconstruction: Digital-Discrete Methods provides a solid foundation to the theory of digital functions and its applications to image data analysis, digital object deformation, and data reconstruction. This new method has a unique feature in that it is mainly built on discrete mathematics with connections to classical methods in mathematics and computer sciences. Digitally continuous functions and gradually varied functions were developed in the late 1980s. A. Rosenfeld (1986) proposed digitally continuous functions for digital image analysis, especially to describe the "continuous" component in a digital image, which usually indicates an object. L. Chen (1989) invented gradually varied functions to interpolate a digital surface when the boundary appears to be continuous. In theory, digitally continuous functions are very similar to gradually varied functions. Gradually varied functions are more general in terms of being functions of real numbers; digitally continuous functions are easily extended to the mapping from one digital space to another. This will be the first book about digital functions, which is an important modern research area for digital images and digitalized data processing, and provides an introduction and comprehensive coverage of digital function methods. Digital Functions and Data Reconstruction: Digital-Discrete Methods offers scientists and engineers who deal with digital data a highly accessible, practical, and mathematically sound introduction to the powerful theories of digital topology and functional analysis, while avoiding the more abstruse aspects of these topics.

Data visualization is currently a very active and vital area of research, teaching and development. The term unites the established field of scientific visualization and the more recent field of information visualization. The success of data visualization is due to the soundness of the basic idea behind it: the use of computer-generated images to gain insight and knowledge from data and its inherent patterns and relationships. A second premise is the utilization of the broad bandwidth of the human sensory system in steering and interpreting complex processes, and simulations involving data sets from diverse scientific disciplines and large collections of abstract data from many sources.
These concepts are extremely important and have a profound and widespread impact on the methodology of computational science and engineering, as well as on management and administration. The interplay between various application areas and their specific problem solving visualization techniques is emphasized in this book. Reflecting the heterogeneous structure of Data Visualization, emphasis was placed on these topics:

-Visualization Algorithms and Techniques;
-Volume Visualization;
-Information Visualization;
-Multiresolution Techniques;
-Interactive Data Exploration. Data Visualization: The State of the Art presents the state of the art in scientific and information visualization techniques by experts in this field. It can serve as an overview for the inquiring scientist, and as a basic foundation for developers. This edited volume contains chapters dedicated to surveys of specific topics, and a great deal of original work not previously published illustrated by examples from awealth of applications. The book will also provide basic material for teaching the state of the art techniques in data visualization. The companion CD-ROM contains all chapters in digital form with illustrations in color, as well as additional high-quality images and movies.
Data Visualization: The State of the Art is designed to meet the needs of practitioners and researchers in scientific and information visualization. This book is also suitable as a secondary text for graduate level students in computer science and engineering.

Arobotmustperceivethethree-dimensionalworldifitistobeeffective there. Yet recovering 3-D information from projected images is difficult, and still remains thesubjectofbasic research. Alternatively, onecan use sensorsthatcanprovidethree-dimensionalrangeinformationdirectly. The technique ofprojecting light-stripesstartedto be used in industrialobject recognition systems asearly asthe 1970s, andtime-of-flight laser-scanning range finders became available for outdoor mobile robotnavigation in the mid-eighties. Once range data are obtained, a vision system must still describe the scene in terms of 3-D primitives such as edges, surfaces, and volumes, and recognize objeCts of interest. Today, the art of sensing, extractingfeatures, and recognizing objectsbymeans ofthree-dimensional rangedataisoneofthemostexcitingresearchareasincomputervision. Three-Dimensional Machine Vision is a collection of papers dealing withthree-dimensionalrangedata. Theauthorsarepioneeringresearchers: some are founders and others are bringingnew excitements in thefield. I have tried to select milestone papers, and my goalhas beento make this bookareferenceworkforresearchersinthree-dimensionalvision. The book is organized into four parts: 3-D Sensors, 3-D Feature Extractions, ObjectRecognitionAlgorithms, andSystemsandApplications. Part I includes four papers which describe the development of unique, capable 3-D range sensors, as well as discussions of optical, geometrical, electronic, and computational issues. Mundy and Porter describe asensor systembasedonstructuredilluminationforinspectingmetalliccastings. In order to achieve high-speed data acquisition, it uses multiple lightstripes withwavelength multiplexing. Case, Jalkio, andKim alsopresentamulti stripe system and discuss various design issues in range sensing by triangulation. ThenumericalstereocameradevelopedbyAltschuler, Bae, Altschuler, Dijak, Tamburino, and Woolford projects space-coded grid patterns which are generated by an electro-optical programmable spatial viii PREFACE light modulator. Kanade and Fuhrman present a proximity sensor using multipleLEDswhich areconically arranged. Itcan measurebothdistance andorientationofanobject'ssurface."

Vision chips, or smart visual sensors, are those sensors that have integrated image acquisition and parallel processing, often at the pixel level, using dedicated analog and digital circuits. Vision Chips presents a systematic approach to the design and analysis of vision chips using analog VLSL. It presents algorithmic level implementation issues, from both the VLSI and computer vision points of view. It reviews the VLSI technologies and general analog VLSI design methodologies, in the context of suitability for vision chips. It describes chip-level architectural issues, including tessellation structures, pixel-processor interaction, and data read-out. It presents detailed analysis of building-blocks necessary in vision chips, including photodetectors, photocircuits, and spatial and temporal processing circuits. It addresses other important design issues, such as testing, digital noise, and mismatch. In addition Vision Chips reviews some of the past and existing implementations of smart vision sensors. It contains condensed information on more than fifty vision chips, designed by research laboratories all over the world. Novel and interesting features of each vision chip have been highlighted through informative diagrams and concise descriptions. This book is a valuable asset for researchers in the area, engineers working on the design of vision sensors, graduate students working in analog VLSI and vision, and computer vision and biological vision researchers and scientists.

The application of intelligent imaging techniques to industrial vision problems is an evolving aspect of current machine vision research. Machine vision is a relatively new technology, more concerned with systems engineering than with computer science, and with much to offer the manufacturing industry in terms of improving efficiency, safety and product quality. Beginning with an introductory chapter on the basic concepts, the authors develop these ideas to describe intelligent imaging techniques for use in a new generation of industrial imaging systems. Sections cover the application of AI languages such as Prolog, the use of multi-media interfaces and multi-processor systems, external device control, and colour recognition. The text concludes with a discussion of several case studies that illustrate how intelligent machine vision techniques can be used in industrial applications.

This book presents a unique guide to heritage preservation problems and the corresponding state-of-the-art digital techniques to achieve their plausible solutions. It covers various methods, ranging from data acquisition and digital imaging to computational methods for reconstructing the original (pre-damaged) appearance of heritage artefacts.The case studies presented here are mostly drawn from India's tangible and non-tangible heritage, which is very rich and multi-dimensional. The contributing authors have been working in their respective fields for years and present their methods so lucidly that they can be easily reproduced and implemented by general practitioners of heritage curation. The preservation methods, reconstruction methods, and corresponding results are all illustrated with a wealth of colour figures and images.The book consists of sixteen chapters that are divided into five broad sections, namely (i) Digital System for Heritage Preservation, (ii) Signal and Image Processing, (iii) Audio and Video Processing, (iv) Image and Video Database, and (v) Architectural Modelling and Visualization. The first section presents various state-of-the-art tools and technologies for data acquisition including an interactive graphical user interface (GUI) annotation tool and a specialized imaging system for generating the realistic visual forms of the artefacts. Numerous useful methods and algorithms for processing vocal, visual and tactile signals related to heritage preservation are presented in the second and third sections. In turn, the fourth section provides two important image and video databases, catering to members of the computer vision community with an interest in the domain of digital heritage. Finally, examples of reconstructing ruined monuments on the basis of historic documents are presented in the fifth section. In essence, this book offers a pragmatic appraisal of the uses of digital technology in the various aspects of preservation of tangible and intangible heritages.

The concept of ridges has appeared numerous times in the image processing liter ature. Sometimes the term is used in an intuitive sense. Other times a concrete definition is provided. In almost all cases the concept is used for very specific ap plications. When analyzing images or data sets, it is very natural for a scientist to measure critical behavior by considering maxima or minima of the data. These critical points are relatively easy to compute. Numerical packages always provide support for root finding or optimization, whether it be through bisection, Newton's method, conjugate gradient method, or other standard methods. It has not been natural for scientists to consider critical behavior in a higher-order sense. The con cept of ridge as a manifold of critical points is a natural extension of the concept of local maximum as an isolated critical point. However, almost no attention has been given to formalizing the concept. There is a need for a formal development. There is a need for understanding the computation issues that arise in the imple mentations. The purpose of this book is to address both needs by providing a formal mathematical foundation and a computational framework for ridges. The intended audience for this book includes anyone interested in exploring the use fulness of ridges in data analysis."

Computer vision is one of the most complex and computationally intensive problem. Like any other computationally intensive problems, parallel pro cessing has been suggested as an approach to solving the problems in com puter vision. Computer vision employs algorithms from a wide range of areas such as image and signal processing, advanced mathematics, graph theory, databases and artificial intelligence. Hence, not only are the comput ing requirements for solving vision problems tremendous but they also demand computers that are efficient to solve problems exhibiting vastly dif ferent characteristics. With recent advances in VLSI design technology, Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) massively parallel computers have been proposed and built. However, such architectures have been shown to be useful for solving a very limited subset of the problems in vision. Specifically, algorithms from low level vision that involve computations closely mimicking the architec ture and require simple control and computations are suitable for massively parallel SIMD computers. An Integrated Vision System (IVS) involves com putations from low to high level vision to be executed in a systematic fashion and repeatedly. The interaction between computations and information dependent nature of the computations suggests that architectural require ments for computer vision systems can not be satisfied by massively parallel SIMD computers."

The research book is focused on the recent advances in computer vision methodologies and innovations in practice. The Contributions include: * Human Action Recognition: Contour-Based and Silhouette-based Approaches. * The Application of Machine Learning Techniques to Real Time Audience Analysis System. * Panorama Construction from Multi-view Cameras in Outdoor Scenes. * A New Real-Time Method of Contextual Image Description and Its Application in Robot Navigation and Intelligent Control. * Perception of Audio Visual Information for Mobile Robot Motion Control Systems. * Adaptive Surveillance Algorithms Based on the Situation Analysis. * Enhanced, Synthetic and Combined Vision Technologies for Civil Aviation. * Navigation of Autonomous Underwater Vehicles Using Acoustic and Visual Data Processing. * Efficient Denoising Algorithms for Intelligent Recognition Systems. * Image Segmentation Based on Two-dimensional Markov Chains. The book is directed to the PhD students, professors, researchers and software developers working in the areas of digital video processing and computer vision technologies.

Computer Vision for Multimedia Applications: Methods and Solutions includes the latest developments in computer vision methods applicable to various problems in multimedia computing. This publication presents discussions on new ideas, as well as problems in computer vision and multimedia computing. It will serve as an important reference in multimedia and computer vision for academicians, researchers, and academic libraries.

With a focus on the interplay between mathematics and applications of imaging, the first part covers topics from optimization, inverse problems and shape spaces to computer vision and computational anatomy. The second part is geared towards geometric control and related topics, including Riemannian geometry, celestial mechanics and quantum control. Contents: Part I Second-order decomposition model for image processing: numerical experimentation Optimizing spatial and tonal data for PDE-based inpainting Image registration using phase amplitude separation Rotation invariance in exemplar-based image inpainting Convective regularization for optical flow A variational method for quantitative photoacoustic tomography with piecewise constant coefficients On optical flow models for variational motion estimation Bilevel approaches for learning of variational imaging models Part II Non-degenerate forms of the generalized Euler Lagrange condition for state-constrained optimal control problems The Purcell three-link swimmer: some geometric and numerical aspects related to periodic optimal controls Controllability of Keplerian motion with low-thrust control systems Higher variational equation techniques for the integrability of homogeneous potentials Introduction to KAM theory with a view to celestial mechanics Invariants of contact sub-pseudo-Riemannian structures and Einstein Weyl geometry Time-optimal control for a perturbed Brockett integrator Twist maps and Arnold diffusion for diffeomorphisms A Hamiltonian approach to sufficiency in optimal control with minimal regularity conditions: Part I Index

Computer systems that analyze images are critical to a wide variety of applications such as visual inspections systems for various manufacturing processes, remote sensing of the environment from space-borne imaging platforms, and automatic diagnosis from X-rays and other medical imaging sources. Professor Azriel Rosenfeld, the founder of the field of digital image analysis, made fundamental contributions to a wide variety of problems in image processing, pattern recognition and computer vision. Professor Rosenfeld's previous students, postdoctoral scientists, and colleagues illustrate in Foundations of Image Understanding how current research has been influenced by his work as the leading researcher in the area of image analysis for over two decades. Each chapter of Foundations of Image Understanding is written by one of the world's leading experts in his area of specialization, examining digital geometry and topology (early research which laid the foundations for many industrial machine vision systems), edge detection and segmentation (fundamental to systems that analyze complex images of our three-dimensional world), multi-resolution and variable resolution representations for images and maps, parallel algorithms and systems for image analysis, and the importance of human psychophysical studies of vision to the design of computer vision systems. Professor Rosenfeld's chapter briefly discusses topics not covered in the contributed chapters, providing a personal, historical perspective on the development of the field of image understanding. Foundations of Image Understanding is an excellent source of basic material for both graduate students entering the field and established researchers who require a compact source for many of the foundational topics in image analysis.

This volume aims to stimulate discussions on research involving the use of data and digital images as an understanding approach for analysis and visualization of phenomena and experiments. The emphasis is put not only on graphically representing data as a way of increasing its visual analysis, but also on the imaging systems which contribute greatly to the comprehension of real cases.

Scientific Visualization and Imaging Systems encompass multidisciplinary areas, with applications in many knowledge fields such as Engineering, Medicine, Material Science, Physics, Geology, Geographic Information Systems, among others.

This book is a selection of 13 revised and extended research papers presented in the International Conference on Advanced Computational Engineering and Experimenting -ACE-X conferences 2010 (Paris), 2011 (Algarve), 2012 (Istanbul) and 2013 (Madrid). The examples were particularly chosen from materials research, medical applications, general concepts applied in simulations and image analysis and other interesting related problems.

In this groundbreaking new volume, computer researchers discuss the development of technologies and specific systems that can interpret data with respect to domain knowledge. Although the chapters each illuminate different aspects of image interpretation, all utilize a common approach - one that asserts such interpretation must involve perceptual learning in terms of automated knowledge acquisition and application, as well as feedback and consistency checks between encoding, feature extraction, and the known knowledge structures in a given application domain. The text is profusely illustrated with numerous figures and tables to reinforce the concepts discussed.

Advancements in digital sensor technology, digital image analysis techniques, as well as computer software and hardware have brought together the fields of computer vision and photogrammetry, which are now converging towards sharing, to a great extent, objectives and algorithms. The potential for mutual benefits by the close collaboration and interaction of these two disciplines is great, as photogrammetric know-how can be aided by the most recent image analysis developments in computer vision, while modern quantitative photogrammetric approaches can support computer vision activities. Devising methodologies for automating the extraction of man-made objects (e.g. buildings, roads) from digital aerial or satellite imagery is an application where this cooperation and mutual support is already reaping benefits. The valuable spatial information collected using these interdisciplinary techniques is of improved qualitative and quantitative accuracy. This book offers a comprehensive selection of high-quality and in-depth contributions from world-wide leading research institutions, treating theoretical as well as implementational issues, and representing the state-of-the-art on this subject among the photogrammetric and computer vision communities.

Surveillance systems have become increasingly popular. Full involvement of human operators has led to shortcomings, e.g. high labor cost, limited capability for multiple screens, inconsistency in long-duration, etc. Intelligent surveillance systems (ISSs) can supplement or even replace traditional ones. In ISSs, computer vision, pattern recognition, and artificial intelligence technologies are used to identify abnormal behaviours in videos. They present the development of real-time behaviour-based intelligent surveillance systems. The book focuses on the detection of individual abnormal behaviour based on learning and the analysis of dangerous crowd behaviour based on texture and optical flow. Practical systems include a real-time face classification and counting system, a surveillance robot system that utilizes video and audio information for intelligent interaction, and a robust person counting system for crowded environments.

Gaussian scale-space is one of the best understood multi-resolution techniques available to the computer vision and image analysis community. It is the purpose of this book to guide the reader through some of its main aspects. During an intensive weekend in May 1996 a workshop on Gaussian scale-space theory was held in Copenhagen, which was attended by many of the leading experts in the field. The bulk of this book originates from this workshop. Presently there exist only two books on the subject. In contrast to Lindeberg's monograph (Lindeberg, 1994e) this book collects contributions from several scale space researchers, whereas it complements the book edited by ter Haar Romeny (Haar Romeny, 1994) on non-linear techniques by focusing on linear diffusion. This book is divided into four parts. The reader not so familiar with scale-space will find it instructive to first consider some potential applications described in Part 1. Parts II and III both address fundamental aspects of scale-space. Whereas scale is treated as an essentially arbitrary constant in the former, the latter em phasizes the deep structure, i.e. the structure that is revealed by varying scale. Finally, Part IV is devoted to non-linear extensions, notably non-linear diffusion techniques and morphological scale-spaces, and their relation to the linear case. The Danish National Science Research Council is gratefully acknowledged for providing financial support for the workshop under grant no. 9502164."

Advances in sensing, signal processing, and computer technology during the past half century have stimulated numerous attempts to design general-purpose ma chines that see. These attempts have met with at best modest success and more typically outright failure. The difficulties encountered in building working com puter vision systems based on state-of-the-art techniques came as a surprise. Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of the problem is that machine vision sys tems cannot deal with numerous visual tasks that humans perform rapidly and effortlessly. In reaction to this perceived discrepancy in performance, various researchers (notably Marr, 1982) suggested that the design of machine-vision systems should be based on principles drawn from the study of biological systems. This "neuro morphic" or "anthropomorphic" approach has proven fruitful: the use of pyramid (multiresolution) image representation methods in image compression is one ex ample of a successful application based on principles primarily derived from the study of biological vision systems. It is still the case, however, that the perfor of computer vision systems falls far short of that of the natural systems mance they are intended to mimic, suggesting that it is time to look even more closely at the remaining differences between artificial and biological vision systems."

This book proposes soft computing techniques for segmenting real-life images in applications such as image processing, image mining, video surveillance, and intelligent transportation systems. The book suggests hybrids deriving from three main approaches: fuzzy systems, primarily used for handling real-life problems that involve uncertainty; artificial neural networks, usually applied for machine cognition, learning, and recognition; and evolutionary computation, mainly used for search, exploration, efficient exploitation of contextual information, and optimization. The contributed chapters discuss both the strengths and the weaknesses of the approaches, and the book will be valuable for researchers and graduate students in the domains of image processing and computational intelligence.

This book, compiles, presents, and explains the most important meta-heuristic and evolutionary optimization algorithms whose successful performance has been proven in different fields of engineering, and it includes application of these algorithms to important engineering optimization problems. In addition, this book guides readers to studies that have implemented these algorithms by providing a literature review on developments and applications of each algorithm. This book is intended for students, but can be used by researchers and professionals in the area of engineering optimization.

"3D Surface Reconstruction: Multi-Scale Hierarchical Approaches "presents methods to model 3D objects in an incremental way so as to capture more finer details at each step. The configuration of the model parameters, the rationale and solutions are described and discussed in detail so the reader has a strong understanding of the methodology. Modeling starts from data captured by 3D digitizers and makes the process even more clear and engaging.

Innovative approaches, based on two popular machine learning paradigms, namely Radial Basis Functions and the Support Vector Machines, are also introduced. These paradigms are innovatively extended to a multi-scale incremental structure, based on a hierarchical scheme. The resulting approaches allow readers to achieve high accuracy with limited computational complexity, and makes the approaches appropriate for online, real-time operation. Applications can be found in any domain in which regression is required.

"3D Surface Reconstruction: Multi-Scale Hierarchical Approaches" is designed as a secondary text book or reference for advanced-level students and researchers in computer science. This book also targets practitioners working in computer vision or machine learning related fields.

Acquiring spatial data for geoinformation systems is still mainly done by human operators who analyze images using classical photogrammetric equipment or digitize maps, possibly assisted by some low level image processing. Automation of these tasks is difficult due to the complexity of the object, the topography, and the deficiency of current pattern recognition and image analysis tools for achieving a reliable transition from the data to the high level description of topographic objects. It appears that progress in automation only can be achieved by incorporating domain-specific semantic models into the analysis procedures. This volume collects papers which were presented at the Workshop "SMATI '97." The workshop focused on "Semantic Modeling for the Acquisition of Topographic Information from Images and Maps." This volume offers a comprehensive selection of high-quality and in-depth contributions by experts of the field coming from leading research institutes, treating both theoretical and implementation issues and integrating aspects of photogrammetry, cartography, computer vision, and image understanding.