Detection of Intensity Changes with Subpixel Accuracy Using Laplacian-Gaussian Masks

We present a system that takes a gray level image as input, locates edges with subpixel accuracy, and links them into lines. Edges are detected by finding zero-crossings in the convolution of the image with Laplacian-of-Gaussian (LoG) masks. The implementation differs markedly from M.I.T.'s as we decompose our masks exactly into a sum of two separable filters instead of the usual approximation by a difference of two Gaussians (DOG). Subpixel accuracy is obtained through the use of the facet model [1]. We also note that the zero-crossings obtained from the full resolution image using a space constant ¿ for the Gaussian, and those obtained from the 1/n resolution image with 1/n pixel accuracy and a space constant of ¿/n for the Gaussian, are very similar, but the processing times are very different. Finally, these edges are grouped into lines using the technique described in [2].