Abstract
In this paper, we introduce a fast ellipse detection method that uses the geometric properties of three points on an ellipse. Many conventional ellipse detection methods carry out detection using five points, but a random selection of such points among candidate edges requires much redundant processing. To search for an ellipse with the minimum number of points, this study used the normal and differential equations of an ellipse, which requires three points based on their locations and edge angles. First, to reduce the number of candidate edges, the edges were divided into 8 groups depending on the edge angle, and then a new geometric constraint called the quadrant condition was introduced to reduce noisy candidate edges. Clustering was employed to find prominent candidates in the space of a few ellipse parameters. Experiments using many real images showed that the proposed method satisfies both reliability and computing speed for ellipse detection.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Q. Feng, J. S. Pan, and L. Yan, “Restricted nearest feature line with ellipse for face recognition,” Journal of Information Hiding and Multimedia Signal Processing, vol. 3, no. 3, pp. 297–305, July 2012.
Y. Guan and Y. Huang, “Multi-pose human head detection and tracking boosted by efficient human head validation using ellipse detection,” Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence, vol. 37, pp. 181–193, 2015. [click]
M. Nam, M. U. Ahmed, Y. Shen, and P. K. Rhee, “Mouth tracking for hands-free robot control,” International Journal of Control, Automation, and Systems, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 628–636, 2014. [click]
S. Thamizharasan, J. Baskaran, and S. Ramkumar, “A new cascaded multilevel inverter topology with voltage sources arranged in matrix structure,” Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology, vol. 10, no. 4, pp 1552–1557, 2015. [click]
S. H. Park and G. W. Kim, “Expanded guide circlebased obstacle avoidance for the remotely operated mobile robot,” Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology, vol. 9, no. 3, pp 1034–1042, 2014. [click]
Q. Uang, H. Hu, W. Gui, S. Zhou, and C. Zju, “3-Parameter Hough ellipse detection algorithm for accurate location of human eyes,” Journal of Multimedia, vol. 9, no. 9, pp. 619–626, 2014. [click]
S. C. Zhang and Z. Q. Liu, “A robust, real-time ellipse”, Pattern Recognition, vol. 38, no. 2, pp. 273–287, 2006. [click]
G. Hua, Y. Fu, M. Turk, M. Pollefeys, and Z. Zhang, “Introduction to the special issue on mobile vision,” International Journal of Computer Vision, vol. 96, no. 3, pp. 277–279, 2012. [click]
G. Wang, G. Ren, Z. Wo, Y. Zhao, and L. Jiang, “A fast and robust ellipse-detection method based on sorted merging,” The Scientific World Journal, vol 2014, pp. 15, 2014. [click]
J. Yao, N. Kharma, and P. Grogono, “A multi-population genetic algorithm for robust and fast ellipse detection,” Pattern Analysis and Applications, vol 8. no. 1-2, pp. 149–162, 2005. [click]
V. Q. Nhat and G. Lee, “Illumination invariant object tracking with adaptive sparse representation,” International Journal of Control, Automation, and Systems, vol. 12, no. 1, pp. 195–201, 2014. [click]
D. K. Prasad, M. K. Leung, and S. Y. Cho, “Edge curvature and convexity based ellipse detection method,” Pattern Recognition, vol. 45, no. 9, pp. 3204–3221, 2012. [click]
T. M. Nguyen, S. Ahuja, and Q. Wu, “A real-time ellipse detection based on edge grouping,” Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, pp. 3280–3286, 2009. [click]
K. S. Hahn, S. C. Jung, U. J. Han, and H. S. Hahn, “A new algorithm for ellipse detection by curve segments,” Pattern Recognition Letters, vol. 29, no. 13, pp. 1836–1841, 2008. [click]
W. Cai, Q. Yu, and H. Wang, “A fast contour-based approach to circle and ellipse detection,” Intelligent Control and Automation, vol. 5, pp. 4686–4690, 2004. [click]
L. Xu and E. Oja, “Randomized Hough Transform (RHT): Basic mechanisms, algorithms, and computational complexities,” Image Understanding, vol. 57, no. 2, pp. 131–154, 1993. [click]
R. A. McLaughlin, “Randomized Hough Transform: Improved ellipse detection with comparison,” Pattern Recognition Letter, vol. 19, no. 3-4, pp. 299–305, 1998. [click]
P. S. Nair and A. T. Saunders Jr. “Hough transform based ellipse detection algorithm,” Pattern Recognition Letter, vol. 17, no. 10, pp. 777–784, 1996. [click]
A. S. Aguado, M. E. Montiel, and M. S. Nixon, “Ellipse detection via gradient direction in the Hough transform,” Proc. of International Conference on Image Processing and its Applications, pp. 375–378, 1995. [click]
Z. Teng, J. H. Kim, and D. J. Kang, “Ellipse detection: a simple and precise method based on randomized Hough transform,” Optical Engineering, vol. 51, no. 5, 2012. [click]
M. Fornaciari, A. Prati, and R. Cucchiara, “A fast and effective ellipse detector for embedded vision applications,” Pattern Recognition, vol. 47, no. 11, pp. 3693–3708, 2014. [click]
J. Canny, “A computational approach to edge detection,” Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, vol. 8, no. 6, pp. 679–698, 1986. [click]
https://gist.github.com/egonSchiele/756833
C. Yizong, “Mean shift, mode seeking, and clustering,” Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, vol. 17, no. 8, pp. 790–799, 1995. [click]
M. A. Fischler and R. C. Bolles, “Random sample consensus: a paradigm for model fitting with applications to image analysis and automated cartography,” Communications of the ACM, vol. 24, no. 6, pp. 381–395, 1981. [click]
A. Fitzgibbon, M. Pilu, and R. B. Fisher, “Direct least square fitting of ellipses,” Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, vol. 21, no. 5, pp. 476–480, 1999. [click]
P. L. Rosin, “Further five-point fit ellipse fitting,” Graphical Models and Image Processing, vol. 61, no. 5, pp. 245–259, 1999. [click]
http://www.vision.caltech.edu/Image_Datasets/Caltech256/256_ObjectCategories.tar
https://imagelab.ing.unimore.it/imagelab/ellipse/ellipse_dataset.zip
L. Libuda, I. Grothues, and K. F. Kraiss, “Ellipse detection in digital image data using geometric features,” Communications in Computer and Information Science, no. 4, pp. 229–239, 2007. [click]
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Recommended by Associate Editor Hauping Liu under the direction of Editor Euntai Kim. This work was supported by a 2-Year Research Grant of Pusan National University.
Bae-Keun Kwon received his B.S. degree from School of Mechanical Engineering at Pusan National University, Pusan, Korea in 2008. He received his combined MS and Ph.D. degree from same school of PNU. Now he is a research engineer in LG electronics. His research interests include pattern recognition, image processing and object detection.
Zhu Teng received her B.S. degree in Automation from Central South university, China, in 2006 and a combined MS and Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Pusan National University, Pusan, Korea, in 2013. She is now an assistant professor in Beijing Jiaotong University, China. Her current research interests are shape recognition, machine vision, and pattern recognition.
Tae-Jung Roh received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from KAIST, Korea, in 1986 and 1995, respectively. Now he is a professor at the Dept. of Mechatronics Engineering in Tongmyong University. His current research interests are mechatronics and factory automation.
Dong-Joong Kang received his BS degree in Precision Engineering from Pusan National University, Pusan, Korea, in 1988, and his MS and Ph.D. degrees in Mechanical, and Automation & Design Engineering from KAIST, Korea, in 1990 and 1999, respectively. In 1997 to 2000, he was a research engineer at SAIT (Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology). Now he is a professor at the School of Mechanical Engineering in Pusan National University. He is also an associate editor of the International Journal of Control, Automation, and Systems since 2007. His current research interests are machine vision, pattern recognition, and visual inspection in factory.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kwon, BK., Teng, Z., Roh, TJ. et al. Fast ellipse detection based on three point algorithm with edge angle information. Int. J. Control Autom. Syst. 14, 804–813 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12555-014-0561-y
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12555-014-0561-y