Flexible montage retrieval for image data
Hiroaki Sakamoto, Hideharu Suzuki, Akira Uemori · Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE · 1994
Academic and photo libraries require the reuse of images. If the database is large, similarity retrieval and retrieval by sketch are effective. However, similarity retrieval can retrieve images that are similar to only one key image. Retrieval by sketch can retrieve images that are similar to the sketch, but it is not always easy to make a sketch sufficiently similar to the desired image. To overcome these limitations, we propose a new flexible montage retrieval method (FMR) that allows the user to retrieve images by appropriately combining characteristics of the key images in the same way that a montage picture of a criminal is constructed. In FMR, the user selects one or more key images and specifies areas (called `key regions') manually or by using image manipulating tools. He then indicates the retrieval conditions, for example, the requirement that the image to be retrieved includes specified areas. This paper describes an FMR algorithm that uses a color histogram and texture to quantify the similarity between a key region and an image in the database. The effectiveness of FMR is then statistically demonstrated by comparing its correct retrieval rate with that of retrieval by sketch. The retrieval rate is calculated from the result of retrieving the images that include a specified sky image from among more than 150 images containing various sky images.