Skeletonization of two-dimesional regions using hybrid method

Abstract

Conversion of two-dimensional objects into a skeletal representation forms an essential step in many image processing and pattern recognition applications. Most of the topological structure of objects, and the information contained in the outline of their shapes, are preserved in the skeleton. Approaches based on Voronoi techniques preserve topology, but heuristic measures are introduced to remove unwanted edges. Methods based on Euclidean distance functions can localize skeletal points accurately, but often at the cost of altering the topology of the object. In this paper we offer a method to generate skeletal representations combining this two methods , which is robust and accurate, and preserves topology.