9 - Image Processing

Summary

The term image processing refers to the manipulation or analysis of digital images. While manipulation alters the image in some way to make it more meaningful or informative, analysis merely extracts information from the image without changing its pixels. This chapter describes some very basic notions in image processing, namely segmentation, morphological operators such as erosion and dilation and noise reduction, and labeling. Image processing is really a whole field of expertise, involving rather sophisticated mathematical methods. This chapter aims to familiarize the reader with the field, setting the ground for further exploration of this fascinating topic.