Automatic extraction of built-up footprints from high resolution overhead imagery through manipulation of alpha-tree data structures

摘要

A system for automatically extracting or isolating structures or areas of interest (e.g., built-up structures such as buildings, houses, shelters, tents; agricultural areas; etc.) from HR/VHR overhead imagery data by way of making as little as a single pass through a hierarchical data structure of input image components (where pixels are grouped into components based on any appropriate definition or measure of dissimilarity between adjacent pixels of the input image) to identify candidate components (e.g., possible structures of interest) free of necessarily having to re-iterate the same operator configured with different threshold parameters for a plurality of values.

主权项

1. A method for use in extracting structures of interest from overhead imagery data, comprising:
identifying, using a processor, a plurality of groups of pixels in at least one input overhead image of a geographical region, wherein each pixel in each group is adjacent to at least one other pixel in the group, wherein adjacent pixels in each group do not differ by more than a predetermined level of a dissimilarity measure between the adjacent pixels, wherein a plurality of such groups of pixels at each of a plurality of successive predetermined levels of the dissimilarity measure are identified, wherein the groups at one of the predetermined levels are hierarchically related to the groups at an adjacent one of the predetermined levels in a hierarchical data structure, and wherein each group is a first component; and detecting first components in the hierarchical data structure that each include pixels collectively comprising a geometric attribute level greater than a threshold geometric attribute level.