A high performance edge detector based on fuzzy inference rules

Edge detection is an important topic in computer vision and image processing. In this paper, a novel edge detector based on fuzzy If-Then inference rules and edge continuity is proposed. The fuzzy If-Then rule system is designed to model edge continuity criteria. The maximum entropy principle is used in the parameter adjusting process. We also discuss the related issues in designing fuzzy edge detectors. We compare it with the popular edge detectors: Sobel and Canny edge detectors. The proposed fuzzy edge detector does not need parameter setting as Canny edge detector does, and it can preserve an appropriate detection in details. It is very robust to noise and can work well under high level noise situations, while other edge detectors cannot. The detector efficiently extracts edges in images corrupted by noise without requiring the filtering process. The experimental results demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method to existing ones. (c) 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.