A Novel Pixon-Based Image Segmentation Process Using Fuzzy Filtering and Fuzzy C-mean Algorithm

Image segmentation, which is an important stage of many image processing algorithms, is the process of partitioning an image into nonintersecting regions, such that each region is homogeneous and the union of no two adjacent regions is homogeneous. This paper presents a novel pixon-based algorithm for image segmentation. The key idea is to create a pixon model by combining fuzzy filtering as a kernel function and a fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm for image segmentation. Use of fuzzy filters reduces noise and slightly smoothes the image. Use of the proposed pixon model prevented image over-segmentation and produced better experimental results than those obtained with other pixon-based algorithms.