Computer Science - The City College of New York
CSC I6716 - Fall 2007  3D Computer Vision and Video Computing

Assignment 2.
Edge Detection Exercise ( Due: Oct 09 before class)


Note:  Turn in a document (in writing) containing a list of your .m files, images showing the results of your experiments, and an analysis of the results.All the writings must be hard copies in print - you may hand them in during class, or put them in my mailbox in the CS main office . You also need to turn in your “soft” copies of your assignment via email. Send your source code to me by email ONLY – please don’t send in your images and executable (if you use C++).  You are responsible for the lose of your submissions if you don’t write  “CSC I6716 Computer Vision Assignment 2” in the subject of your email. Do write your names and IDs (last four digits) in both your hardcopy and softcopy submissions.


Choose one or two of the images on the course web page for this assignment or use an image of your own choice.  If you use a different image, be careful that the image has not been saved under JPEG using a high level of compression.  This often introduces artifacts into the image that confound subsequent analyses of the results.  For the most part, you should apply the edge operators to a grayscale version of the image. 

1.  Apply the 1x2 operator and Sobel operator to your image and analyze the results.  Does the Sobel operator have any clear visual advantages over the 1x2 operator?  If you subtract the 1x2 edge image from the Sobel are there any residuals? (Note: don't forget to normalize your results as shown in slide # 29 of  feature extraction lecture: part 2)

2.  Does changing the individual weights in the Sobel-like operator have any discernable impact on the results (locations, strengths and orientations of edge points)?  If so, explain. (Hint: you may use a 3*3 image  with a 2D step of 45 degrees. For more details, please refer to slide # 36 of  feature extraction lecture: part 2)

3.  What happens when you increase the size of the kernel to 5x5 , or 7x7? Discuss computational cost, edge detection results and sensitivity to noise, etc.

4.  Suppose you apply the Sobel operator to each of the RGB color planes comprising the image.  How might you combine these results into a color edge detector?  Do the resulting edge differ from the gray scale results?  How and why?