VisualSEEk: a fully automated content-based image query system

John R. Smith and Shih-Fu Chang
Department of Electrical Engineering and
Columbia University
New York, N.Y. 10027 USA
{jrsmith, sfchang}@ee.columbia.edu

 

Note: This paper was published in: John R.Smith, Shih-Fu Chang. "VisualSEEk: a Fully Automated Content-Based Image Query System". In ACM Multimedia, Boston, MA, November 1996." [pdf]

Abstract:

 

We describe a highly functional prototype system for searching by visual features in an image database. The VisualSEEk system is novel in that the user forms the queries by diagramming spatial arrangements of color regions. The system finds the images that contain the most similar arrangements of similar regions. Prior to the queries, the system automatically extracts and indexes salient color regions from the images. By utilizing efficient indexing techniques for color information, region sizes and absolute and relative spatial locations, a wide variety of complex joint color/spatial queries may be computed.

KEYWORDS:

image databases, content-based retrieval, image indexing, similarity retrieval, spatial query.

• INTRODUCTION
  • Content-based Image Query
  • Spatial Image Query
  • Joint Content-based/Spatial Image Query
  • Unique Features of VisualSEEk
• COLOR SETS AND BACK-PROJECTION
• COLOR QUERY
  • Color Similarity
  • Color Set Query Strategy
• SINGLE REGION QUERY
  • Region Absolute Location
  • Size
  • Single Region Query Strategy
• MULTIPLE REGIONS QUERY
  • Multiple Regions Query Strategy - Absolute Locations
  • Region Relative Location
  • Special Spatial Relations
  • Multiple Regions Query Strategy - Relative Locations
• QUERY EVALUATION
• SUMMARY AND FUTURE WORK
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• References
• About this document ...