Gray connected components and image segmentation

A new definition for the connected components of gray images that takes into account both the gray values of the pixels and the differences of the gray values of the neighboring pixels is investigated. Our definition depends on two parameters epsilon and delta and so we call these components the (epsilon, delta)-components. We describe a method to find the (epsilon, delta)-components for a given image. We discuss the applications of (epsilon, delta)-components to segmentation and understanding of gray images. We describe a method to study images in an intermediate level through the (epsilon, delta)-component histograms. For appropriate values of epsilon and delta, an object in an image may be represented by an (epsilon, delta)-component. We discuss a method to adjust the values of epsilon and delta so that object extraction and segmentation may be done by locating the corresponding (epsilon, delta)-components. Our approach provides a possible method of transition from low level computer vision to a higher level vision. Since we do not make any assumptions a bout the formation model of the image data, our proposed method could be applied to many types of images.