Algorithm to detect overlapping rows of two images

algorithm, image, image-processing

Solution

The FFT solution might be more complex than you were hoping for. For a general problem, that might be the only robust way.

For a simple solution, you need to start making assumptions. For example, can you guarantee that the columns of the images line up (barring the noted changes)? This allows you to go down the path suggested by @n.m.

Can you cut the image into vertical strips, and consider a row matches if a sufficient proportion of the strips match?

[ This could be redone to use a few passes with difference column offsets if we need to be robust to that.]

This gives something like:

class Image
{
public:
    virtual ~Image() {}
    typedef int Pixel;
    virtual Pixel* getRow(int rowId) const = 0;
    virtual int getWidth() const = 0;
    virtual int getHeight() const = 0;
};

class Analyser
{
    Analyser(const Image& a, const Image& b)
        : a_(a), b_(b) {}
    typedef Image::Pixel* Section;
    static const int numStrips = 16;
    struct StripId
    {
        StripId(int r = 0, int c = 0)
            : row_(r), strip_(c)
        {}
        int row_;
        int strip_;
    };
    typedef std::unordered_map<unsigned, StripId> StripTable;
    int numberOfOverlappingRows()
    {
        int commonWidth = std::min(a_.getWidth(), b_.getWidth());
        int stripWidth = commonWidth/numStrips;
        StripTable aHash;
        createStripTable(aHash, a_, stripWidth);
        StripTable bHash;
        createStripTable(bHash, b_, stripWidth);
        // This is the position that the bottom row of A appears in B.
        int bottomOfA = 0;
        bool canFindBottomOfAInB = canFindLine(a_.getRow(a_.getHeight() - 1), bHash, stripWidth,  bottomOfA);
        int topOfB= 0;
        bool canFindTopOfBInA =  canFindLine(b_.getRow(0), aHash, stripWidth, topOfB);
        int topOFBfromBottomOfA = a_.getHeight() - topOfB;
        // Expect topOFBfromBottomOfA == bottomOfA
        return bottomOfA;
    }
    bool canFindLine(Image::Pixel* source, StripTable& target, int stripWidth, int& matchingRow)
    {
        Image::Pixel* strip = source;
        std::map<int, int> matchedRows;
        for(int index = 0; index < stripWidth; ++index)
        {
            Image::Pixel hashValue = getHashOfStrip(strip,stripWidth);      
            bool match =  target.count(hashValue) > 0;
            if (match)
            {
                ++matchedRows[target[hashValue].row_];
            }
            strip += stripWidth;
        }
        // Can set a threshold requiring more matches than 0
        if (matchedRows.size() == 0)
            return false;
        // FIXME return the most matched row.
        matchingRow = matchedRows.begin()->first;
        return true; 
    }
    Image::Pixel* getStrip(const Image& im, int row, int stripId, int stripWidth)
    {
        return im.getRow(row) + stripId * stripWidth;
    }
    static Image::Pixel getHashOfStrip(Image::Pixel* strip, unsigned width)
    {
        Image::Pixel hashValue = 0;
        for(unsigned col = 0; col < width; ++col)
        {
            hashValue |= *(strip + col);
        }
    }
    void createStripTable(StripTable& hash, const Image& image, int stripWidth)
    {
        for(int row = 0; row < image.getHeight(); ++row)
        {
            for(int index = 0; index < stripWidth; ++index)
            {
                // Warning: Not this simple!
                // If images are sourced from lossy intermediate and hence pixels not _exactly_ the same, need some kind of fuzzy equality here.
                // Details are going to depend on the image format etc, but this is the gist.
                Image::Pixel* strip = getStrip(image, row, index, stripWidth);
                Image::Pixel hashValue = getHashOfStrip(strip,stripWidth);      
                hash[hashValue] = StripId(row, index);
            }
        }
    }

    const Image& a_;
    const Image& b_;

};

Problem

Original source