Livewire Segmentation Technique
Livewire, is a segmentation technique which allows a user to select regions of interest to be extracted quickly and accurately, using simple mouse clicks. It is based on the lowest cost path algorithm, by Edsger W. Dijkstra. Firstly convolve the image with a Sobel filter to extract edges. Each pixel of the resulting image is a vertex of the graph and has edges going to the 4 pixels around it, as up, down, left, right. The edge costs are defined based on a cost function. In 1995, Eric N. Mortensen and William A. Barrett made some extension work on livewire segmentation tool, which is known as Intelligent Scissors. Livewire segmentation The user sets the starting point clicking on an image's pixel, known as an anchor. Then, as he starts to move the mouse over other points, the smallest cost path is drawn from the anchor to the pixel where the mouse is over, changing itself if the user moves the mouse. If he wants to choose the path that is being displayed, he simply clicks the image again. One can easily see in the right image, that the places where the user clicked to outline the desired region of interest