Patent ID: 7991224

Claim:
A method of segmenting a digital image comprising a plurality of pixels, said method using at least a processor to perform the steps of: generating a plurality of blocks of pixels from said digital image; and producing at least one connected component for each block using said blocks of pixels in a one-pass manner, said producing step comprising: segmenting a block of pixels into at least one connected component, each connected component comprising a group of pixels that are spatially connected and semantically related, said segmenting step comprising: estimating a number of representative colors for each block; quantizing each block to said representative colors; and forming connected components from each quantized block; merging said at least one connected component of said block with at least one connected component segmented from at least one other block that has been previously processed; and storing, for said block, the connected components of said block and data representing the location, in the digital image, of the connected components of said block.