Patent Document ID: 4538299
Application ID: 06470208
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. An apparatus for automatically locating the boundary of an object in a field of view, said apparatus comprising: imaging means for forming an electrical image of the field of view; means for forming a first representation of said image by segmenting said image into a plurality of pixels and digitizing the image intensity of each pixel into an electrical signal representing the greyscale value; means for processing the electrical signal of each of said greyscale value to form a second representation of said image; logic means for converting said second representation into a third representation whereby the value of a pixel at a location (hereinafter: pixel (X,Y)) in the second representation and the values of the nearest adjacent neighbors of said pixel at said location are converted into a single value at said corresponding location (hereinafter: P(X,Y)) in said third representation; storage means for storing said third representation; and table means for storing various possible values of P(X,Y), said table means for receiving a value of P(X,Y) and an input direction value, and for producing an output direction value to indicate the next location of P(X,Y) having a non-zero value; said non-zero values of P(X,Y) form the boundary of said object.