Digital Image Processing

Relationships between pixels

• In this lecture, we consider several
important relationships between pixels in a
digital image.
 Neighbors of a Pixel
• A pixel p at coordinates (x,y) has four horizontal and vertical
neighbors whose coordinates are given by:
(x+1,y), (x-1, y), (x, y+1), (x,y-1)

(x, y-1)
(x-1, y) P (x,y) (x+1, y)
(x, y+1)

This set of pixels, called the 4-neighbors or p, is denoted by N4(p).

Each pixel is one unit distance from (x,y) and some of the neighbors
of p lie outside the digital image if (x,y) is on the border of the image.
 Neighbors of a Pixel
• The four diagonal neighbors of p have coordinates:
(x+1, y+1), (x+1, y-1), (x-1, y+1), (x-1, y-1)

(x-1, y+1) (x+1, y-1)

P (x,y)
(x-1, y-1) (x+1, y+1)
and are denoted by ND (p).
These points, together with the 4-neighbors, are called the 8-neighbors of p, denoted
by N8 (p).

(x-1, y+1) (x, y-1) (x+1, y-1)

(x-1, y) P (x,y) (x+1, y)
As before, some of the points in ND (p) and N8 (p) fall outside the image if (x,y) is on the
(x-1, y-1) (x, y+1) (x+1, y+1)
border of the image.
 Adjacency and Connectivity
• Let V: a set of intensity values used to define
adjacency and connectivity.
• In a binary image, V = {1}, if we are referring
to adjacency of pixels with value 1.
• In a gray-scale image, the idea is the same,
but V typically contains more elements, for
example, V = {180, 181, 182, …, 200}
• If the possible intensity values 0 – 255, V set
can be any subset of these 256 values.
 Types of Adjacency
1. 4-adjacency: Two pixels p and q with
values from V are 4-adjacent if q is in the
set N4(p).
2. 8-adjacency: Two pixels p and q with
values from V are 8-adjacent if q is in the
set N8(p).
3. m-adjacency =(mixed)
 Types of Adjacency
• m-adjacency:
Two pixels p and q with values from V are
m-adjacent if :
• q is in N4(p) or
• q is in ND(p) and the set N4(p) ∩ N4(q) has no
pixel whose values are from V (no intersection)

• Important Note: the type of adjacency

used must be specified
 Types of Adjacency
• Mixed adjacency is a modification of 8-
adjacency. It is introduced to eliminate the
ambiguities that often arise when 8-
adjacency is used.
• For example:
 Types of Adjacency
• In this example, we can note that to connect between
two pixels (finding a path between two pixels):
– In 8-adjacency way, you can find multiple paths
between two pixels
– While, in m-adjacency, you can find only one path
between two pixels
• So, m-adjacency has eliminated the multiple path
connection that has been generated by the 8-adjacency.
• Two subsets S1 and S2 are adjacent, if some pixel in S1
is adjacent to some pixel in S2. Adjacent means, either
4-, 8- or m-adjacency.
 A Digital Path
• A digital path (or curve) from pixel p with coordinate
(x,y) to pixel q with coordinate (s,t) is a sequence of
distinct pixels with coordinates (x0,y0), (x1,y1), …,
(xn, yn) where (x0,y0) = (x,y) and (xn, yn) = (s,t) and
pixels (xi, yi) and (xi-1, yi-1) are adjacent for 1 ≤ i ≤ n
• n is the length of the path
• If (x0,y0) = (xn, yn), the path is closed.
• We can specify 4-, 8- or m-paths depending on the
type of adjacency specified.
 A Digital Path
• Return to the previous example:

In figure (b) the paths between the top right and

bottom right pixels are 8-paths. And the path
between the same 2 pixels in figure (c) is m-path
 Connectivity
• Let S represent a subset of pixels in an
image, two pixels p and q are said to be
connected in S if there exists a path between
them consisting entirely of pixels in S.
• For any pixel p in S, the set of pixels that are
connected to it in S is called a connected
component of S. If it only has one connected
component, then set S is called a connected
set.
 Region and Boundary
• Region
Let R be a subset of pixels in an image, we
call R a region of the image if R is a connected
set.
• Boundary
The boundary (also called border or
contour) of a region R is the set of pixels in
the region that have one or more neighbors
that are not in R.
 Region and Boundary
If R happens to be an entire image, then its boundary is
defined as the set of pixels in the first and last rows and
columns in the image.

This extra definition is required because an image has no

neighbors beyond its borders

Normally, when we refer to a region, we are referring to

subset of an image, and any pixels in the boundary of the
region that happen to coincide with the border of the image
are included implicitly as part of the region boundary.
 Distance Measures
• For pixels p, q and z, with coordinates
(x,y), (s,t) and (v,w), respectively, D is a
distance function if:
(a) D (p,q) ≥ 0 (D (p,q) = 0 iff p = q),
(b) D (p,q) = D (q, p), and
(c) D (p,z) ≤ D (p,q) + D (q,z).
 Distance Measures
• The Euclidean Distance between p and q
is defined as:
De (p,q) = [(x – s)2 + (y - t)2]1/2
q (s,t)
, q)
(p
De
Pixels having a distance less than or equal
to some value r from (x,y) are the points
contained in a disk of
p (x,y)
radius r centered at (x,y)
 Distance Measures
• The D4 distance (also called city-block
distance) between p and q is defined as:
D4 (p,q) = | x – s | + | y – t |
q (s,t)

Pixels having a D4 distance from

(x,y), less than or equal to some
D4
value r form a Diamond p (x,y)

centered at (x,y)
 Distance Measures
Example:
The pixels with distance D4 ≤ 2 from (x,y)
form the following contours of constant
distance.

The pixels with D4 = 1 are

the 4-neighbors of (x,y)
 Distance Measures
• The D8 distance (also called chessboard
distance) between p and q is defined as:
D8 (p,q) = max(| x – s |,| y – t |)
q (s,t)

Pixels having a D8 distance from

(x,y), less than or equal to some D8(b)

value r form a square p (x,y) D 8(a)

Centered at (x,y) D = max(D

8 8(a) , D8(b))
 Distance Measures
Example:
D8 distance ≤ 2 from (x,y) form the following
contours of constant distance.
 Distance Measures
• Dm distance:
is defined as the shortest m-path between
the points.
In this case, the distance between two
pixels will depend on the values of the
pixels along the path, as well as the values
of their neighbors.
 Distance Measures
• Example:
Consider the following arrangement of
pixels and assume that p, p2, and p4 have
value 1 and that p1 and p3 can have can
have a value of 0 or 1
Suppose that we consider
the adjacency of pixels
values 1 (i.e. V = {1})
 Distance Measures
• Cont. Example:
Now, to compute the Dm between points p
and p4
Here we have 4 cases:
Case1: If p1 =0 and p3 = 0
The length of the shortest m-path
(the Dm distance) is 2 (p, p2, p4)
 Distance Measures
• Cont. Example:
Case2: If p1 =1 and p3 = 0
then, the length of the shortest
path will be 3 (p, p1, p2, p4)
 Distance Measures
• Cont. Example:
Case3: If p1 =0 and p3 = 1
The same applies here, and the shortest –
m-path will be 3 (p, p2, p3, p4)
 Distance Measures
• Cont. Example:
Case4: If p1 =1 and p3 = 1
The length of the shortest m-path will be 4
(p, p1 , p2, p3, p4)