Parallel architectures for image processing

Image processing is often considered a good candidate for the application of parallel processing because of the large volumes of data and the complex algorithms commonly encountered. This paper presents a tutorial introduction to the field of parallel image processing. After introducing the classes of parallel processing a brief review of architectures for parallel image processing is presented. Software design for low-level image processing and parallelism in high-level image processing are discussed and an application of parallel processing to handwritten postcode recognition is described. The paper concludes with a look at future technology and market trends