A parallel shape coding on SIMD architecture

A parallel shape analysis by simultaneous merging of elementary features detected through calculation of the number of objects within neighboring windows is presented. The parallel algorithm can be embedded on a SIMD (single-instruction, multiple-data) mesh architecture. Elementary image features are detected inside partly overlapping windows fixed in an image plane. Each window content is processed by a separate processing element (PE). Two neighboring elementary feature elements are merged by adjacent PEs, and the joined feature chunks are merged in the next step by every 2²th PE possessing the same feature. Feature ends are propagated through 2ⁿ PEs in each nth parallel step toward opposite edges of the mesh array of PEs. The shape coding is completed if all the feature limits (e.g. edges) meet together on one PE. The approach has the property of mapping an image fragment directly into words and phrases