A contour detection method: Initialization and contour model

In this paper, a new contour detection method based on the snake model is d eveloped and reported. The proposed method consists of two steps. The first step is to locate the initial snake contour and a novel initialization alg orithm has been developed. In the second step, an improved snake algorithm is developed to locate the final contour(s). Images with single and multipl e objects are selected to evaluate the capability of the proposed method an d the results are encouraging. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights re served.