HOW EASY IS MATCHING 2D LINE MODELS USING LOCAL SEARCH

Local search is a well established and highly effective method for sol ving complex combinatorial optimization problems. Here, local search i s adapted to solve difficult geometric matching problems. Matching is posed as the problem of finding the optimal many-to-many correspondenc e mapping between a line segment model and image line segments. Image data is assumed to be fragmented, noisy, and cluttered. The algorithms presented have been used for robot navigation, photo interpretation, and scene understanding. This paper explores how local search performs as model complexity increases, image clutter increases, and additiona l model instances are added to the image data. Expected run-times to f ind optimal matches with 95 percent confidence are determined for 48 d istinct problems involving six models. Nonlinear regression is used to estimate run-time growth as a function of problem size. Both polynomi al and exponential growth models are fit to the run-time data. For pro blems with random clutter, the polynomial model fits better and growth is comparable to that for tree search. Far problems involving symmetr ic models and multiple model instances, where tree search is exponenti al, the polynomial growth model is superior to the exponential growth model for one search; algorithm and comparable for another.