MPEG-7 texture descriptors

A texture description is useful in many applications including similarity based image search and browsing. We present here three texture descriptors that are being considered for the final committee draft of the ISO/MPEG-7 standard. A comprehensive overview of the syntax and semantics of these texture descriptors is provided. The Homogeneous Texture Descriptor (HTD) and the Edge Histogram Descriptor (EHD) are useful in similarity search. The HTD characterizes homogeneous texture regions and is also useful in texture classification and recognition. The EHD is applicable when the underlying texture is not homogeneous and can also be used in sketch based retrieval. In addition, a compact descriptor that facilitates browsing applications is also defined. These descriptors are selected after a highly competitive test and evaluation phase within the MPEG group and we briefly summarize the evaluation criteria, the datasets used and the experimental results.