Text Removal Using Wavelet Transform and Morphological Operations
An Approach for the Removal of Text and Ink Artifacts from Historical Watermark Images
D. Banta (TU Delft - Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science)
Martin Skrodzki – Mentor (TU Delft - Computer Graphics and Visualisation)
Jorge Martinez – Mentor (TU Delft - Multimedia Computing)
Christoph Lofi – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Web Information Systems)
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Abstract
Watermarks have an essential role in identifying the origins and age of specific documents. However, this is often a laborious process. One of the main issues in automatic watermark segmentation is the presence of text that obstructs it, making it difficult to properly reconstruct a watermark. Image processing and machine learning techniques face limitations, requiring time, training of data, or manual parameter selection. This research introduces a new method using wavelets transform to locate and remove text from a watermarked image, while preserving the underlying watermark. This method manages to outperform classic image processing techniques for the case when text is thicker than the watermark outline.