An image of the Earth's surface from the Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM).

There is a substantial body of scientific knowledge about computer processing of visual information and the future promises even greater developments.  The subject is cross-disciplinary, drawing on mathematics and statistics, physics, electrical and optical engineering, physiology, and information theory, as well as computer science, and has many applications including remote sensing, space exploration, surveillance, manufacturing, robotics, and medicine.  The principles of digital image processing can be applied to other types of data in arrays of one, two, three, or higher dimensions.  Digital image processing is the principal area of my research.  One of the reasons that I like digital image processing is that the results of solving a problem are very visible.

The UNL Computer Science and Engineering Department offers courses in both digital image processing (CSCE472/872) and computer vision (CSCE473/873).  This course, CSCE 472/872 Digital Image Processing, focuses on lower-level imaging, especially image acquisition and image-to-image operations.  The other course, CSCE 473/873 Computer Vision, focuses on higher-level vision, especially operations that extract symbolic information from images.  These courses will prepare students to meet the growing need for scientists and engineers in digital imaging and computer vision and to participate in on-going imaging and vision-related research at UNL.  Both courses are open to students from all departments and require only knowledge of a high-level programming language, basic calculus, and elementary statistics.

The topics to be covered include image acquisition; image data structures; image operations (arithmetic, geometric, logical, convolution, transforms, etc.); and basic problems (calibration, correction, enhancement, restoration, reconstruction, segmentation, compression, etc.).  These topics are applicable to many applications.  We will use a textbook that uses the MATLAB programming environment and the MATLAB Image Processing Toolkit.  I will provide access to an online textbook I am writing which adds a few other topics, notably calibration, correction, and restoration.

Exams will account for 50% of the grade.  There will be three topical exams, each worth 10% of the grade, and a comprehensive final worth 20% of the grade.  Laboratory assignments will account for 50% of the grade.  There will be five laboratory assignments, each worth 10% of the grade.  The laboratory exercises will provide substantial hands-on experience.  Students can utilize either the CSE Department's Unix or Microsoft programming environments.  The CSE Systems FAQ provides helpful information for computer users.  The CSE Student Resource Center provides general student assistance.  (Course-specific assistance should be sought from the course instructor or course assistant.)  All use of the CSE Department's computing resources is subject to the UNL Computing Policy.  You are expected to write well-documented, modular code that accomplishes the assigned task as the minimum expectation for each assignment.  See the specifications for homework and programming assignments for details.  Most of the laboratory grade will be based on your project reports.

The CSE Department has adopted an academic integrity policy that requires reporting of all incidents of academic dishonesty to the CSE Department office.  You are responsible to read the policy and adhere to it.  While it can be permissable to discuss problems in general terms with others, you must do all class work independently.  Representing the work of anyone else as your own, in whole or in part, is plagiarism.  Sharing your work with others in the class is equally serious.  Make sure that all your files are protected.  You will be accountable if someone copies your work and hands it in.  Students whom I determine are guilty of academic dishonesty will receive a failing grade in the course and I will refer all cases of academic dishonesty to the CSE Department office with my recommendation for expulsion.

I welcome any comments or suggestions you wish to make at any time during the semester.  I plan to be flexible in conducting this class and your input will help me refine the course.  I have posted office hours when I will make every effort to be in my office, but I sometimes have other commitments so if it is important to see me try to make an appointment.  I am here most daytime hours and can usually take time to talk, so feel free to drop by most any time.  Also, email is one of the best mechanisms for contacting me.