Automatic seam-line determination for orthoimage mosaics using edge-tracking based on a DSM

A novel seam-line determination method was developed via edge tracking based on Digital Surface Model (DSM). The whole work-flow includes 4 steps: generation of initial network with standard Voronoi Diagram, generation of edge diagram with DSM, relocation of vertices in the initial network based on edge diagram, and optimization of seam-lines using edge tracking algorithm based on edge diagram. This method is not sensitive to terrain since the edge diagram is detected by height gradient based on DSM. The edge tracking algorithm is also efficient since none shortest path searching algorithm (such as Dijkstra's algorithm) is used. All the seam-lines are optimized based on a single edge diagram which has the same size as the DSM data. Preliminary results have shown that the proposed method produces acceptable results, from quality and efficiency perspectives.