Dynamic wires: An alanog VLSI model for object-based processing.

Shih-Chii Liu, John G. Harris

Abstract: The dynamic-wire methodology provides dedicated lines of communication among groups of pixels of an image which share common properties. In simple applications, object regions can be grouped together to compute the area or the center of mass of each object. Alternatively, object boundaries may be used to compute curvature or contour length. These measurements are useful for higher-level tasks such as object recognition or structural saliency. The dynamic-wire methodology is efficiently implemented in fast, low-power analog hardware. Switches create a true electrical connection among selected pixels, dynamically configuring wires or resistive networks on the fly. Dynamic wires provide a model for object-based processing. This approach is different from present early vision chips which are limited to pixel-based or image-based operations. Using this methodology, we have successfully designed and demonstrated a custom analog VLSI chip which computes contour length.