Preface When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing Enrique Jardiel Poncela This edition is the most comprehensive revision of Digital Image Processing since the book first appeared in 1977. As the 1977 and 1987 editions by gonzalez and Wintz, and the 1992 edition by Gonzalez and Woods, the present edition was prepared with students and instructors in mind. Thus, the principal objectives of the book continue to be to provide an introduction to basic concepts and methodologies for digital image processing, and to develop a foundation that can be used as the basis for further study and research in this field. To achieve these objectives, we again focused on material that we believe is fundamental and has a scope of application that is not limited to the solution of specialized prob- lems. The mathematical complexity of the book remains at a level well within the grasp of college seniors and first-year graduate students who have intro- ductory preparation in mathematical analysis, vectors, matrices, probability, sta- tistics, and rudimentary computer programming. so The present edition was influenced significantly by a recent market survey 1. A need for more motivation in the introductory chapter regarding the spec- trum of applications of digital image processing 2. A simplification and shortening of material in the early chapters in order to"get to the subject matter"as quickly as possible. 3. A more intuitive presentation in some areas, such as image transforms and restoration 4. Individual chapter coverage of color image processing, wavelets, and image morphology. 5. An increase in the breadth of problems at the end of each chapter The reorganization that resulted in this edition is our attempt at providing a reasonable degree of balance between rigor in the presentation, the findings of the market survey, and suggestions made by students, readers, and colleagues since the last edition of the book. The major changes made in the book are as Chapter 1 was rewritten completely. The main focus of the current treatment is on examples of areas that use digital image processing. While far from ex- haustive, the examples shown will leave little doubt in the reader's mind re garding the breadth of application of digital image processing methodologies. Chapter 2 is totally new also. The focus of the presentation in this chapter is on how digital images are generated, and on the closely related concepts ofPreface When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing. Enrique Jardiel Poncela This edition is the most comprehensive revision of Digital Image Processing since the book first appeared in 1977.As the 1977 and 1987 editions by Gonzalez and Wintz, and the 1992 edition by Gonzalez and Woods, the present edition was prepared with students and instructors in mind.Thus, the principal objectives of the book continue to be to provide an introduction to basic concepts and methodologies for digital image processing, and to develop a foundation that can be used as the basis for further study and research in this field.To achieve these objectives, we again focused on material that we believe is fundamental and has a scope of application that is not limited to the solution of specialized prob￾lems. The mathematical complexity of the book remains at a level well within the grasp of college seniors and first-year graduate students who have intro￾ductory preparation in mathematical analysis, vectors, matrices, probability, sta￾tistics, and rudimentary computer programming. The present edition was influenced significantly by a recent market survey conducted by Prentice Hall. The major findings of this survey were: 1. A need for more motivation in the introductory chapter regarding the spec￾trum of applications of digital image processing. 2. A simplification and shortening of material in the early chapters in order to “get to the subject matter” as quickly as possible. 3. A more intuitive presentation in some areas, such as image transforms and image restoration. 4. Individual chapter coverage of color image processing, wavelets, and image morphology. 5. An increase in the breadth of problems at the end of each chapter. The reorganization that resulted in this edition is our attempt at providing a reasonable degree of balance between rigor in the presentation, the findings of the market survey, and suggestions made by students, readers, and colleagues since the last edition of the book. The major changes made in the book are as follows. Chapter 1 was rewritten completely.The main focus of the current treatment is on examples of areas that use digital image processing. While far from ex￾haustive, the examples shown will leave little doubt in the reader’s mind re￾garding the breadth of application of digital image processing methodologies. Chapter 2 is totally new also.The focus of the presentation in this chapter is on how digital images are generated, and on the closely related concepts of xv GONZFM-i-xxii. 5-10-2001 14:22 Page xv