Digital geometry deals withdiscrete sets (usually discretepoint sets) considered to bedigitizedmodels orimages of objects of the 2D or 3DEuclidean space. Simply put,digitizing is replacing an object by a discrete set of its points. The images we see on the TV screen, theraster display of a computer, or in newspapers are in factdigital images.
Constructing digitized representations of objects, with the emphasis on precision and efficiency (either by means of synthesis, see, for example,Bresenham's line algorithm or digital disks, or by means of digitization and subsequent processing of digital images).
Transforming digitized representations of objects, for example (A) into simplified shapes such as (i) skeletons, by repeated removal of simple points such that thedigital topology of an image does not change, or (ii) medial axis, by calculating local maxima in a distance transform of the given digitized object representation, or (B) into modified shapes usingmathematical morphology.
Reconstructing "real" objects or their properties (area, length, curvature, volume, surface area, and so forth) from digital images.
A 2D digital space usually means a 2D grid space that only contains integer points in 2D Euclidean space. A 2D image is a function on a 2D digital space (Seeimage processing).
In Rosenfeld and Kak's book, digital connectivity are defined as the relationship among elements in digital space. For example, 4-connectivity and 8-connectivity in 2D. Also seepixel connectivity. A digital space and its (digital-)connectivity determine adigital topology.
In digital space, the digitally continuous function (A. Rosenfeld, 1986) and thegradually varied function (L. Chen, 1989) were proposed, independently.
A digitally continuous function means a function in which the value (an integer) at a digital point is the same or off by at most 1 from its neighbors. In other words, ifx andy are two adjacent points in a digital space, |f(x) − f(y)| ≤ 1.
A gradually varied function is a function from a digital space to where and are real numbers. This function possesses the following property: Ifx andy are two adjacent points in, assume, then,, or. So we can see that the gradually varied function is defined to be more general than the digitally continuous function.
An extension theorem related to above functions was mentioned by A. Rosenfeld (1986) and completed by L. Chen (1989). This theorem states: Let and. The necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of the gradually varied extension of is : for each pair of points and in, assume and, we have, where is the (digital) distance between and.