Use of the sigma probability in Tomita´s filter

An image smoothing algorithm, the Sig-Tomita algorithm, based on the sigma probability used in the sigma filter and the directional method used in the Tomita´s filter is proposed. The sigma probability used in sigma filter is integrated with Tomita´s (1977) directional smoothing process. In this approach, the geometric shape of the subregion selected is varied instead of a square shape as used in most edge-preserving algorithms. It is shown that a more homogeneous neighbourhood will be found for smoothing with the proposed algorithm. This method is effective in smoothing complex-shaped images such as remotely sensed data. The regularity of the masks used in the algorithm is simple to implement. The comparison with Tomita´s and sigma filters is illustrated