Min-# polygonal approximation of closed curves

Polygonal approximation of closed contours with minimum number of segments can be found by applying optimal algorithm for the open curves repeated for all possible starting points, or by using heuristic adjustment of the starting point. A better approach, however, is to extend the optimal algorithm from open to closed curves by extending the search space circularly. In this paper, we adopt this idea to the case of min-# problem. The proposed algorithm finds the optimal solution in less than 1.5 times of the time required by the open curve.