Multi-spectral document image binarization using image fusion and background subtraction techniques

In this paper, the authors exploit a multispectral image representation to perform more accurate document image binarisation compared to previous color representations. In the first stage, image fusion is employed to create a “document” and a “background” image. In the second stage, the FastICA algorithm is used to perform background subtraction. In the third stage, a spatial kernel K-harmonic means classifier binarizes the FastICA output. The proposed system outperforms previous efforts on document image binarization.