Title Automated quantification of brittle stars in seabed imagery using computer vision techniques /
Authors Buškus, Kazimieras ; Vaičiukynas, Evaldas ; Verikas, Antanas ; Medelytė, Saulė ; Šiaulys, Andrius ; Šaškov, Aleksej
DOI 10.3390/s21227598
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Is Part of Sensors.. Basel : MDPI. 2021, vol. 21, iss. 22, art. no. 7598, p. 1-15.. ISSN 1424-8220
Keywords [eng] deep learning ; ophiuroidea ; semantic segmentation ; underwater imagery
Abstract [eng] Underwater video surveys play a significant role in marine benthic research. Usually, surveys are filmed in transects, which are stitched into 2D mosaic maps for further analysis. Due to the massive amount of video data and time-consuming analysis, the need for automatic image segmentation and quantitative evaluation arises. This paper investigates such techniques on annotated mosaic maps containing hundreds of instances of brittle stars. By harnessing a deep convolutional neural network with pre-trained weights and post-processing results with a common blob detection technique, we investigate the effectiveness and potential of such segment-and-count approach by assessing the segmentation and counting success. Discs could be recommended instead of full shape masks for brittle stars due to faster annotation among marker variants tested. Underwater image enhancement techniques could not improve segmentation results noticeably, but some might be useful for augmentation purposes.
Published Basel : MDPI
Type Journal article
Language English
Publication date 2021
CC license CC license description