Java Image Processing Tutorial

Use of geometrical primitives such as lines, curves, points, polygons etc. (which can be mathematically derived) to represent image constitute Vector graphics. As name suggests Vector Graphics constitute of Vectors(location points) and graphics(images). Reader must know vectors before he understands this implementation. (Vector represented by V with an arrow mark at the top.). Each of these vectors has a definite position on the multidimensional plane and determines the direction of the path. Also each path may be assigned a colour, texture, shape, contrast or thickness. Right now, the standard followed is Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), recommended by The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

Conversion of raster graphics into vector graphics is known as Vectorization  or Image tracing. Classic example is when satellite captures images, they cectorize it to create maps. There are many algorithms for Vectorization. There is no single defined clear cut algorithm for this. Some of them are 1) Sobel 2) Canny Edge 3) Roberts Cross 4) Sparse Pixel 5) MaxDistanceVectorizer 6) LineVectorizer 7) DirectionBasedVectorizer