Image clustering algorithm using superpixel segmentation and non‐symmetric Gaussian–Cauchy mixture model

Abstract

In this study, an unsupervised clustering algorithm is proposed to label superpixel density images. Firstly, the authors propose a novel superpixel segmentation algorithm driven by a modified fuzzy C‐means objective function, Kullback–Leibler (KL) divergence, and an entropy term, which generate superpixels with good boundary adherence and intensity homogeneity. In this model, the logarithm of Gaussian distribution as a new distance metric is used to improve the accuracy of boundary pixel classification, the KL divergence is applied to regularise the fuzzy objective function. Based on this model, the generated superpixel intensity images with a highly distinctive background colour from the colour of the target are obtained. Grouping cues generated by superpixels can affect the performance of image clustering greatly. Next, according to the small amount of clustering data generated by the superpixel intensity images, they construct a non‐symmetric mixture model based on a mixture of Gaussian distribution and Cauchy distribution for implementing image clustering. Thus, clustering of colour images is transformed into clustering of these newly generated data. The advantage of this model is its well adaption to different shapes of observed data. Experimental results on publicly available data sets are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.