Signature segmentation from machine printed documents using conditional random field

Abstract

Automatic separation of signatures from a document page involves difficult challenges due to the free-flow nature of handwriting, overlapping/touching of signature parts with printed text, noise, etc. In this paper, we have proposed a novel approach for the segmentation of signatures from machine printed signed documents. The algorithm first locates the signature block in the document using word level feature extraction. Next, the signature strokes that touch or overlap with the printed texts are separated. A stroke level classification is then performed using skeleton analysis to separate the overlapping strokes of printed text from the signature. Gradient based features and Support Vector Machine (SVM) are used in our scheme. Finally, a Conditional Random Field (CRF) model energy minimization concept based on approximated labeling by graph cut is applied to label the strokes as "signature" or "printed text" for accurate segmentation of signatures. Signature segmentation experiment is performed in "tobacco" dataset and we have obtained encouraging results. © 2011 IEEE.