Skin region segmentation using an image-adapted colour model

Abstract

This paper presents a new skin region extraction method that generates an imageadapted skin colour model and then segments skin areas using the model. Our method first detects eyes by using an eye map and then develops an image-adapted skin colour distribution model based on a skin map generated by reliably selecting true skin samples near the detected eyes. All skin areas over the entire image are then segmented with the generated skin model. While most of the existing skin detection methods use some pre-defined colour model, our skin model is adaptively constructed from each test image online so that it can overcome fundamental difficulties in extracting skin areas. Experimental results show that our skin extraction method gives better results as compared to other existing approaches.