A 2D-fractional derivative mask for image feature edge detection

Feature extraction is a classic problem of machine vision and image processing. Edges are often detected using integer-order differential operators. In this paper, a one-dimensional digital fractional-order Charef differentiator (1D-FCD) is introduced and extended to 2D by a multi-directional operator. The obtained 2D-fractional differentiation (2D-FCD) is a new edge detection operation. The computed multi-directional mask coefficients are computed in a way that image details are detected and preserved. Experiments on texture images have demonstrated the efficiency of the proposed filter compared to existing techniques.