Change Classification in Graphics-Intensive Digital Documents

This paper proposes an approach for the automatic detection and classification of changes occurring in images of documents with identical content, but generated with different software versions, or under different operating platforms. Our work is performed on a database of digitally-born business documents created using financial reporting tools. The proposed method involves a multi-stage process, where the end goal is to present to a human user the reports which have changed and the changes which were detected. Our main contribution is related to matching and comparing of graphical document elements. This paper focuses on detection of local, translation-based changes. Future work will explore other local changes involving size, color, and rotation.