Combination of gabor wavelets and circular gabor filter for finger-vein extraction

Abstract

Recently, more attentions have been paid on finger-vein based personal identification. In real applications, finger-vein segmentation always is a crucial step to extract finger-vein features. Since finger-vein images usually are in low contrast, segmentation results often are the abridged versions of finger-vein networks. In this paper, we present a new method of finger-vein extraction based on combination of Gabor wavelets and a circular Gabor filter such that the finger-vein networks can be highlighted significantly as well as nonvascular region elimination. First, a family of Gabor wavelets is used to enhance vascular regions in an image. Then, image reconstruction is implemented using a combination rule. Finally, a circular Gabor filter is used for finger-vein extraction. Experimental results show that the proposed method is capable of extracting finger veins in an image reliably and effectively. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.