We introduce a spatial color image retrieval method which does not include any segmentation step. This method relies on small image thumbnails and the Earth Mover's Distance (EMD). We then derive an unsupervised matching criterion using an a contrario approach. Experiments are performed on a database of illuminated manuscripts.
Thomas Hurtut, Haroldo Dalazoana, Yann Gousseau, Francis Schmitt, "Spatial color image retrieval without segmentation using thumbnails and the Earth Mover's Distance" in Proc. IS&T CGIV 2006 3rd European Conf. on Colour in Graphics, Imaging, and Vision, 2006, pp 54 - 59, https://doi.org/10.2352/CGIV.2006.3.1.art00011