Human-vision-based selection of image processing algorithms for planetary exploration

Independent and automatic image processing is a fundamental objective of the computer vision community. Understanding the role of the eye movement scan path in human vision is an important step toward the achievement of this objective. This top-down model of higher human vision is a new approach to bottom-up image processing algorithms and provides an important new metric and tool in computer vision. We have demonstrated that a small and manageable collection of image processing algorithms, experimentally selected and then combined together can serve in a task such as predicting human eye fixations identifying geological features. Thus, automatic picture analysis based upon human vision could be an essential element in planetary exploration.