Parameterization of written signatures based on EFD

Abstract

In this work we propose a method to quantify written signatures from digitalized images based on the use of Elliptical Fourier Descriptors (EFD). As usually signatures are not represented as a closed contour, and being that a necessary condition in order to apply EFD, we have developed a method that represents the signatures by means of a set of closed contours. One of the advantages of this method is that it can reconstruct the original shape from all the coefficients, or an approximated shape from a reduced set of them finding the appropriate number of EFD coefficients required for preserving the important information in each application. EFD provides accurate frequency information, thus the use of EFD opens many possibilities. The method can be extended to represent other kind of shapes.