Content-based image retrieval using color vector angle difference histogram

This paper presents an innovative method to represent an image for image retrieval in Content-Based Image Retrieval (CBIR), using a color vector angle differences histogram approach (CVADH), which is different from the existing histograms, such as color histograms, gray level co-occurrences (GLCM), color distribution entropy (CDE), or just counting the frequency number of pixels or neighbors. In contrast to other methods, the CVADH takes account of the color difference and spatial information of two pixels in RGB color space. Furthermore, it directly leverages color clues to extract shape features to show differences given different backgrounds. Experimental results show that the scheme is more efficient than traditional ones that have been developed for CBIR.