3DGPRIPS: 3-D Ground Penetrating Radar

2021 11th International Conference on Cloud Computing, Data Science & Engineering (Confluence) | 978-1-6654-1451-7/20/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/Confluence51648.2021.9377193

Image Processing System

G. Ramesh Chandra K. Rajiv B. Basaveswara Rao
Department of Computer Science Department of Information and Computer Centre
and Engineering Technology Acharya Nagajuna University
VNR Vignana Jyothi Institute of GRIET Guntur-522510
Engineering and Technology Hyderabad, India A.P, India
Hyderabad, India rajiv.research31@gmail.com
rameshchandra_g@vnrvjiet.in
Abstract data. Such software systems are already available in the market
to handle and analyze the GPR data. One of the popular
This paper introduces a 3-D Ground Penetrating Radar software to handle GPR data is “GPR Slice”.
Image Processing System (3DGPRIPS), which reconstructs a 3-D This paper discusses about the inhouse software developed as
image from a set of subsurface images in 2-D form scanned in a part of funded project (Mentioned in the acknowledgement).
sequence by ground penetration radar (GPR) device and apply Section II lists out various functionalities developed for
various image processing operations developed in the framework processing of GPR data in 3-D framework. Section III
of cellular logic array processing. The various 3-D image
discusses about comparison few techniques developed for
3DGPRIPS.
processing operations developed in the cellular logic array
processing framework are: point detection, edge detection, surface II. Proposed Work
detection, thinning, skeletonization and directional textures etc.
In the results section performance of Cellular Logic Array In this paper it is proposed to introduce 3-D Ground
Processing (CLAP) based edge detection algorithm is compared Penetrating Radar Image Processing System (3DGPRIPS).
against Morphological Based Edge detection algorithms. Fig.1 shows the 3DGPRIPS system.
Keywords-- Ground Penetrating Radar; 3-D Image Processing; 3-
D Edge Detection; 3-D Thinning; 3-D Skeletonization; 3-D
Directional Textures

I. Introduction

Ground Penetrating Radar(GPR) detects the objects under the

ground using the principle of radar imaging. GPR sends a
signal using transmitter to the subsurface of the ground and
collects the echo of the signal using receiver. The signal
received is reconstructed in the form of image. The sequences
of images are obtained using subsurface imaging noninvasively
Fig.1 3-D GPR Image Processing System
using GPR. These images are analyzed based on the various
features [18-28] detected using various machine learning The various functionalities developed in 3DGPRIPS system
techniques or image processing techniques. One of the are: reconstruction of 3-D volumetric image from a set of 2-D
important features to detect circular objects using GPR is slices of subsurface images, 3-D edge detection, 3-D erosion,
hyperbola. Various algorithms are devised to detect hyperbola 3-D dilation, 3-D opening, 3-D Closing, 3-D surface detection,
features [18, 22, 23, 27,28] from the GPR images. 3-D thinning, 3-D skeletonization, 3-D directional textures.
The GPR can be used to detect sewerage lines/ water pipe This section discuss about the said functionalities of
lines/underground electrical cables by the civil contractors, 3DGPRIPS. Section IV concludes the work done.
while laying any new line. This helps a lot in identifying a) Reconstruction of 3-D Volumetric Image
objects under the ground without digging it. A new line can be
A 3-D volumetric image is reconstructed from a set of
laid without disturbing the existing infrastructure. In the similar
sequence of GPRD 2-D slices generated through sub surface
lines landmines/ any other explosives buried under the ground
imaging. A detailed algorithm for reconstructing a 3-D volume
can be easily detected using the said technology. The
using ray casting algorithm is discussed in [1]. The Fig. 2
archeological objects buried deep in the ground can be detected
shows slice 1, slice 2, slice 80 and slice 81 of a 2-D images,
and bring in to lime light without destruction of the basic
where the GPR data set contains 81 two dimensional images.
structure. The similar technology can be enhanced to identify
the objects behind the wall, people struck underneath the
collapsed structures due to earth quakes or any other natural
calamites. Other uses are: Forensic & Law Enforcement,
Mining & Quarrying, Military, Agriculture & Forestry,
Concrete Scanning & Assessment, Mapping Roads & Bridges,
Utility Locating, Archaeological Survey, Identifying the
thickness of Ice & Snow, scanning the infrastructure inside the
buildings etc.
It is also necessary to build software systems to handle,
analyze, process the GPR data. Such systems help in
identifying the various features and correlating with the in-situ (a) (b)

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 c) 3-D Erosion
3-D erosion is performed in the frame work of mathematical
morphology. A detailed discussion on 3-D erosion definition
with example is discussed in [6-8]. Basically in the erosion
operation we look for a structure/pattern in the original 3-D
image based on the structure defined in the 3-D structuring
element, if the pattern exactly matches then retain the central
voxel otherwise remove all voxel information. Fig. 5 shows the
result of 3-D erosion operation on 3-D image shown in Fig. 3.

(c) (d)
Fig. 2 : First 2 and Last 2 Slices of data set containing 81
images (a) Slice 1 (b) Slice 2 (c) Slice 80 (d) Slice 81

Fig. 3 shows a reconstructed 3-D image from as set of

sequence of 81 two dimensional images generated through
GPR device.

Fig. 5: 3-D Erosion of 3-D Image shown in Fig. 3

d) 3-D Dilation
Similarly 3-D dilation is one of the fundamental operation in
mathematical morphology. In the 3-D dilation if at least one
voxel matched according to the pattern then we retain all voxel
information. Fig. 6 shows the result of 3-D dilation operation
on 3-D image shown in Fig. 3.
Fig. 3: A Reconstructed 3D Volumetric Image

b) 3-D Edge Detection

There are different ways 3-D edge detection can be performed;
1) Using basic Convolution operation 2) Using mathematical
morphological (MM) operations 3) Using cellular logic array
processing (CLAP). The various 3-D edge detection operations
are discussed in [2-5]. 3-D edge detection using MM and
CLAP is elaborated in [6]. Fig 4. Shows 3-D edge detection.

Fig. 6: 3-D Dilation of 3-D Image shown in Fig. 3

e) 3-D Closing and 3-D Opening
3-D closing of a 3-D image is applying a 3-D dilation using 3-
D structuring element followed by 3-D erosion. Similarly, 3-D
opening of a 3-D image is applying a 3-D erosion using 3-D
structuring element followed by 3-D dilation [7].
Fig. 7. Shows the 3-D Closing and 3-D Opening operation on a
3-D image shown in Fig. 3.
Fig 4: 3-D edge detection of GPR Data

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 h) 3-D Textures
Texture is a repeated pattern, which are directional in nature.
There are two types of textures; i) Linear Textures ii) Non
Linear Textures. This is paper discusses about extraction of
linear textures. The detailed algorithm for extraction of Linear
Directional Textures is discussed in [8]. The 3-D directional
texture algorithm detects the textures in north-west, north-
south, north-east, east-west, south-west and south-east. 3-D
directional texture algorithm detects textures in 36 different
directions. The detailed linear 3-D textures algorithm is
discussed in [8]. Fig. 10(a) to (aj) shows the list of 36 linear 3-
D directional textures.

(a) (b)
Fig. 7: (a) 3-D Closing (b) 3-D Opening
Of 3-D Image shown in Fig. 3
f) 3-D Thinning
Thinning is an iterated boundary removal process. The term
boundary refers to the closed surface of a voxel in a specific 3-
D neighborhood. The boundaries were removed repeatedly like (a): Rank Filter X1 (b): Rank Filter X2 (c) Rank Filter X3
that of an onion peeling operation till there is no boundary left
out to be removed. The remaining set of patterns, be it lines or
curves is the thinned version of processed image. The detailed
algorithm is discussed in [8]. Fig. 8 (a) is thinned version of
Fig. 3.

(d): Rank Filter X4 (e): Rank Filter XL1 (f) Rank Filter XL2

(a) (b)
Fig 8: (a) Thinned version (b)Skeletonized version
Of 3-D Image shown in Fig. 3
(g):Rank Filter XL3 (h): Rank Filter XL4 (i) Rank Filter XR1
g) 3-D Skeletonization
Skeletonization is the extended version of thinning.
Skeletonization is an iterated boundary removal process by
preserving the corner edges. The difference between thinning
and skeletonization is better explained in the Fig. 9. Fig. 9(a)
shows a rectangle prism of size 120x120x90. Fig. 9(b) shows
the thinned versions of Fig. 9(b). Fig. 9(c) shows the
skeletonized version of Fig. 9(c). Fig. 8 (b) is skeletonized
version of Fig. 3
(j):Rank Filter XR2 (k): Rank Filter XR3 (l): Rank Filter XR4

(a) (b) (c)

Fig 9: (a) Square Prism (b)Thinned version
(c) Skeletonized Version
(m):Rank Filter Y1 (n): Rank Filter Y2 (o): Rank Filter Y3

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 (p):Rank Filter Y4 (q): Rank Filter YL1 (r): Rank Filter YL2
(s):Rank Filter YL3 (t): Rank Filter YL4 (u): Rank Filter YR1
(v):Rank FilterYR2 (w):Rank Filter YR3 (x): Rank Filter YR4
(y):Rank Filter Z1 (z):Rank Filter Z2 (aa): Rank Filter Z3
(ab):Rank Filter Z4 (ac):Rank Filter ZL1 (ad): Rank Filter ZL2
(ae):Rank FilterZL3 (af):Rank Filter ZL4 (ag): Rank Filter ZR1
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(ah):Rank FilterZR2 (ai):Rank Filter ZR3 (aj): Rank Filter ZR4
Fig 10: 3-D Directional Textures
i) 3-D Surface Detection
3-D surface detection algorithm detects the boundary surface
using Cellular Logic Array Processing (CLAP). A detailed
algorithm is discussed in [8, 12]. The performance of CLAP
based surface detection algorithm[12] is compared against
Push- Relabel algorithm based Surface Detection (PRBSD)
proposed by Kang-Li et al.[9-10], Boykov and Kolmogorov
algorithm based Surface Detection (BKBSD) [11], Cheng-
Wang-Ma algorithm based Surface Detection (CWMBSD)
[13]. After performing the 3-D surface detection of the 3-D
object the result does not convey any meaning, because the
surface detection algorithm detects the boundary surface by
eliminating the inside objects. The effect of the result could be
seen by cutting outer boundary. By removing the outer one can
see the hallow inside the specific object. This can be visualized
in the synthetic objects created in the Fig. 11. Fig. 11(a) show
the 3-D synthetic objects before surface detection and Fig. 11
(b) visualizes the effect of surface detection after removing
front 2 planes and back 2 planes.
(a) (b)
Fig. 11: (a) Synthetic 3-D Solid Cube
(b) Cross section of Surface detected version
The other functionalities of the 3DGPRIPS are: (i) provision
for creation of synthetic data such as square prism &
rectangular prism [14] (ii) Loading a 3-D model (iii) animating
the display of 2-D display (iv) provision to load 2-D object in
3-D space (v) saving the processed 3-D image (vi) loading the
processed 3-D image (vii) Applying geometric filters [15-17]
on 3-D images with the help morphological operations such as
erosion, dilation, opening & closing (viii) provision for other
types of 3-D edge detection [6] such as morphological erosion
based edge detection (EBED), morphological dilation based
edge detection (DBED), morphological opening based edge
detection(OBED), morphological filtering based edge detection
(MFED). (ix) dyadic operations addition (adding two similar
size 3-D objects), subtraction, minimum and maximum (x)
monadic operations such as addition (addition a specific value
to 3-D image), subtraction, division and multiplication.
The next section compares the performance of CLAP based
detection (CLAP-BED) against other morphological based
edge detection algorithms such as: DBED, EBED, OBED and
MFED.
479
 III. Results Comparison Table 1: Comparison of 3-D edge detection algorithms for
GPR data set
In order to compare the performance of 3DGPRIPS system
which is developed in the framework of Cellular Logic Array Number of Number of Processing
Processing (CLAP), one functionality of the said system is Voxels Voxels Time
chosen i.e. 3-D edge detection. The performance of CLAP- Algorithm
Before After (In
BED edge detection is compared against various edge detection
techniques developed in the framework of Mathematical Processing Processing Seconds)
Morphology (MM). The detailed algorithms for CLAP-BED,
EBED, DBED, OBED and MFED is discussed in [6,8]. EBED 5277502 2028118 3

DBED 5277502 1817062 3

MFED 5277502 382883 29.71

OBED 5277502 464527 9.69

CLAP- 5277502 1133010 3.69

BED

Processing Time
35
(a): Original GPR Image (b) EBED Result 30
25

Seconds
20
15
10
5
0
CLAP-
EBED DBED MFED OBED
BED
Time 3 3 29.71 9.69 3.69
Fig. 13: A comparative study on various edge detection
algorithms for GPR data set

EBED and DBED algorithm takes less time to compute, but

can not handle noise well. OBED and MFED handles noise
(c): DBED Result (d) MFED Result
very well. But MFED removes some important features, which
may be important for geologist to make decision. CLAP-BED
take less time compute, handles noise very well and preserves
important features. So CLAPBED algorithm is better when
compared to the MM based 3-D edge detection algorithms.
This comparision is well depicted in the Table2 including the
time complexity in Big-Oh notation.

Table 2: Comparison of 3-D edge detection algorithms for

GPR data set

(e): OBED Result (f) CLAP-BED Result

Fig. 12: CLAP based and MM based 3-D Edge Detection
Results
The performance of various 3-D edge detection algorithms in
the framework of CLAP and Mathematical Morphology is
listed in the Table 1. The said algorithms in CLAP and MM
framework such as CLAP-BED, MFED, OBED, DBED, In the similar way the performance of CLAP based Surface
EBED are executed on laptop with Geforce GT 520 M detection detection(CLAPBSD) algorithm is compared against
(NVIDIA) GPU having Intel i5 processor CPU at a speed of Push- Re-label algorithm Based Surface Detection(PRBSD),
2.40GHz with 4GB RAM memory. The data set contains GPR Boykov-Kolmogrov based Surface Detection (BKBSD), and
image of size 256x256x81 (Width X Height X Depth), here Cheng-Wang-Ma based Surface Detection(CWMBSD) which
depth is no. 2-D slice i.e. 81. detailed in [8, 12]

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 IV. Conclusions
Three dimensional Ground Penetrating Radar Image
Processing System (3DGPRIPS) is developed to reconstruct a
GPR image in 3-D space and apply various 3-D image
processing operations to extract various features from GPR
data. The various algorithms developed for processing the GPR
data are: 3-D edge detection, 3-D surface detection, 3-D
thinning, 3-D skeletonization, 3-D point detection, 3-D
directional textures detection etc. All the said algorithms are
developed in CLAP paradigm. Various algorithms developed
in the CLAP paradigm is compared against MM paradigm.
Acknowledgement
The work carried out in this paper is sponsored by
Collaborative Research Scheme(CRS), TEQIP-III, JNTUH
with Procs No. JNTUH/TEQIP-III/CRS/2019/CSE/02. The
said project is a collaborative research project between VNR
Vignana Jyothi Institute of Engineering and Technology &
Gokaraju Rangaraju Institute of Engineering and Technology.
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