18CSE357T – BIOMETRICS
Unit –2 : Session –5 : SLO -2
SRM Institute of Science and Technology 1
Fingerprint features, matching and synthesis
What Is Fingerprint ?
➢ A fingerprint is the feature pattern of one finger.
➢ A fingerprint is collection of many ridges and furrows
(Valleys).
➢ The continuous dark pattern flow in fingerprint is called ridges and
the light area between ridges is called furrows.
➢ Fingerprint has some unique points on the ridge which is known
as minutiae point.
➢ A ridge ending is defined as the point where a ridge ends
abruptly.
➢ A ridge bifurcation is defined as the point where a ridge forks or
diverges into branch ridge.
Fig: Fingerprint[1]
Why Fingerprints?
The advantages of using fingerprint
• fingerprint identification is one of the most reliable identification
technique.
• Fingerprint identification is acceptable in a court of law.
• A fingerprint is an individual characteristic.
• Fingerprints will remain unchanged during an individual‘s lifetime.
What is Fingerprint Recognition?
• Fingerprint recognition is the process of comparing questioned and
known fingerprint against another fingerprint to determine if the
impressions are from the same finger or palm.
• The fingerprint recognition problem can be grouped into two sub-
domains:
– fingerprint verification
– fingerprint identification.
• Fingerprints are highly reliable for of identification because of their
uniqueness and consistency over time.
➢Fingerprint verification :
• Fingerprint verification is to verify the authenticity of one person by his
fingerprint.
➢Fingerprint identification:
• Fingerprint identification is to specify one person’s identity by his fingerprint(s).
[Link] vs. Identification
Fingerprint Patterns & Features
Minutia Features : - Minutiae are major features of a fingerprint, which
comparisons of using one print with another can be made.
•Ridge ending - the abrupt end of a ridge.
•Ridge bifurcation - a single ridge that divides into two ridges.
•Short ridge, or independent ridge - a ridge that commences, travels a
short distance and then ends.
• Island - a single small ridge inside a short ridge or ridge ending that is
not connected to all
other ridges.
•Ridge enclosure - a single ridge that bifurcates and reunites shortly
afterward to continue as a
single ridge.
•Spur - a bifurcation with a short ridge branching off a longer ridge.
•Crossover or bridge - a short ridge that runs between two parallel ridges.
•Delta - a Y-shaped ridge meeting.
•Core - a U-turn in the ridge pattern.
Fingerprint Patterns &
Features
Techniques For
Fingerprint Matching
• Minutiae-based matching
- minutiae capture much of individual info.
-minutiae based representations are storage efficient robust to
fingerprint degradation.
Flowchart for Minutia Extraction
Load Image
Enhancement
Binarization
Region of interest
Thinning
Minutiae Extraction
Matching
Flow of the presentation:
➢This particular method of fingerprint matching consists mainly of
seven stages.
1. Load Image
2. Enhancement
3. Binarization
4. Region of interest
5. Thinning
6. Minutiae Extraction
7. Matching
Enhancement
• The performance of minutiae extraction algorithms depends on quality
of images
• In general, due to skin conditions (e.g. dry, wet, bruise, etc.), sensor
noise, incorrect finger pressure, and inherent low quality fingers,
many fingerprints acquired are of low quality.
• Leads to problems in minutiae extraction
• Enhancement improves the clarity of ridge and valley structures in the
• fingerprint images.
• Histogram equalization method is used for image enhancement
Binarization
• We have perform binarization on the grayscale image which have
image intensity value between (0-255).
• Benefits of grayscale image.
• A Fingerprint-Image-Binarization transforms an 8-bit gray image to
a 1-bit binarized image where 0-value holds for ridges and 1-value
for furrows.
• An adaptive binarization method is achieved to binarize the fingerprint
image.
Region of interest
• A region of interest are samples within a data set identified for a
particular purpose.
• The concept of a ROI is commonly used in many application areas.
• For example, in medical imaging, the boundaries of a tumor may be
defined on an image or in a volume, for the purpose of measuring its
size.
Thinning
• Thinning is a operation that is used to remove selected foreground
pixels from binary images.
• Reduces the width of the ridges to one pixel.
• Filling holes, removing small breaks, eliminating bridges between
ridges etc.
Minutiae Extraction
• A ridge bifurcation is defined as the point where a ridge forks or diverges
into branch ridges.
• Collectively, these features are called minutiae.
• Most of the fingerprint extraction and matching techniques restrict the set of
features to two types of minutiae:
I. ridge endings
II. ridge bifurcations.
• Most fingerprint recognition systems are based on minutiae matching, but a
reliable minutiae matching algorithm requires accurate minutiae extraction.
• Therefore, minutiae extraction is an extremely important step in the whole
system, especially in low-quality images where noise may hide the real
minutiae.
Matching
• Minutiae matching is the step which comes after minutiae extraction
and it is here that we match the minutiae obtained from two sample
fingerprint images and test whether they are from the same fingerprint
or not.
• Minutiae matching are performed for verification. Basically, minutiae
Matching are a process which completed in two steps:
1)Find Total Minutia Points
2)Find Location of Minutiae Points.
Merits
• Physical attributes are much strong to be faked than ID cards.
• Fingerprints can’t be guessed unlike passwords.
• Fingerprints can’t be misplaced unlike a card.
• Fingerprints can’t be forgotten unlike passwords.
• Sudden enhancement in the current security level.
• Less security concerns leads to increased productivity.
Demerits
• Highefficiency needed as the fields of
application are related to security.
• It can be trick by a picture or a mold of finger using
Gelatin.
• Fingerprints if stolen,can be a great threat
to Security and intellectual property.
• Requires a very large data base of fingerprints.
• Some of the employees may find it
uncomfortable to have their fingerprint stored
with the employer.