Abstract: In order to reduce the computational complexity of image stitching method, we proposed a fast image stitching method based on scale invariant feature transform (SIFT) feature vector image. Firstly, the method combined the phase correlation algorithm to determine the overlapping regions of the images to be stitched, and the detection range of the SIFT feature points was defined. Then we considered the spatial location information of feature points,  constructed the SIFT feature vector images in order to limit the searching ranges in the feature matching, and got the matching points quickly. Experimental results show that the new method reduces a lot of unnecessary search, and improves the speed of image stitching.

Key words: image stitching, feature vector image, feature matching, scale invariant feature transform (SIFT)