Editing Hough transform (section)

== History ==

It was initially invented for machine analysis of [[bubble chamber]] photographs (Hough, 1959).

The Hough transform was patented as {{US patent|3069654}} in 1962 and assigned to the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission with the name "Method and Means for Recognizing Complex Patterns". This patent uses a slope-intercept parametrization for straight lines, which awkwardly leads to an unbounded transform space, since the slope can go to infinity.

The rho–theta parametrization universally used today was first described in
: {{cite journal |last1=Duda |first1=R.O. |last2=Hart |first2=P. E. |title=Use of the Hough Transformation to Detect Lines and Curves in Pictures |journal=Comm. ACM |volume=15 |pages=11–15 |date=January 1972 |doi=10.1145/361237.361242|s2cid=1105637 |doi-access=free }}
although it was already standard for the [[Radon transform]] since at least the 1930s.

O'Gorman and Clowes' variation is described in
: {{cite journal | last1 = O'Gorman | first1 = Frank | last2 = Clowes | first2 = MB | year = 1976 | title = Finding Picture Edges Through Collinearity of Feature Points | journal = IEEE Trans. Comput. | volume = 25 | issue = 4 | pages = 449–456 | doi = 10.1109/TC.1976.1674627 | s2cid = 10851078 }}

The story of how the modern form of the Hough transform was invented is given in
: {{cite journal |last=Hart |first=P. E. |url=https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f7e8/cbca97de34fd3695e538e164a1b40d27b04e.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180516103712/https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f7e8/cbca97de34fd3695e538e164a1b40d27b04e.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=2018-05-16 |title=How the Hough Transform was Invented |journal=IEEE Signal Processing Magazine |volume=26 |issue=6 |pages=18–22 |date=November 2009 |doi=10.1109/msp.2009.934181 |s2cid=16245096 }}