What Are Image Classification and Object Detection?

Image classification is an image processing method that separates different classes of targets according to the features reflected in the images. With quantitative analysis on images, it classifies an image or each pixel or area in an image into different categories to replace human visual interpretation. In general, image classification aims to identify a class, status, or scene in an image. It is applicable to scenarios where an image contains only one object. Figure 1 shows an example of identifying a car in an image.

Figure 1 Image classification

Object detection is one of the classical problems in computer vision. It intends to label objects with frames and identify the object classes in an image. Generally, if an image contains multiple objects, object detection can identify the location, quantity, and name of each object in the image. It is suitable for scenarios where an image contains multiple objects. Figure 2 shows an example of identifying a tree and a car in an image.

Figure 2 Object detection