Converting Textbook Figures to Editable Assets on a Budget: A Pipeline Guide
Afraid_Reviewer · reddit · 2026-08-02
In a document understanding project, a developer aims to convert illustrations from academic textbooks (like biology or engineering diagrams) into structured digital assets controllable via a frontend. The core challenge is: how to accurately remove original embedded labels while preserving the underlying illustration, all at a very low processing cost.
The author tried traditional computer vision methods like contour detection with limited success. They are now seeking community advice on several fronts:
- Whether this is fundamentally a document layout analysis, image segmentation, or image inpainting problem.
- If there are lightweight models trained specifically on scientific illustrations rather than natural images.
- How to build a low-cost, human-in-the-loop workflow that allows manual correction.
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