Book excerpt: This unique and useful textbook presents a comprehensive review of the essentials of image data mining, and the latest cutting-edge techniques used in the field. The coverage spans all aspects of image analysis and understanding, offering deep insights into areas of feature extraction, machine learning, and image retrieval. The theoretical coverage is supported by practical mathematical models and algorithms, utilizing data from real-world examples and experiments. Topics and features: Describes essential tools for image mining, covering Fourier transforms, Gabor filters, and contemporary wavelet transforms Develops many new exercises (most with MATLAB code and instructions) Includes review summaries at the end of each chapter Analyses state-of-the-art models, algorithms, and procedures for image mining Integrates new sections on pre-processing, discrete cosine transform, and statistical inference and testing Demonstrates how features like color, texture, and shape can be mined or extracted for image representation Applies powerful classification approaches: Bayesian classification, support vector machines, neural networks, and decision trees Implements imaging techniques for indexing, ranking, and presentation, as well as database visualization This easy-to-follow, award-winning book illuminates how concepts from fundamental and advanced mathematics can be applied to solve a broad range of image data mining problems encountered by students and researchers of computer science. Students of mathematics and other scientific disciplines will also benefit from the applications and solutions described in the text, together with the hands-on exercises that enable the reader to gain first-hand experience of computing.