Abstract: After the computer became a tool for data sharing and information exchange, the unified computer font has made the text lose the diversity and discreteness of handwriting. Text is the crucial factor for the spread of culture and civilization. Many electronic books have lost the characteristic fonts with cultural background and historical significance in the original ancient books after the digitalization. One example is the sculpted typeface with diversity and discreteness that can be called a Tibetan culture. In order to solve this problem, a research method of digitizing engraving fonts in ancient Tibetan books is proposed. Firstly, the projection method and the connected domain method are used to segment the ancient book image. Secondly, the GIST feature algorithm is used to realize the image text recognition. Thirdly, the SIFT feature algorithm is used to implement the image font style classification, and diffe rent styles of carved fonts in the ancient books are obtained. A font diversity expression algorithm is proposed to realize the diversity and discreteness of carved fonts in ancient books. The purpose of the research is to achieve the inheritance and protection of engraving fonts, which has important cultural research and inheritance significance.

Key words: Tibetan ancient book, image segmentation, Tibetan recognition, font classification, font diversity expression algorithm